Project #4

Dear Professor Rodrigo and my classmates,

This was one difficult semester.  While I felt as though I was performing exceptionally well at the beginning of the semester, various personal and school related issues began to accumulate and this class took a massive blow around halfway through.  Whether or not I obtain a passing grade is unknown at this point, but this class was extremely helpful either way.

I’ve never seen myself as an exceptional writer.  Traditionally, whenever massive writing assignments have to be done, I’ve always done them reluctantly.  This class has helped wonderfully.  The simple task of allowing me to write about my own personal field (such as Project #1) improves moral considerably.  To be honest, I’ve never cared so much for reading or writing.  It’s not that I have any disdain for reading.  I do actually read a lot, but most of my escapism has been in film and not so much with literature.  

One thing this class has helped with is organizing what needs to be done to prepare for a project.  I appreciate spending a week obtaining sources, another writing drafts, before finally submitting a project.  This helps me a lot.  I would always have a nasty habit of writing exactly one version of a paper and submitting it with very few if any revisions.  This class forced outlines and drafts which forced me to put more effort in planning.  I feel this helped a lot, especially with Project #2 (which had a lot of pre-planning involved).  Peer review and revision allowed me to see what other students were doing and use those ideas in my own projects.  Then I could see other student’s notes on my thoughts, and revise.  It was very helpful.

I also enjoyed being able to use different formats for projects.  Not every paper was submitted in a typical MLA format.  I actually did my Project 3 as a video, which was more akin to my background.  Though that project had enormous technical difficulties and held me up for weeks.  I somewhat regret choosing video.

I’m not an expert yet on anything.  I really enjoyed this class and what I learned.  Not just about writing, but even about my own field.  There’s still a few grammar issues I have and formatting usually gets me, but I enjoyed it a lot.

-          - Jon Thomas