Taylor Rogers Writing is like sculpting; you start with a large brick and slowly chip away the

access to shape the story thats in your head. In writing, you also may start writing about something and then it turns into something completely different than you expected. Looking back over my essays and my notebook through the semester, my writing has changed for the better. Each essay has led me to be more knowledge about writing and formatting in general and it has been refreshing to look back at how it has changed during this class. I have developed more as a writer by becoming more aware of how I write and gaining more knowledge about what I write compared to the past. Without a doubt, the narrative essay was the easiest for me to write about; but it also had the most mistakes that I had to fix. Starting this class, I had the tendency to be wordy and over dramatic with how I said things, which made my writing sound corny. For example, in my revisions work I wrote, That weekend was the biggest competition of the year and not only did we win for the third year in a row, but I was also named an All-County cheerleader that the coach had nominated me for! I was ecstatic and I knew that I had pushed through a broken nose and achieved my goals! Looking back, I wish I wouldve taken the last sentence out because it comes across corny to me. The first sentence was also wrody that I couldve made more concise. I also realized throughout the semester, that when I dont use as many words and focus on what Im writing I sound so much smarter. Although there was a lot of wordiness to fix, it was very easy for me to write. I wrote the whole Shitty First Draft when we had a substitute. Writing the Shitty First Draft helped me to get all my ideas on the paper. With other essays you sit and sweat until you figure out what to write, but with this essay, I just continued to type until I was

completely finished and then went back and revised it later. It helped to write it effortlessly and then come back it and see how my thoughts flowed naturally. The persuasive essay was probably the most difficult for me to write out of the three essays. It was difficult because even though I know that I want to go into radiology, I have no idea what its like yet. It felt as if I was driving blind. I had sources, but I had no book source because they were all textbooks and just about the anatomy instead of information about the career. I got the best feedback for my revising from the work we did in our peer groups. It was interesting to read each others papers and see how different students worded things. They critiqued me suggesting I add more to some paragraphs and be more concise in others. It helped me a lot when I was revising because I had their notes and critiques to look back on; which helped build my paper. Even though I had some trouble, I feel like I still did a good job getting my point across. In my introduction, I began with, Radiology provides a study of the bones with many different branches, a compassionate atmosphere and can be affordable for budgeted college students. I feel like I developed a good thesis with good supporting topics, which developed into a good overall paper. Although this essay was the hardest to write, I think it is the best paper I wrote this semester. Like the persuasive essay, the analytical essay was difficult for me to write as well. It made me doubt Radiology as my career choice by looking at the negatives in the field. It was a lot harder for me to write because I couldnt fluff my way through it. It was based strictly on facts which I never considered myself good at. This was my thesis statement in my analytical essay:

Although it is an excellent career that can provide outstanding careers and opportunities in the medical field, it does have its own disadvantages. Radiology can have some disadvantages in MRIs, the job field can be limited, and it can cause radiation exposure in employees which could potentially cause long term damage. It was a little wordy, but I think it is a strong statement to start an analytical essay. I wrote strictly about technology, rates and the dangers of exposure. I followed the formatting of clean and logical structures and it transformed my paper from just okay to sounding like I knew exactly what I was talking about. I didnt struggle with wordiness as much because of the strict rules in APA formatting. It was a struggle to get started but it got easier through writing, class discussions and peer editing. A strength I will take away from this class will be the formatting techniques. Before this class, I would just start writing which made my papers get jumbled and off focus at times. I also formatted all my papers the same way, and I had no idea that different types of writing required different types of formatting. I loved learning how to format the different writing styles. From outlining to revising the formats on my papers, it helped me to gain knowledge about writing papers for Radiology in the future. Outlining helps me get my thoughts in order before I start writing and organize my thoughts in a constructive way. For this essay I did a small outline which is shown below. I. Introduction a. Narrative i. Strengths ii. Weaknesses

iii. SFD b. Persuasive i. Sources ii. Peer Revising iii. Introduce Thesis c. Analytical i. No fluff, individual struggle ii. Introduce Thesis iii. Talk about format d. Formatting i. Outline ii. Formatting essays iii. What it has taught me with Radiology II. Conclusion

Although it is a small, it helped me organize my thoughts in my head. I was really confused on how to construct my reflective essay effectively. But formatting the essay and outline has allowed me to construct my thoughts in my head where I can get them on paper and make them sound concise and smart. It also made revising a lot simpler because everything was organized and my thought didnt come out as jumbled together. It was one of my favorite things to learn in the class. I used to be the type of writer who would only feel good writing on topics I could emotionally connect with, but now Im the type of writer who can write on topics I dont necessarily connect with but I can still conduct a decent paper. I have grown through the

semester by learning how to write different types of writing as well as organizing and formatting my essays. It has been a delightful semester that taught me a lot about my writing and made me a well-rounded writer. Thank you for a wonderful semester!