Scheu 1

Mackenzie Scheu
Dr. Guenzel
ENC1102
April 18, 2017

Self-Assessment: ENC1102

Walking into ENC1102 on the first day of the semester, I did not know

what to expect. I had credits to cover ENC1101, so I had not taken an English

class in a little over six months, which made me very nervous. I have learned

so much about the writing and research process in the past few months and I

know I will be able to use what I have learned during this semester

throughout the rest of my schooling, as well as in my future career. The

assignments that I completed throughout this course have helped me

understand the relevance of rhetoric, the relevance of my areas of interest

for a career, formatting, the importance of peer review, and strategies for

revising work.

Every Monday and Wednesday, and occasionally a Friday, there was

always some sort of assignment due at ten in the morning. In the beginning

of the course these assignments were usually what Dr. Guenzel called

Reading Responses. We read passages helping us understand rhetoric and

how to apply different aspects of it, and then responded to the text. Before

these responses, I was unsure of how to integrate quotes using format, I was

unaware of what terms like exigence and Kairos meant, I did not know that

arguments are conversations. Argument as Conversation really stuck with

 Scheu 2

me throughout the semester; it made me realize that no one really creates

an issue out of thin air. The issue is existent and has been existent, you are

just now forming an opinion on the issue and ready to defend it in the

ongoing conversation. I remember the example being that someone is in a

parlor, overhearing a discussion on a topic. To join in on that discussion that

person must form an opinion and be able to defend it when he or she is

refuted. The defenses cause conversation. Thinking of this example put this

reading in a real-life situation for me; it was relatable.

The relevance of my topic can also be referred to as its exigence. This

is something else I learned in this course, and was again introduced in a

reading response assignment. When I was first asked to respond to this term,

I interpreted it as the reason the information was being presented. When we

spoke about exigence in class the next day, a peer made me realize that it is

not only the reason the information is being presented, but it is also the

timing. In my research paper, the final product of all we have learned, I refer

to todays society a few times, referring to the exigence. The issue of

inclusion is important today. I also state that, My research will benefit

children with disabilities and help those who disapprove of inclusion

understand why it is so vital to their education. It is important that people

know the benefits of inclusion so that these children have a voice and people

to advocate for them when it comes to their education. This extends the

exigence into the future, saying what my research and what the research of

many others in this field will accomplish one day.

 Scheu 3

Formatting was something that I have always been unsure of; the

writing process (peer review, professor feedback, revising, drafting, etc.)

confirmed that feeling. My teachers in high school only worried about their

students passing the advanced placement exam that corresponded with the

class they taught. I got to college and realized I had never written a real

paper, I had never learned how do MLA format on my own; on my own,

meaning without the assistance of websites that cite sources for you. The

mistakes I was making on my assignments in this class were unbeknownst to

me, until I received grades back on a few final drafts. I was unaware that

MLA format required a specific header. I did not know that the citations had

to be in alphabetical order; in one of my drafts for my dossier, for example, I

had Dr. Goodman as my last source and Jennifer Ledford as my first source.

In all honesty, I did not even know that there were specific margins. The first

few assignments and drafts I turned in I had hoped that the margins were the

same as the automatic setting that is in my word processing software. I also

was unaware that images were allowed to be included in academic papers.

Because of the discovery that there can be images in our research papers, I

did my best to include at least a few images, along with captions to explain

them. One of the pictures I included was one of my cousins that I talk about

in my introduction. I include a caption to clarify this, and integrated the

image in the text, making their story surround the actual image.

The first time the class did peer review I saw it as an easy one hundred

points. I did not appreciate the importance of it until I got a C on one of my

 Scheu 4

final drafts. I began to take it more seriously and take more of the corrections

and suggestions under consideration while editing my essays and

assignments. I also found myself finding a parallel to what we were doing in

class: my career. Wanting to be a teacher, I realized that I will be editing and

helping my students revise their own work. The format in which we

completed peer review (Canvas, view feedback button) was very user

friendly and easy to access. It allowed for us to highlight sentences and

phrases we liked, make a comment on a whole area, make a comment on a

specific word or punctuation choice, and add an overall comment regarding

the paper. I could see myself using this forum in my own classroom, when I

become a teacher, as technology seems to be becoming more prevalent in

schools.

Another very helpful assignment, especially when doing peer review,

was the reading response that required reading about revision strategies. I

did not realize that professionals analyzed the way we revise papers and that

there were so many strategies to choose from. I stated that I mainly used

reviewing and rewriting, especially if I got frustrated and decided to start

over again. After the reading, I began to use the strategy of completely

slashing words, phrases, and complete sentences out. I also began to pay

more attention to what really needed to be included; I was trying to get rid of

filler information. This was challenging for me at first, because I have never

had a minimum word count requirement as high as two thousand words,

which is what our minimum requirement is. The word count became a
 Scheu 5

personal goal, driving my revision process, rather than focusing on the

information that would persuade my audience that inclusion is beneficial for

children with autism and autism spectrum disorder. This is something that I

learned to stop doing, focusing on the content first, and the word count after

my information was stated. After revising and completing the final draft of

my research paper, the final word count was two thousand and thirty-six

words. This was an accomplishment for me, because I felt that by employing

the revision strategies I have learned about, I eliminated unnecessary

information and included information and sources that would get my point

across to the audience.

To conclude, I can honestly say that this class (and Dr. Guenzel) has

taught me the most useful information, in terms of being able to apply it to

the real world. Overall I had a very positive experience in this class and

would recommend it to anyone that asked. I will not need to understand

concepts like tangent and cotangent in life, but I will need to understand how

to defend my stance on issues and enter the conversation.