Gianna Bell

September 29, 2015

UWRT 1103
Mid-term

Throughout the first half of this course, we have barely touched on the key concepts in
class. Instead, as a student, we had to independently analyze them and adapt to them. How could
we use these concepts in this course? What about in others? Some are comparatively easier than
others to understand and vice versa.
So far in this class, we have done a series of peer editing activities. We have also had
drafts that were due. With those drafts, my peers in my group provided me with feedback and
suggestions on how I could that paper. Professor Ingram has also provided the same as well.
These activities have helped me develop skills for the composing process. The composing
process is one of the key concepts I greatly engage with. Also known as the, writing process, the
composing process consists of three to five stages; with drafting, revising, and editing being
the main three; and prewriting and publishing being supplements to the process. With the use of
peer editing, I am able to utilize the composing process to enhance my papers. On September
10th, we were assigned a warm-up to express how we felt about draft 1. I like the fact that its
almost finished I would like my peers to help me not be so wordy when I write. While
typing this, I actually thought all my paper needed was a conclusion. I was confident in my
paper. However, after receiving feedback from my peer group and Professor Ingram, I saw there
was still plenty of work to do. Right now, I am in the revising and editing stage of the process.
Multi-modality is a crucial characteristic in this course. We briefly touched base on the 5
modes; linguistic, visual, aural, gestural, and spatial. The use of these five modes can help my
writings convey the message to my audience. By making an e-portfolio, as a writer I was able to
utilize a few of these modes to get my message out. On my blog posts, I have incorporated
animated gifs and pictures that relate to them. With these, I am using the visual and gestural
modes. In class, we did a Seeing the Moment activity to enhance our Passion related papers.
For this activity, I had to think back to a moment I wrote about in my paper. From there I
described things I saw, heard, smelt, or even tasted. How do I feel? I am bored (mentally),
What do I feel? The cold chill of the AC, and What do I smell? Febreeze plug-in; my dog
smells like outside, are a few of the things I could recall. By incorporating these and others into

Gianna Bell
September 29, 2015
UWRT 1103
Mid-term

my next draft, I could improve how I convey my message linguistically and add some imagery to
my bland paper.
A key concept I tend to have trouble with achieving is making connections. Ive always
had trouble doing so. I can make connections, but it is hard to convey that connection with my
audience. Sometimes those connections are quite vague. During the peer edit of draft two for the
passion assignment, I received feedback from Professor Ingram, as well as one of my peers. But
you could always expand and include how your phone is your passion, was a suggestion one of
my peers wrote me. After going back and reading draft one, I realized he was right. Throughout
the whole paper I was telling why my phone was my passion, not how. I failed to describe the
passionate connection I have with my phone. I want to work towards being able to make
meaningful connections and convey them to my peers.
It is hard for to get out of my comfort zone. In this class, I feel like the comfort zone is
different for others. However, for me, my comfort zone is writing for a grade and not for myself.
In high school, papers were expected to meet a certain criteria; this many sources, and this many
pages. In this course, Ive began to see that the writings we do are for our own benefit. Many of
them have no word limit or page requirement. It only wants us to express our thoughts in the way
WE want, but my papers tend to be in a 5 paragraph, with conclusion form. It sounds like a
narrative , was a statement from someone in my peer edit group. The assignment called for
an exploratory essay, yet instead my paper seemed like a narrative. For the second half of the
semester, I hope to break free of my high school writing trend and explore different types of
writings I could utilize.
My knowledge of conventions is pretty well. My grammar, punctuation, and spelling is
good also. Ive never really had any problems with that. However, I do have problems with genre
conventions when it comes to writing my papers. This goes along with my comfort zone. For
example, Im not sure what makes an exploratory essay an exploratory essay. Or what makes a
narrative a narrative. What are the components? Throughout the second half of the semester, I
hope I will be able to pick out the differences in the genre conventions. I seem to be stuck in
narrative mode.