Brooke D'Sousa

1. Students will exhibit their rhetorical awareness and flexibility as readers and writers through extended practice negotiating new and diverse reading and writing situations and tasks that require their adaptation to shifting expectations and demands.

          This semester of English 1010 has given me the opportunity to read a multitude of essays from various perspectives, which has helped to expand my knowledge of rhetorical awareness. I also believe the overarching subject of food aided in the absorption of this new material as it gave me a common and understood baseline, by which I was able to increase my comprehension of different rhetorical arguments. In addition, my writing improved, as I was able to use what I learned from reading and put it into practice in my writing.

​

2. Students will demonstrate their critical thinking capacity as readers and writers through the ongoing practice of analyzing, synthesizing, interpreting, and evaluating ideas, information, situations, and texts across diverse reading and writing tasks.

          The essay assignments this semester provided me with opportunities to view subject matter in a more critical way. The issue exploration essay required that I view a chosen topic from an opposing viewpoint, as well as one in favor of, and research to answer a question in and unbiased, academic tone. The rhetorical analysis essay asked me to select a text to analyze independent from the subject it was discussing. Separating the rhetoric from the subject proved more difficult but was great practice.

3. Students will develop metacognition through the ongoing practice of reflecting on their own thinking and language use as writers and readers and theorizing, more generally, the work that language does in the world.

          Through the recipe memoir assignment, I was able to reflect on a time long past that held special meaning to me, and share it with others through my writing. This assignment helped me to become particularly aware of the words I used to relate my memory. This semester has also helped me to hear the way others speak in a way that I hadn’t previously, particularly the news media.

4. Students will develop an ability and confidence to navigate writing processes through ongoing opportunities to write in diverse contexts, engage writing assignments in stages, and practice revision.

​

          During each major writing exercise I participated in multiple revision processes that included instructor and peer feedback. It was helpful to see how others interpreted my writing as each person holds a different perspective. This increased my ability to proactively review my writing while keeping diverse perspectives in mind.