Shour 1

Wagma Shour
Professor Jerri A. Harwell
ENGL 1010-053 (Final Reflection)
10 December 2015
My ENGL 1010 Final Reflection
Each of my assignment was different than the other but they were still somehow
connected to each other. In this class, our first major assignment was summary/response. I wrote
my summary/response essay on The Human Cost of an Illiterate Society. I first read the essay
a couple to times and I highlighted some of the sentences which I thought was important to
include in my summary and when I was sure enough that I understood what each sentence meant
in the essay, I then began writing. First I did an outline, where I wrote those highlighted major
details and minor details of the essay. Then, I put those details in order and wrote a summary. For
the response part, I wrote about how I felt and what I thought of the essay. Either I agreed with
that the author said or not. I chose the essay, The Human Cost of an Illiterate Society written
by Jonathan Kozol, because in my opinion what Kozol wrote about was true and the things that
he mentioned in his essay, still happen in our society. As I was reading his essay, I found it
interesting and it made sense to me. Since I agreed with what the author said, so I thought of
writing my summary/response on this topic.
The second major assignment we wrote was rhetorical analysis. I wrote my essay on
What is Poverty? which was written by Jo Goodwin Parker. While reading, I had to find a few
rhetorical techniques used in the essay. I used different colored pens to highlight each technique.
I remember reading Parkers essay more than four times and each time, I would find more
techniques and I would highlight that with a different colored pen. Next to the highlighted parts,

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I would make some notes so I would remember what to write about that technique. I then started
writing about each technique. I used some quotes too to support what I had to say. I chose this
topic because at first glance the title caught my attention and made me want to read the essay. As
I began reading, I got interested and then I decided to write my assignment about this topic.
The third major assignment we wrote in this class was annotated bibliography. For this
assignment I first chose to write about abortion. When I did my research on it, I couldnt find
what exactly I was looking for and I didnt feel interested about the topic anymore. I then
decided to research about something that I was at least familiar with, something that I have
always wanted to know more about, and then child marriage came to my mind. I did my research
and found some great articles. By reading each article, I gained more knowledge about my topic
and I got more interested. The answers to my question about my topic, child marriage, were all in
the articles. For this assignment, beginning was the hardest part. I really didnt know how to
begin writing an introduction. After thinking about it, I decided to introduce the topic in a way
that would interest the reader and something that I knew or how I felt about the topic. After the
introduction, I began writing each source. I probably spent more time competing my annotated
bibliography essay than any other assignment because it took me about two hours to complete
each source and there were five sources total. After writing about the first source, the second
became a little bit easier to write about and half way through, I knew exactly what to write in
each part of my sources.
The fourth major assignment we wrote about was synthesis/exploration. I believe it was
an essay assignment because most of the work was done in annotated bibliography. Basically all
I had to write about was to introduce my topic or issue to others and to say what I thought about
this issue. I highlighted a few main points in my annotated bibliography so later I could include

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those in my synthesis/exploration. Out of five sources in my annotated bibliography, one of
them, Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions, which was written by Elizabeth Cady
Stanton in Readings for Writers: Salt Lake Community College English 1010 Reader, didnt
really belong in my synthesis/exploration, so I did not mention that source.
In class we did peer editing for our assignments. The peer editing process helped in my
assignments. I not only got feedback on my assignments, but I saw where I had to fix some
things to make it look better. Sometimes we thing our paper looks pretty good, but when we let
others read it then we would know what others think about it and what could be done to make it
better. Editing other students papers also helped me. I got more ideas by reading other students
papers.
If I was given the chance, I would do more research for my annotated bibliography. I
have always wanted to know more about the issue, child marriage, and by doing more research, I
would have gotten more answers and major details to include in my essay to make it look much
better and interesting to read. Annotated bibliography helped me do well in my other class too.
One of my assignments in my other class was to do a research and write an essay on that. Since I
had already done a research paper, annotated bibliography, in this class, I had the idea of what to
look for while doing the research for my other class. I had also done a works cited page for each
of my assignment in this class, so I knew what to include in my works cited page or how to do a
works cited for my other classes too.
I used to the critical thinking process in my assignments especially rhetorical analysis and
annotated bibliography. The critical thinking process helped me think critically and deeply on my
assignments. By using this process, I understood what exactly to include in my essays. Revision,
editing, and peer feedback also helped me complete my essays. For example, on the first draft of

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my annotated bibliography, the sources were not listed alphabetically. When one of the students
in my class was reading my essay, she made a note on the top of my paper to let me know and
when I noticed that, I then alphabetized the sources. So, getting a feedback from someone else
does help revise the essay. I also learned how to cite multiple texts. Either by putting the authors
last name in parenthesis at the end of the sentence or by beginning a sentence by mentioning the
authors name and then writing about what the author has said. This class has helped me learn
many things and it has helped me know how to complete my other assignments and I am sure in
the future, if one of my assignments was similar in any way to any of the assignments I wrote in
this class, I would the know how to complete those as well.
One of the smartest things I did in this class was to come prepared every day. I would
always turn in my assignments the day they were due. When I turned in my assignment on time,
I got them back quickly so I could work on my next paper and make it look better. If I had some
mistakes on my any of my assignment, I would look at them and try not to repeat the same
mistake on my next essay. At the beginning of this class I was struggling with run-on sentences
and the more I wrote and did my assignments, the better I got. By the end of this class and my
last assignment, I dont think I noticed many run-on sentences. Doing these assignments did help
me because I did more practice and understood what could be done to prevent using run-on
sentences.