Project 1 Reflection
For my Project 1, I surprised myself with how I organized my essay, beginning with the algorithm part first before exploring about myself. I took a risk with ordering in that way since I wasn’t sure how I would be able to get the essay to flow well in that order, but surprisingly I feel like I made it work well! Writing this essay also helped me to figure out more about my identity as a Chinese-American. I never really gave it a deep thought but by delving into this aspect of myself, I was able to pinpoint a more specific explanation for why I was feeling the way I did among my white peers when I was growing up. I did not realize how much I stood out as one of the only Asian students until coming to Berkeley! Through the exercises we did in class, I learned more ways to integrate quotes and verify credibility of quotes as well which helped me to change my previous bad habits of quote integration and show me new ways to add variety into integration.
One of my goals for projects 2 and 3 is to have more clear topic sentences for my body paragraphs. I tend to shy away from body topic sentences because I feel that they interrupt my writing flow a bit, but I realize (thanks to Carmen’s comments!) that including topic sentences allows the paragraphs to stand alone and makes the essay structure more clear to the reader. I also want to spend more time on the research component–I feel like for this essay I rushed it a bit and didn’t go as deep as I probably could have. Since the next two projects are very research heavy, I can be sure to get a lot of practice looking for good sources and credible information. I also want to be less of a perfectionist. I have a tendency to write up my first drafts to be as good as my final draft, and therefore I get less editing done because I am unwilling to change as much. I just need to let go of that mindset and write down my thoughts into a crappy first draft.
One of my goals for projects 2 and 3 is to have more clear topic sentences for my body paragraphs. I tend to shy away from body topic sentences because I feel that they interrupt my writing flow a bit, but I realize (thanks to Carmen’s comments!) that including topic sentences allows the paragraphs to stand alone and makes the essay structure more clear to the reader. I also want to spend more time on the research component–I feel like for this essay I rushed it a bit and didn’t go as deep as I probably could have. Since the next two projects are very research heavy, I can be sure to get a lot of practice looking for good sources and credible information. I also want to be less of a perfectionist. I have a tendency to write up my first drafts to be as good as my final draft, and therefore I get less editing done because I am unwilling to change as much. I just need to let go of that mindset and write down my thoughts into a crappy first draft.