The process piece I chose to revise was my About Me page. Due to the relatively small length of the piece (two paragraphs), especially in comparison to longer papers like the Familiar Genre Analysis (four pages), doing a momentous amount of revisions is unpractical. However, the changes I did make significantly altered the piece. To start off, I made some corrections to various middle and lower order concerns, like grammar (added “am” before “from” in the first sentence) and transitions (first sentence of second paragraph links the two, creating flow that was previously absent).
After that, I focused on these, more important higher order concerns: audience, pathos and genre conventions. Previously, the reference to the audience for my blog was vague and practically missing. By adding the fact that “one of the primary uses of this blog is for my English 1020 class at Wayne State University,” I was able to hone in on my prospective audience: my professor and fellow classmates. Next, I added in more details about myself to help the reader feel better connected to me. By stating where I lived through my life and what country I identity myself as being from, as well as one of my biggest goals in life, I am allowing future readers to know me and my writing, not just the latter. Finally, I attempted to improve my use of genre conventions. About Me pages typically include a reason why the writer started a blog, so I included that. Also, I tried to be more interactive with my readers by asking them to provide feedback to my blogs, another characteristic of the genre. In terms of the Course Learning Outcomes (CLOs), I feel I have made significant progress in writing, reading, research and reflecting (some more than others) so for this semester. I am excited to see how much further I can improve in these categories, as they are essential not only for English and other classes in college, but also for me as a reader, writer and speaker of the English language. Since English 1020 is by far the most writing-intensive course I have ever taken so far, my writing naturally is one of the CLOs I have progressed in the most. Arguably the best example of this is the revision of my About Me page: being able to recognize the importance of higher, middle and lower order concerns and directly implementing that to my own work is the epitome of the steps to become a better writer. In addition to that process piece, my Reader Response Blogs exemplify the advancements of my writing. For example, I admit that at first, I was not sure exactly how to properly analyze a reading and then write a response about it. My first two blogs especially – the ones regarding assigned readers in the Wayne Writer – provided a summary of the literature rather than a breakdown of the author’s main point. Later on, however, I definitely improved in that aspect; the RRB on “Discourse Communities” focused only on the important ideas Swales (the author) wishes to relay to the reader: discourse communities have a distinctive set of characteristics and uses. By adding quotes from Swales in my blog (something I recently started to do), I was able to better my appeal to my audience’s logos, as a reference to the author’s original words sometimes is the best way to explain a concept.
Just like writing, I have progressed significantly as a reader as well throughout the semester. Through the constant in-class references to “the triangle,” I am able to better understand the relationship between the rhetor, purpose and audience when I am reading. As previously mentioned, the quality of my blog writing has improved. This means that my ability to analyze literature has also developed, since the two share a definite correlation. Through the class readings, Familiar Genre Analysis, Unfamiliar Genre Analysis, and Multi-Genre project, I have exposed myself to many different genres so far and have studied some (like Tweets and Relationship Advice Columns) that I never would have looked so far in-depth into before. Now when I read pieces of literature, not even just for this class, I pay close attention to the scene (context), situation (rhetorical interaction) and genre (tool to communicate) of the writing, as these play a crucial role in proper understanding of material. For example, when reading Swales’ work on “Discourse Communities,” I recognized that it was only a segment of a larger piece, and so being able to fully comprehend the already confusing material would be a challenge. Thus, by evaluating the context, I realized I needed to do my own research on what a discourse community really is prior to starting to read.
Though this class has not been too research-heavy, I still feel as though my ability to conduct valuable research has improved. This is because, in English 1020, we have not done much “traditional” research, including exploring databases, articles, journals etc. Instead, we have focused on researching on our own or other familiar works. In the Familiar Genre Analysis, I have researched my writing to study the genre of Tweets. By learning to identify the distinctive characteristics of a genre in class, I was able to deconstruct my tweets to find meaning behind what most would fail to even acknowledge: the effect of length requirement on rhetorical devices and significance of the ease of publishing. Basically, I have learned how to broaden my scope of “research-able” literature this semester.
Finally, the emphasis of reflection in this class has introduced me to a method for improving my work. In high school, very rarely did I even read an essay after submitting it, let alone study its effects on me as a writer. However, in this class, the “Reflect Project” assignments guided me into looking deeper into projects, specifically as to what they reflect about me as a writer. For instance, in Reflect Project Two, it occurred to me that my writing tends to be more on the formal side: even in my tweets – a genre where correctness is not of the highest importance – I strive for flawless grammar and spelling. In fact, being forced to shorten “tomorrow” to “tmrw” due to the 140 character limit in one of my tweets bothered me a lot more than it probably should have! All in all, my progress in refection has been an incredible, new tool to help find my identity as a writer and thus improve the quality of my work.
For the rest of the semester, I want to specifically focus further on improving on CLOs, especially research and reflect. Since we will obviously be doing a lot more reading and writing, I feel that those CLOs will advance naturally. That is why I want to focus on research and reflect. I want to be able to analyze and study other texts and genres for their unique scenes and situations, as it would indefinitely aid in understanding. Researching for projects and reflecting on them afterwards will continue to provide me insightful information to help me improve as a student. Those two CLOs are ones that I can implement to other classes such as Honors 1000, which is also literature-based. By doing so, I would be able to use what I learn in not only other classrooms, but also in my life in general.

Previous About Me:
“Hi my name’s is Amitoj Chahal. I am 17 (late birthday) and from Novi, Michigan. I am an avid soccer fan, so starting a conversation with me is pretty easy if it relates to the sport. I’m also really into movies, which is pretty much all I did this past summer. Some of my favorites include The Wolf of Wall Street, 21 Jump Street and Eastern Promises.
English has always been one of my favorite classes, so I am excited to be taking this class, especially after all the praise I’ve heard about Professor Varty. I am looking forward to my first semester as a freshman here at Wayne State and getting to know everyone here in Eng 1020.”

New About Me:
“Hi, my name is Amitoj Chahal. I am 17 (late birthday) and am from Novi, Michigan. I was born in India, but moved to Canada (Windsor actually, so right across the border) when I was a toddler (so I’m basically Canadian). One thing you should know about me is that I am an avid sports fan: soccer, hockey, basketball…anything! I have played soccer for as long as I can remember. In fact, one of my biggest dreams is watching my favorite team Real Madrid play at the Santiago Bearnabeau Stadium in Spain one day. Also, I love watching movies. Some of my favorite include The Wolf of Wall Street, 21 Jump Street and Eastern Promises.