Introduction

Throughout my semester in English 120, we focused on many Student

Learning Outcomes. In the many assignments I was involved with in this
semester, all involved a separate SLO. I think that focusing on different
aspects of my writing, using the different unique SLOs, really improved my
writing capabilities. Many have helped me improve as a writer as I realized
by reflecting my assignments. Probably more that I havent noticed as well.
In this assignment I will cover the SLOs that were required and two that I felt
I improved most on.
Student Learning Outcome A - Rhetorical Situation and Genre
This SLO is addresses the rhetorical situation and the strategies a
writer uses in order to persuade, entertain, or inform. Numerous strategies
are composed in different mediums that its the situation best and
incorporates different form of technology, evidence, and genres. For
example, we read Friends with Benefits; Do Facebook Friends Provide the
Same Support as Those in Real Life and In Defense Of Torture. They both
were arguing on a stance that they thought they were correct with, but they
had very different genres and mediums. SLO A is using different ways of
communicating the same information.
Another way I made progress on SLO A, is through reviewing appeals
and patterns in the movie trailers in class. I wrote what thoughts I had about

the trailer and how it actually was trying to appeal to the audience. For many
movies, the trailer is what makes it or breaks it. They have to use emotions
and other forms such as logos and ethos. It reaches people differently. This is
what SLO A is all about! Using the mediums that fit best and incorporates
different forms of technology, evidence, and genres.
Yet another example for this SLO is the urban legend documentary we
just finished. We wrote a group LSA about our urban legend, then we then
took the information and turned it into a short documentary. Thus meaning
we composed it in different mediums that fits the situation best and different
forms of technology, evidence, and genres! I didnt realize this until I was
reflecting back on that assignment.
Student Learning Outcome F - Reflection
Throughout the semester we focused a lot of energy on SLO F, which
emphasizes learning from looking back on your own work. We looked at our
work from another perspective and learned probably better than anybody
else could have taught us. I will never look back and say reflecting on my
work was a waste of time. It isnt a waste of time is youre doing it correctly.
You will be wasting your time if you dont have your mind in the right place.
I actually used some of these same concepts in my math class. I was
having trouble solving a problem and my teacher told me to look at it
another way. So that reminded me of reflecting on my work, setting my mind

in the right place as soon as I thought about it. Through some reflecting and
thoughts or routes I usually wouldnt take, I finally came up with an idea that
could possibly bring me to the correct answer. So I worked out the problem
and found that it led me to the correct answer! So thinking in other ways to
come to a solution is so helpful in basically any situation. This skill is a must
have for success in my opinion. I guess thats why we had a lot of group
activities, in order to look at things in different ways. I feel that I made
probably the most progress with SLO F than I did out of the rest of the SLOs.
I remember thinking back last semester in English 110 thinking why we
were doing these horrible reflections. Now I look back and I see exactly
why. We do reflections to learn from ourselves and we learn the best from
ourselves oddly enough. Its just common to see people not in the right
mindset when doing a reflection. They dont see the argument from another
point of view. Life is all about what type of point of view you use.
Student Learning Outcome C Writing as a Process
Outcome C addresses writing as a process. It describes the writing
process from beginning to end, with approaches such as brainstorming,
outlining, composing a rough draft, proofreading, peer review, revising,
editing, and reflecting on the process as a whole. I believe I made a lot of
progress on this SLO. For example, when we had to make the notecard
outline for the trailer of our movie that helped the structure of the rest of my
writing so much easier and faster. Usually when I write I just go for it and I

dont do any outlines or plans ahead of time. I think seeing that firsthand
really thought me the power of structuring your work before actually getting
to work!
Another example of how I advanced in this SLO is through the peer
reviews we did. I didnt know what Google Docs was until this class, and Im
glad I found out. I thought it was so neat being able to see live feedback from
no matter where the people were. I believe I write so much better when I
receive feedback from my peers. Without feedback Im almost lost and
confused. On the other hand, I believe I am very good at giving other people
feedback which doesnt really make sense to me. Hopefully I will resume
using feedback with any work in the future, as I see it helps my work majorly.
This class was the first class I had to do cover letters. I didnt
understand why we had to do them because I saw them as so pointless. As
the semester went on, I finally started understanding what the meaning was
behind doing a cover letter for each of my works. It helped me reflect on my
writing and processes that led up to the whole, while asking questions to the
readers pertaining my writing. So not only could I learn from reflecting my
own work, I could learn from asking questions to the readers to see what
opinions they had as well. Also another part that I started enjoying later in
the semester, was sort of going over the assignment bit by bit, which just
grew my understanding by a greater degree than I would have ever thought.

I never would have thought that baby steps and repetitive looking over my
own work would help me grow so much to where I am today.
Student Learning Outcome I Research
SLO I is taking the prompt we are given and in doing research,
convincing your audience of the point you are trying to make. I thought I had
a lot of experience in this subject before this class, but I guess not. I didnt
realize the power of the university libraries and all the sources needed. I
guess all that time spent on the computer was wasted! One class activity we
did was going to the library as a class and learning how to find reliable
sources by doing a scavenger hunt. At first I thought it was going to be really
lame and a waste of time. After doing most of the things listed I realized that
I hadnt even been to this side of campus. Its pretty amazing how much of
the world you miss just because you arent willing to explore. So I pretty
much got a life message out of this one assignment in English 120. Explore
more of the places you dont go and youll be surprised about what youve
missed.
Another example of using research in our work was pretty much all of
sequence one. We used research to find out more about our conflict. We used
research to make our paper more persuasive. We used it quite a lot the more
that I think about it. I thought it was interesting about how each website
pretty much had their own information or bias towards the subject I was
looking into. It just showed me that most sites arent reliable and cant really

be trusted. Research is such a powerful but twisted tool if you get it from the
wrong hands.
Student Learning Outcome H Integration
SLO H is learning how to use other peoples ideas and work
appropriately in your own writing. I believe that I made progress towards this
SLO and Im excited to write about it. For example, in our work most of our
assignments we learning to properly and officially use peoples published
works in our papers. I didnt really understand the point of putting works
cited in our writing before this class. Well I understood that it wasnt out
work, so it would be stealing. It made me look at peoples work so much
more different when we talked about it. Its like looking into the past, future,
transforming ideas that we will pretty much always have records of. Its a
weird thought if you ask me. So having this self-realization, I made me
respect everybodys work and made me think of literacy different as a whole.
Another example, was using peer reviews to integrate others ideas
into our own work. So after I had this self-realization the next time we did a
peer review, I realized it was basically taking thoughts that we didnt have to
cite! So I thought that was kind of weird. As I said before, I believe I did a lot
better with my writing when I had others integrate their thoughts into my
work. I guess I have all the thought but structure, writing, and grammar is
exactly there yet.

Conclusion
In conclusion, I feel that my progress as a writer has changed so much
than compared to when I first started this class. Im not sure exactly how its
changed, but I can tell its changed. I have learned so many things from
reviewing peers, citing sources, changing genres, and most of all
understanding what and why each topic is being gone over and done. Im an
engineer, so most the time we dont get the time to actually understand the
material we just have to do it and be good at it. It think that this class will
help me understand other classes to a whole other degree. I have not only
become a better writer, but a better student, peer, son, and friend because
of this class.