English 102, Wow.

Christina Todd

garyandchristina@msn.com

ENG 102 034w

Semester Reflection

May 1, 2011

English 102, Wow.

Wow the end of my first semester in college is here.  Wow.  Taking into consideration the fourteen year lapse from my 1997 high school graduation to now I think I did pretty well, despite the grueling amount of work, desperate count downs to deadlines, and a complete mental breakdown on the discussion board one frightful afternoon my ship is now coasting safely to the harbor. 

                I have learned a lot about myself in these past weeks. One major thing being that I am a very self-centered person, something I wouldn’t have believed at all before my journey of discovery.  It all started the first day I opened up the dreadful MDG’s.  My first thoughts as I read through our list of research topic choices was, you have got to be kidding this lady wants us to solve the world’s problems in this class and I said it out loud to my 15 month old son who was watching Toy Story next to me in bed..  I thought to myself these are fresh out of high school college kid’s topics.  I don’t care if people starving around the world, I am trying to keep my own family nourished with rising gas prices and food prices and no salary raise in four years working against me.  Now as I look back I wonder how self centered could I have been, now that I have read too many stories of hunger here in Boise, here in the United States and around the world.  Women trying to scrape together a dollar a day to buy rats to feed their children, families displaced by natural disasters beyond their control, children dying by the minute and here I am saying I don’t care cause I need to figure out how I am going to pay for my cable and still have money for full course meals at home.  Beyond the personal enlightenment I have found that I learned how important it is to sound intelligent, even if it is a quick email to a co-worker.  I have learned how to breakdown writings and analyze them for my purpose, a piece of writing might not tie in totally with what I am researching, but one little nugget of information could open a flood gate of ideas you just need to know how to look for it.  The most important skill I learned was how to research.  I have been putting my new research skills to work in both my professional and private life as I search for new graphic printers and daycares.  I leave this class with the knowledge that a little hard work will lead to wonderful mind opening discussions and knowledge. 

I felt myself grow in this experience.  I started off unsure of how to write intelligently yet keep it interesting, I think now I have found a good balance.  My first reading response was an over thought out and over work sited bore about BPO’s in India.  My final reading response about Michael’s Berube’s essay  Analyze, Don’t Summarize I analyzed less and wrote freely which lead to a much more enjoyable piece to read.  This class has also strengthened my researching skills, well to be more accurate it developed skills I never knew where important.  Research makes you knowledge able about any subject you wish wither it be crabs, pigeons, or politics.  It gives you the tools to discuss why something means so much to you.  You have a better chance of getting someone to listen to your ideas or needs or thoughts if it is backed by strong research. 

                I also learned from this class that I need to work on many things.  Spelling and proofing, rambling on and on, and the biggest procrastinating.  I am a terrible speller, I always have been and always will be, and not running spell check before I send out any sort of document be it report, email, or news letter is an unacceptable lazy practice.  I am trying desperately to spell check and proof read before I hit send on any piece of writing that has my name attached.  Sometimes though my hand moves faster than my brain and I hit send before doing this ever important step.  I also tend to ramble in my writings, I try to tone it down, but continually have to read and read stuff to make sure it makes sense, I would like to be able to control my thoughts better in a more intellectual and flowing way.  Something I am despartley needing to continue working on is deadlines and procastonating.  To be honest this essay is do today and I am just now finishing it up, not very good for ones mental state.   Self disapline is the only way to achieve this goal. I start off a week with good intentions of doing at least an hour to two of English work a day, but the day would get away from me and I would continulay put off finishing project until it’s due date stared me in the face.  Towards the end of this class all the procrastinating caught up with me and I missed three deadlines, not something to be tolerated and I was disappointed in myself. 

                I have been using my new found research skills in so many areas of my life it would be easier for me to tell you where I am not using it.  I enjoy watching news and especially love politics and before this class my alliance was to MSNBC and no one else, but that changed with this class.  I started incorporating Fox News into my nightly news watching because I wanted to know what they were thinking as well and many times I found myself at the computer to research who was closer to the truth of the subject they had chose to cover that night.  In my personal life I have my research skills to find a good daycare for my son.  First I chose all that were within ten miles of our home, then researched each, from there I narrowed the choices down, I went for a drive by of each, the group got smaller, then I interviewed and toured each and finally chose a winner.  Jack starts at Peirce Park Academy for two days a week starting Thursday.  In my professional life I found research most useful in getting the graphic printer I wanted most.  Every four years my company budgets for me to get a brand new graphics printer.  This year, unlike pervious, I had to fight with the money crunches to get the one I wanted.  They wanted a less expensive one that also was way below the quality of the one I was desperate to get.  In the end I won thanks to my English 102 research skills.  I worked and laid out a presentation backed by facts and pictures to get my machine in here. 

                For the most part this was a very rewarding experience, crazy at times and pushed to the brink on others I found out a lot about myself what I am good at, what I need to work on, and how to take a step out of my world and peer into others.  I guess this is what high learning is all about, finding yourself, finding your weaknesses and strengths and taking all this knowledge with you out into the big bad world.