Jay Trivedi

Professor Mosher Freshman Composition

11/16/20

Self Assessment Essay

In a fairly unusual semester, I was tasked with many assignments as well as major assessments. With the topics we learned in class,  I was able to use the themes and strategies to better my writing and I have seen myself improve in several different aspects of writing and become a more complete writer in many different aspects. I have felt myself grow as a writer throughout the semester and also visually seen this growth through the improvement in writing from phase to phase. On top of this, I also saw myself improve with editing when improving from draft to draft.

I was able to explore and analyze a variety of genres and rhetorical situations from phase to phase. For example, phase 2 included pieces where the narrator talked about his/her experiences almost like an autobiography, while phase 3 included many articles that took a stance on something and backed it with facts. Exploring these different genres and rhetorical situations reflected on my ability to show what the text was not only implying, but also how multiple types of these texts were related or correlated with each other.

Through my time in this class, I have had multiple major assignments, one from each phase. In these assignments, I have had time to brainstorm, write, edit, and then finally make polishing touches and submit these papers. This can be shown when I write, “ There were bright lights, loud music, and a religious ceremony featuring a yogi who recited Hindu prayers. Outside, there were loud fireworks that lit up the night sky upon exploding with a bang and leaving behind the scent of smoke. I saw complete strangers singing, dancing, and embracing each other on the streets. I also could smell the various flavors of food they were eating: smoked tandoori chicken, buttered naan, and sugar from the various sweet desserts.” This was done after multiple drafts where I was able to incorporate the five senses to better describe the atmosphere and put the audience in my position. 

Specifically in phase 2, I was able to develop rhetorical strategies such as Pathos. In my essay, I state, “Saleem’s use of pathos to impact the Ted Talk will be abundantly clear. Saleem states, “Hi, my name is so and so, what is your name? And I am just quiet, unable to respond. After some awkward silence, he says, ‘have you forgotten your name?’ and I am still quiet, and then slowly, all the people in the room begin to turn towards me and ask almost in unison, have you forgotten your name?(repeating)’” Here, I am describing how Safwat Saleem, the narrator, is using Pathos to appeal to the audience’s emotion. He is speaking about how he was self-conscious about his voice and public speaking was one of his most dreadful and biggest fears. 

Not only did I spend time editing my own work, my classmates did a good job giving me feedback on my work to engage in the collaborative and social aspect of the writing process. In class, professor Mosher would split my peers and I into groups where we dissected each other’s thought processes and looked at each other’s work. Additionally, we filled out review sheets for each other and gave each other feedback on the strengths and weaknesses of our drafts throughout each phase.

In phase 1, I was able to demonstrate my creative and artistic mindset where I displayed a use of an artifact to better connect with my audience. Knowing that my audience was tailored towards immigrants or people who have parents that are immigrants, I expressed an artifact that came from my home country, India. 

I used an artifact that I received from India to provide as a visual artifact and digital technology to range out to a variety of audiences, including those who come from different countries and those who want to learn about different countries.

In phase three’s essay, I state, “Tingley illustrates all of this when she states, “Child psychologist Kenneth Barish wrote in Psychology Today that battles over homework rarely result in a child’s improvement in school. Children who don’t do their homework are not lazy, he said, but they may be frustrated, discouraged, or anxious. And for kids with learning disabilities, homework is like “running with a sprained ankle. It’s doable, but painful.” The essence of Tingley’s claim is that homework is just simply not worth it in the amount it is currently given. She uses multiple studies to show that homework hardly affects course grades, if having any type of positive impact at all. With these hours of homework come mental health problems including anxiety, stress, and feelings being overwhelmed. Tingley is correct in the sense that assigning too much homework can in fact, decrease productivity because of an overburden and lead to anxiety, stress, and other potentially worse mental health problems.” Here, I am showing my ability to compose texts that integrate your stance with appropriate sources using methods including summary, critical analysis, interpretation, synthesis, and argumentation. I start off with the quote that the author uses and follow this up with interpreting what his claim is implying. Next, I explain how I agree with his claim and show how I have come to the sense of something similar to his mindset in my experiences. 

Finally, I am able to incorporate sources in the library’s databases or archives and on the Internet and evaluate them for credibility, accuracy, timeliness, and bias while practicing systematic application of citation conventions. I do this by researching reliable articles that have established credibility and presented their argument through factual statements rather than a bias. This is all shown in my works cited page: 

Works Cited

Hough, Lory. “Are You Down With or Done With Homework?” Harvard Graduate School of Education, 2012, www.gse.harvard.edu/news/ed/12/01/are-you-down-or-done-homework. 

Tingley, Suzzane. “Should Students Have Homework?” Hey Teach!, 9 Aug. 2018, www.wgu.edu/heyteach/article/should-students-have-homework1808.html. 

B., Courtney. “Homework Should Be Banned.” Letters to the Next President, 24 Sept. 2016, letters2president.org/letters/739. 

“Homework Overload.” Performance by Mikel Garmendia, Tedx Talks, 2015.