Ibrahim Fadhel

Professor Suzzanne Ingram

July 26, 14
Final Portfolio Essay
The first paragraph in my home page might tell you something about me and my
goals in life, however; this intro will get you to know more about me as a writer. When I
first came here to the United States of America, I was a whole different person. In fact,
everything was different, from school education systems to food to cultural activities to
the way of living, everything. I learned many things that will stay with me for a long time
such as: how to express my thoughts and convert them into letters. When I think of
writing, it was a huge transition for me. Starting high school here in Charlotte with very
little English knowledge was a pretty tough challenge for me. One thing I am really proud
of is that I faced this challenge and I overcame it to become the writer I am today; even
though it was not very easy. I built my basic writing foundations at East Mecklenburg
High School, which are helping me write these assignments.
Even though I havent mastered my punctuation skills yet, I think I have
definitely improved in those criteria. I used to make many mistakes and struggle with
coma splices, run on sentences, etc but due to hard work, never giving up, and with the
help of the English tutors, I now think I am much better than how I used to be. One thing
I was very happy to see on my Portrait of a Writer essays feedback this morning is Mrs.
Ingrams note that says I notice your sentence structure +
punctuation are clearer! Nice work! This note is a motivation for me to
work even harder to work on other criteria. One very important point I think I improved
the most at is my ability to express my thoughts and put them into words. I have always
struggled with that; it sometimes pisses me off when I cant put down something that is
on my chest. I think the only way to get better at writing what is on your mind in a good
organized way is to brainstorm; which is something I am very good at. In fact, I now
know how to brainstorm my ideas much better than I used to be able to because of
Seeing the Moment method that we learned in class. Also, I now know how to
brainstorm and write in very specific details that actually explain the scene and make the
reader picture that moment. Here is an example of a specific, detailed piece of writing
that I wrote the other day for my magazine class: Everybody was dressed up formally;
with my tight purple dress shirt, skinny pants, pink tie, and my tight shoes that I couldnt
wait till I take off.
When you first login to Moodle and then get on the UWRT 1101 page, the first
word in the resources list is going to be a hyperlinked word that downloads the classs
syllabus as soon as you click on it. When the syllabus downloads, in the very first page,
there is a box that includes nine very important words known as key concepts. These key
concepts are very important because in my opinion these nine key words are the path for
a good, successful course experience. Personally, these nine keys helped me so much, not
only in my English writing course, but also in my other courses. I will probably be using
them throughout my next four years. Even though all of them are very important, I will
mention the ones that I thought had the biggest impact on me as a writer.
On my UWRT mid-term I included this sentence I thought that curiosity was the
most important one, because when you are curious about something, you ask many
questions, and when you ask many questions you learn quicker. Mrs. Ingram, my
English professor, stated that she liked that sentence, but she also inquired, I wonder,
can you make yourself be curious about something if you arent naturally curious about
it? I think this is a tricky question. Here is how I think about it: If you want to learn then
you have to be curious; without curiosity you will not learn. If you really want to be an
engineer or a doctor or whatever, you have to be curious about how this car gets going or
how a humans body is functioning. Learning is not all about memorization, maybe some
of it, but it is mostly about curiosity and interest Another key concept is getting out of
your comfort zone; in high school, I personally was a very quiet person. I did not want to
engage with the people in my class because of the classrooms environment. All I wanted
to do is to get out of the class with the highest grade possible and go home. However,
here in college, you can do whatever you want without having to worry about anything.
In one of my Reader Response Letters I included: In college, the fact that being able to
not worry about assigned seats, bathroom passes, etc. is just a great thing to happen in a
high schoolers life.
All of these minor issues prevent high school students from thinking about the
important stuff that is going to help them in their academic performance such as
independent inquiry. This goes back to the curiosity point also. Inquiry is when you ask
about something and try to examine it. When you inquire yourself or also known as
Independent inquiry this means you are curious. In my first blog post I mentioned:
Clarifying your map makes the way toward your destination easier which is success.
When you want to succeed in something you have to clarify your way on how you are
going to do it. Most of the time, nothing is going to be clear. You are going to have to
think and ask or inquire yourself; and thats exactly what I had to do in this course.
I inquired myself on how to be a better writer, and I made myself curious about
this topic. This is how I developed my writing ability and my writing process and
revision. In UWRT 1101I used the Seeing the Moment method many times. It is kind
of a brainstorming process that is very helpful in every detailed piece of writing. Every
writer has his/her own rituals that they develop over time; it just depends on the person.
As I prepared for this E-portfolio, I kept these key concepts in mind. The drafts I included
in my portfolio were also impacted by these key concepts.
I thought my E-portfolio was pretty nice. In my opinion the black and red colors
match together and make a pretty awesome theme. However, I think the content is even
nicer. My E-portfolio consists of different artifacts, notes, peer feedback, and wildcards
that might be from other courses. I am trying to present my work throughout the course in
a meaningful way that helps you as a reader understand what I learned and how I did it.
There are three artifacts that I included in my portfolio; those artifacts show my writing
process such as brainstorming, drafts, and revision. When having a writing assignment,
those three artifacts are the most important for a good piece of writing. I combined my
first draft which is consisted of general information about how my literacy improved with
my second draft that was very detailed and specific. The reason why I included both of
them is to show how my writing improved as I kept on learning in that class. The only
way that could help me combine these two drafts was again, the brainstorming method,
Seeing the Moment. Thats why I chose to include a scanned copy of my
brainstorming sheet. In the home page, I included a picture of me with one of the UTOP
mentors trying to revise and edit my paper. I included the image alone under the title
The most important artifact because revision is very important for me and it is very
necessary for me as a writer. I also included many other major assignments that I had to
do throughout the semester; I included my Portrait of a Writer, Literacy Narrative, Mid-
Term, and my blogs. All of these writings showed my evolvement as a writer and how I
improved in these six weeks of UWRT 1101.
For better final drafts, I asked for help from tutors, peers, and even professors. I
asked for grammar check, punctuation check, and overall feedback. I received many very
helpful responses; however, I only included Mrs. Ingrams feedbacks because I thought
they were the most helpful because they were very precise. The mid-term response was
very helpful to me and made me think about the curiosity part; it made me try to find an
answer and think. Also, I included the literacy narrative feedback because I thought it
was the most valuable compared to tutors or peers feedback. It was very detailed and
specific, Mrs. Ingram told me exactly what to include and what to correct; she was very
clear explaining her thoughts, which to me is the most important point. I included very
important notes that we took in class, the Rhetorical Reading notes. Those notes
changed my whole perspective as a reader. They help me analyze the purpose, the
content, and the audience. However, as a writer these notes helped me organize my
writing and change my way of writing depending on who my audience is or what my
purpose is. I included a memoir that I had to do for my magazine class about my senior
exit project as wildcards. My senior exit project was a big deal for me. I was hustling
about it my whole senior year. I thought it was the most specific, detailed assignment I
have ever done. I also included this portfolios brainstorming because it was very helpful.
Without it I would have not been able to get it done.
The way I organized my artifacts and notes actually meant something to me. I
always try to keep my final drafts the first thing you see in a page because I do not think
most of my audiences are interested in my writing process. My portfolio consists of four
different communication modes: Linguistic, visual, gestural, and spatial. All of these
modes convey different meanings. Because I have many different organized writing
prompts, different phrases, sentences, paragraphs, etc., my portfolio uses linguistic mode.
My portfolio also uses visual mode since it includes different layout, colorful red and
black theme, sentence sizes and either bolded or italicized phrases. The gestural
mode in this portfolio is in my picture; specifically my faces expression and how happy
it shows I am. My portfolio also uses spatial mode because of the way my docuements
and images are organized. They are always beside each other, in the same category. Since
I am the person who made this portfolio, I can call myself the Author. The purpose and
content of this portfolio is to show the assignments that helped me evolve as a writer
throughout the semester; another purpose of this portfolio is for final grade in my UWRT
1101 class. My audience is my professor Mrs. Ingram.
Throughout this semester I improved in many criteria. Compared to my high
school writing abilities, I think there is a major improvement that occurred as a
result to this course. In the beginning of the semester, in my first literacy draft, to
me a detailed sentence would be I would finish my soccer practice every day and
head out to kick about one hundred field goals; However, now an example of a
detailed sentence that I wrote the other day is I used to sit about five foot away from
his desk on the uncomfortable chairs trying to work on different assignments, help
other students and help him grade his students quizzes. Therefore, I think I deserve
an A because I have worked very hard trying to improve and get this grade.