This semester I have improved my writing skills in many ways. To keep my writing clear and coherent I need to stay connected and keep my focus on the main argument of my essay throughout my writing. I learned to keep it simple and not get too complicated, or “wordy” when explaining something. I struggled to be coherent in my writing when I used a quote, sometimes I would go off explaining the wrong message presented in the quote. Compared to explaining the message that pertains to my topic of the paper. In my writing, a grammar issue I also struggled with is the use of commas. I would find myself being “comma happy”, and placing commas all over the place rather than having them where I needed.
Another issue I tend to still come across when writing is changing tenses in my writing. I may start the paper out in present tense but will throughout switch to past tense. This is bad because it confuses the reader and doesn’t help my message get through to the audience. In order to fix these issues, when writing I will keep an eye out for this mistake and try to correct myself. Along with reading my essays out loud. This helps a lot with correcting mistakes especially when I change tense because it is more noticeable when I read it out loud. I learned that the website Purdue Owl is a trustworthy website, it is easy to navigate and helps me cite any source in the correct format. For example, in the research paper I am confident in my works cited page, it even made me more willing to use more sources than necessary because it wasn’t a hassle to cite them. It is important to gain proficiency in this area because I will be writing the rest of my life, whether in emails or for a future job. It is extremely important to have good grammar and proper skills, so I can stand out in a positive way in the future.
After writing a research paper for this class, I have gained and learned many skills. For example, this research paper has made me realize how important it is to have trustworthy sources to back up your information. Scholarly research is not only trustworthy, but the amount of information provides a different advanced level of research compared to many online articles or personal blogs. For my research paper I found many sources, one large source was a documentary which was very beneficial. I saw a tutor along with re-reading my paper out loud a few times. In order to find trustworthy sources and validate their position, I looked into the authors background. Many people had previous experience with SeaWorld, some were even former whale trainers and knew people who were harmed by Orca aggression.
The paper was a little difficult because I was not used to the length of it. I found it hard to make sure everything was coherent and flowed. I was nervous all the information I had was repetitive, but sometimes I just had to take a break from writing and come back to it. Social interactions in the tutoring process are huge. They make a large difference because it’s good to have a second or even third opinion. Other people point out issues you may have never noticed or even known about. For example, I never realized I constantly switched tenses until a peer told me. Ever since then I have been working on the issue and have been slowly improving.
