Reflection: The Transition To College Writing

I had thought long and hard about whether taking English 101 would be a good idea, or not. It was a difficult decision because, I am still in high school, and my grade in this class will stay on my record for the rest of my college career. This school year happened to be the first year that my high school offered an advanced composition class to help students get ready for college writing. I chose not to take it, because I felt confident in my ability and up for the challenge. Out of all the classes I could have taken, I’m glad I took English 101. It was a great introduction to college-level academic writing, and I think it will help me out a lot for English 102. All of the assignments were related to each other and couldn’t be completed without proper knowledge of the one before it. The topic I chose was about solar energy. That is close in relation to my intended major, which has to do with technology. From the overall feedback given, I realized that I

needed to personalize more, give background information, and work on the clarity of my topic.
Near the beginning of the semester, we read a section out of Keith Hjortshoj’s book, The Transition to College Writing.

The section was entitled, “How Good Writing Gets Written.” In this section, Hjortshoj describes the differences between high school and college level writing. He also describes how professors give their grades. As the semester progresses, the less lenient the grades that are given will be. The main goal of every student should be to see how much they can grow and learn about academic writing (Hjortshoj). There are also some helpful tips within this article to inform students on how they can improve their writing abilities. After reading, “How Good Writing Gets Written,” I made sure that I paced myself during assignments, revised all my papers as much as possible, and proofread my papers before handing them in. In my opinion, “How Good Writing Gets Written” was a very beneficial article to read and I think it should be shared to every English 101 class at the beginning of the

semester.
The first paper that was assigned was a rhetorical analysis. I was actually familiar with this type of paper, because I wrote one about two years ago. A rhetorical analysis uses logos, ethos, and pathos to describe a particular text and visual. When I submitted the rough draft, I had a few citation errors that were easy fixes. Those mistakes did not reoccur in any of the other papers I wrote. The next copy I turned in needed work on clarity and more solid transitions between paragraphs. The clarity was not up to par because I used a lot of vague words, such as “it” and “things.” I think this issue was not stressed enough in my high school English classes, but transitions were. My transitions weren’t necessarily bad, but definitely needed some reinforcement. After I revised that copy, all of the corrections were made, except one. I just needed to add in a word, because I still had an incomplete sentence. Once that was corrected, my first college paper was finally completed.
The next assignment was a causal argument. This was a type of analysis that I didn’t have much knowledge of, prior to English 101. I analyzed a cause and effect relationship about the future of solar energy. The clarity of my intended topic was much better in this paper. My corrections for this paper included giving background information, word choice, personalization, and further development of important points. I also was given the suggestion to do more research on the Solyndra scandal. This ended up being a very important piece to the body of the causal argument. This was very interesting to me, as well. When I got the revised paper back, I still had a few spots where my word choice could have been better.
The final paper was a position argument. This is the largest paper and wraps up what was discussed in the rhetorical analysis and the causal argument. I took a stance and agreed with a statement from a source, and also evaluated the possible contradictions, or rebuttals. I had the fewest errors in this paper. This was because I applied everything that I learned in the previous two. I still lacked some history and background information, but I made sure cite everything correctly and clarify as much as possible.
Overall, I believe that my first college class was a success. I also think that taking English 101 as a dual enrollment class was the correct decision. Heading into English 102, I now know that I need to think more about the of the history of the topic, better word choice for the idea I’m presenting, and overall clarity. Next semester I will make sure to look back at Hjortshoj’s article, “How Good Writing Gets Written.” The Backpack Writing and Easy Writer books also will never leave my side.