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Cody Church Susan Ingram English 1103-036 3 December 2012 The Road So Far The theme for my portfolio essay is NASCAR. I kept trying to find some theme to set my work to because I knew I didnt want to do a chronological theme because that is just too boring. I needed something that can better explain the steps in the process that I took in completing these tasks, not the ones done by the class. I have three major sections of my portfolio which are named for different parts of a race. At the start of the semester I started my engine preparing myself and getting back into the swing of things since I hadnt been in a classroom in over six months. Towards the middle of the year I compared it to taking a curve in a race because thats when the drivers start figuring out what line works best for them and they get a feel for how the track is going to be for the entire race. Thats pretty much what I was doing, getting a feel for the course and trying to figure out what worked best. The drivers try and figure out how to beat the track itself and I was trying to figure out the best way to tackle your English class. The curve is also symbolic of me learning to overcome obstacles in my writing and finding new techniques to develop and further hone my writing skills. The last section is very expected because it is aptly named the finish line which stands for the culmination of all the work in the class taken and refined into polished drafts that are over and done with. The class is finally at a close and so is the race that we have been funning for five months now.

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The first section is composed of the second drafts of all my papers except for the WILTBY essay which has both the first and second drafts together. I did this because the assignment was the one that I connected with the most. It wasnt just some assignment because I got to tell people about me and who I was as well as learn about Kang and Dominique. The other reason that I loved this assignment so much is that I thought I knew everything there was to know about me and through my writing I saw that there was a lot more that I needed to learn, for example I learned that my high school never prepared me for college that well and that I had a huge problem with comma splices. I learned that even though I had taken AP English classes for the last two years of high school I still didnt really know anything about English. I also feel that these were my best drafts because once my other classes started up I really didnt have as much time as I really wanted to devote to the drafts for this English class which I why I was commonly not up to date on what we were doing in class all the time. These drafts were where I started my engine and got ready for the big race. This was the starting point for me where I didnt know anything. The curve is where the learning took place just as it is for the drivers thats how it was for me. The first thing I put in this part was the paper that you gave me telling how to fix my comma splices. I had come in to review the second draft of my WILTBY essay and you had written that every other word was a comma splice. Your exact words were Cody; Im going to stop marking comma splices now but know that is your editing challenge for this semester. You gave me that little coffee stained piece of paper that I have kept by my computer the entire semester which has helped me eliminate comma splices from my writing. They may not all be gone but there are very few if any anymore. This was a major learning experience for me because my school never cared that I wrote that way and I did it that way all throughout high

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school. The second thing in the folder was the essay Why Eating Well is Elitist. We read it in class one day and you explained that the author had put his thesis at the end of the paper instead of the beginning which I didnt think you could do that, but I instantly loved the idea. That had always bothered me that you always told the audience what you opinion was before they even read the paper, so if they already knew your opinion why read it. Putting it at the end was the best thing ever so now if they wanted to know what you thought they would have to read the whole thing and pay attention which is what I think every writer wants. That definitely influenced my writing as you will see later on. The third and final thing in this folder is something that I didnt do for this class but for my sociology class. The reason that I had for nothing spending enough time own the drafts for this class was commonly because of this class and I felt it was only polite to tell what I was doing that was taking up so much of my time. It is an eight page paper about sociological theories written in APA format. I had to learn APA format for that class which has helped in my writing ability because I have not only learned MLA this semester but another citing style that is commonly used in my major. I learned APA style from the library citation tools webpage which I learned about in your class so I really have gotten a lot out of your class and have applied it to other things outside of English, and if it wasnt for knowing about the citation tools it would have been much harder figuring APA style out. Its just another thing I learned about the track and have become a better writer because of it. This paper was my final which made a ninety seven so I feel I have learned APA style pretty well. It was just another thing I had to pick up while taking the turn and heading for the finish line. The other things I put in the folder were some work from the class that shows my attention in the class room and I also put the second draft of my portfolio essay to show how much has changed from that one to this one. This shows not only what I have learned but what I am

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continuing to learn as well and that is no matter what you writing can always be better than what it already is. The last folder called the finish line has all my final drafts in it and is supposed to represent my completion of the race and my ability to leave this class and be successful. Every one of my final essays is here and they all have demonstrated what I have learned over the semester. If a driver doesnt learn the track fast they will inevitably wreak and the ones that do figure it out it shows in their racing style. I learned some major and important things in my short time in this class like comma splices which when you saw the second copy of my research essay you said there were no comma splices in it so I feel pretty accomplished because I have always had a flaw in my paper somehow. I put my thesis at the end of the paper just like the elitist paper so my reader would get informed before hearing my opinion on the matter at hand. I also did the same in my sociology paper so I have not only incorporated things back into your class but have also brought them into my other classes as well and incorporated them into my writing. So now that I have done what I can in this class I can progress into upper level college writing and become successful and I am prepared for whatever they through at me. The link to my blogs is the very last thing on the long road through my journey in this class and they are just as I originally wrote them. I didnt revise them because I believe they show all the work I went through trying to find good enough topic to work with. I started off in the field of healthcare but that was too big so I went to technology and its effect of causing people to be antisocial. I went through a lot of pain to get where I am with my topic and I feel that if I revise all the blogs to reflect just one topic then it would take away all the other work that I done in this class and it would mean nothing. I think it shows the effort I put into trying to find a topic and make it work and I kept doing that until I found one that worked, it only took me

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three tries before I found my topic. I learned how to properly refine my search which helped me pick a topic which turned out to be osteoarthritis. I feel that I have become a whole different writer since I entered this classroom. I have not only learned just about English in this class, but have also learned about myself as well as the campus itself such as the library. If it wasnt for your class I would have probably never have entered the library this year except for maybe a couple of time. One of my friends who is in 1101 has not entered the library at all this semester and he doesnt know how to use it, but I do. I have learned new techniques for my writing and now know that there is always something I can improve on in it. I feel I deserve an A for this class because I have down everything that has been asked of me. I havent missed a day of class the whole semester. I have been right there trying to get everything out of this class that I can and I think it shows in my writing. I have learned less in my freshman seminar class and am still making an A so if I cant make an A in this class with all the things and techniques I have learned then I dont deserve an A in any of my classes. I have achieved my goal of editing out my comma splices this semester and I have been incorporating the lessons in this class towards other like sociology and I can definitely say that without this class I wouldnt have done as well as I did on the final paper. The main reason that I should make an A is because Im not just telling you what I have learned, but what I am still continuing to learn. New citation formats and multiple ways to organize a paper make the possibilities endless. There is always something to be learned and that is what I am continuing to do. So my main reasons for receiving an A included successful completion of fixing my comma splices and incorporation of this English class into other classes over the semester.