Reflections

            Throughout the quarter, I have met several objectives in writing and revising my blog posts. Beyond writing, there were also many helpful class discussions, peer reviews, as well as class lectures and critical input from the instructor.  All these elements helped me to clearly meet my objectives as a writer.

            One of my objectives was to learn how to use voice to convey my intentions as a writer. In some of my texts, like the Wikipedia article, I needed to omit voice in order to stay neutral and focus on a brief explanation of the subject. I wrote without much difficulty in this way. However, when I needed to incorporate voice to change the tone of an article, like in my news article, I had a little trouble drawing the line in terms of the amount of personalization I am causing to the article. Removing voice from the same article however made it bland and lifeless. This was somewhat of a struggle for me. My peers helped me realize that keeping voice in the article helps the reader to connect with the text so I listened to their advice and ended up with a more successful text.

            Another objective was to apply style, tone and format to communicate my purpose as a writer to the right audience. I did this in my process analysis essay when I chose to address the general public and identify the target audience that would most likely use my set of guidelines after reading. I was successful in applying the right tone but had some trouble with sticking to one style of writing to address the audience. I needed to revise my blog posts several times to make it consistent throughout in terms of verb tenses and pronouns that refer to the reader. After review from my peers, it turned out that my text was successful in getting the attention of the intended audience and was clear in style and format. I added some headers to make it even easier to navigate the text.

            The most successful learning outcome of the blog writing process was learning to be objective toward my own writing. I enjoyed sharing my texts with my peers and my instructor to get their constructive input about my work. I learned the most from this practice because I needed to step outside of my comfort zone and look at my own writing critically. The class environment was always very respectful and my peers were careful yet critical in communicating their assessment and points of improvement for my blog posts. I felt that their opinions were the most important in making progress toward successful writing because they were the readers of my posts. I also thoroughly appreciated and considered comments that were made on my blog about the texts. These were usually carefully written by other students and the instructor to help me make my writings the best that they could be. Reading and discussing my strengths and weaknesses really helped me see my work from different perspectives.

            Overall, I was able to meet my course objectives and challenge myself throughout the course with trying to manipulate the voice, style, format and tone of my blog posts. It was a real learning process that was made enjoyable and more successful thanks to collaboration with my fellow students as well as my instructor.