reflection

So, I have definitely become much more comfortable at learning how to use evidence to my stance and strengthen my opinion. I have also learned how to qualify my opinion and make my essays more than just a “I solely agree with this” or “I solely disagree with this”. At least I hope I have. By this I mean that you can narrow or more clearly define your stance by contrasting evidence with other quotes from the literature. For example, you can say, well Author A says this. But, if you look at Text B, you can see that blah, blah. I think that this was a really eye-opening course for me in terms of really narrowing and defining your essay. Also it was really hard for me to formulate an opinion for some of these essays or take a stance on some of these essays. But forcing myself to take a stance so that I could choose the appropriate evidence to create my essay really helped me develop as a writer. Also I really appreciated the peer reviews, which were all so helpful. Also, I really appreciated learning how to reverse outline? Because I feel like I really needed that to make sure that my essay did not stray off topic or focus on different things rather than what it needed to focus on. I think coming up with a research question for our last paper was novel as well. I cannot believe that this course is already almost over... but it was hands down the best, most challenging English course in my life and I am so thankful because I personally feel like I am taking away so much from this course.