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Dariush Rohani

Professor Ditch

ENGL 115 APPR UNIV WRITING

9 December 2020

How My Skills in Writing Have Improved Throughout This Semester

Throughout this semester, I have written several essays and proposals. While doing all of

these, I have learned and improved in many parts of my writing. I have improved in areas such as

writing a thesis, incorporating quotes or evidence, and using the correct punctuation of in-text

citations. The biggest reason I have improved this semester was because of my teacher. The

zoom meeting lessons really helped. Seeing each lesson correspond with a power-point helped

me improve a lot. Another big part of my improvement was due to the LRC. This was a big help

on revising my thesis. Overall, my writing has improved in many areas throughout the different

parts of this semester.

In my previous essays, a big problem I had was writing a strong and short thesis. I always

had trouble trying to keep the thesis one to two sentences. In my first essay, I made it more

because I couldn’t simply compact all the information I wanted to say in the thesis in only a few

sentences. That is one thing I wanted to improve in pretty badly this semester. I first started to

improve in this after the one lesson in class where we went over thesis statements. After that, I

used the feedback you gave me from project space to improve my thesis for project space. Even

in project space, I went over two sentences because I found it very challenging to compact what I

wanted to say. After going to a few LRC visits, I had finally learned to compact my thesis and

keep it at only two sentences. Though they were still quite long, but it answered the prompt and

was only two sentences. My thesis for project media was, “ They both formed through suffering
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in different ways in the sense that T’Challa became at one with his past and accepted everything

that has happened in it, but Erik’s past angered him which transformed him into a hateful person

with the initiative to claim what he believed was his right. The main message of the film is that

T’Challa is making a change by leading a self-sustaining and prospering society without

oppression while on the other hand Erik’s effort of making a change involves revolting against

oppressors using Wakanda’s vibranium.” It was still long but it was technically only two

sentences. From here on out, I am confident that I can write shorter and more thorough thesis’s

for future essays thanks to this great class and the LRC visits.

Another area that I had trouble in was using evidence to back up my argument. Every

essay needs good evidence to back up the thesis or what you’re arguing for. I had trouble

connecting the evidence to the body paragraph and making it necessary in the sense it helps my

argument. After seeing your feedback on the first two essays, I had improved a lot. I started to

make my argument stronger by using evidence that helped me. Instead of putting a quote and just

simply summarizing it, I would use a quote that strengthens my argument and could be

explained. An example for some strong evidence that I used was, “We love how he shed a tear

for Killmoger after learning his tragic backstory and he even found it in his heart to forgive both

Killmonger and W’Kabi for acting the way they did under certain circumstances” (Chow). This

really helped show how T’Challa remained peaceful and didn’t let his suffering form him into a

hateful person. Throughout the semester, I have truly learned how to incorporate quality

evidence into my essays. I know for future essays that I will write, I will have strong evidence.

The last major area that I improved in was putting the correct punctuation for in-text

citations. Throughout the semester, I learned how to put the correct in-text citations by putting

the right information in the parentheses after the quote. This part was the easiest to learn and
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improve in. I improved in this by paying attention in the zoom lessons and constantly going on

owl purdue. An example of this would be when I am quoting an author. In my essay I would put

the quote and then their name in parentheses. It would look like, “Think of the way Franklin

Roosevelt came back deeper and more empathetic after being struck with polio” (Brooks 228). I

simply just put the authors name and the page number where I had found it.

This semester had taught me so much. After all the great things I had learned in this class,

I feel that I will excel in essays that I will face in my future. I know for a fact that improved in

areas such as writing a thesis, using evidence for the argument, and in-text citations due to my

great teach and other helping centers. I am confident that my future in writing is better because

of this class.
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Work Cited Page

Brroks, David. What Suffering does. Pursuing Happiness, 2nd Edition, Bedford St.

Martin’s, 1 November 2019

Chow, Nicholas. 7 Leadership Skills We Can All Learn From The Black Panther:

Lifestyle: Rojak Daily. 23 February 2018, https://rojakdaily.com/lifestyle/article/4499/7-

leadership-skills-we-can-all-learn-from-the-black-panther