At the beginning of the semester, I was hesitant to be in this class, because I never felt truly confident with my writing.  In high school, we wrote five paragraph papers that were monotonous and I dreaded writing every single one of them.  I think it discouraged me even more.

                Over the course of this semester, I have grown to actually enjoy writing! GWRTC103 was definitely my favorite class this semester, and I really enjoyed how Professor Harness made the class enjoyable, while we learned about various parts of writing.  I really liked the fact that we were able to choose a topic to write about.  It helped me gain interest in the paper quickly, because I chose topics to write about that I was actually interested in.  I feel as though my writings have changed because I was more engaged in the papers I was writing.  Instead of quickly typing up a horrible five paragraph paper the night before, hitting print, and handing it in as a final copy the next day, I spent a lot more time on my papers.  I thoroughly took time on each one, brainstorming on several different papers, then typing some of my thoughts, as I kept returning to the unfinished draft each day.  I found that my papers were improving by simply just breaking up the time I spent on them.  Instead of writing it all in one sitting, I spent several different writing sessions on them.  I also took advantage of the writing center, and also benefited greatly from our peer edits.  I realized how important it is to have several eyes look at your paper before completing a final copy.  Sometimes other people are capable of finding ways to improve my writing, which I sometimes completely skip over, and don’t see.  I’m really glad that we spent an adequate amount of time on writing these papers.  I was a little discouraged that I wasn’t going to do well in the class after seeing my grade on the Rhetorical Analysis paper, but overall, I was happy with the grades I received on the others!     

                Now that it’s the end of the semester, I definitely feel more confident with my writing abilities, and have learned much better methods of revising and edited than the methods I have used in the past.  I realize how important it is to put time and effort into thoroughly thinking things out.  Also, I feel more comfortable expressing my thoughts and opinions about certain topics after spending time working on blogs these past few months. 

                Overall, I really enjoyed this class, and learned a lot from it! I’m really glad that I took it, and would definitely enjoy taking another class similar to this one!

Originally the definition of revision was different than mine, but I can definitely understand the defiinition they gave for revision.  I see how important it is because sometimes during the stage of proofreading I find myself just so annoyed with writing the paper, and just want to finish and hand it in, that I just change a few things from what I originally wrote, and hit print, and that’s the end of “my revision” process.  I think this process of revision sounds important because it’s not until you finally get a chance to step back from being so engulfed in the paper, and really try to understand it from another person’s point of view.  The revision process is important because after you have had some time to not constantly think about the paper and what you are going to write, you can come back to it, and see things that should obviously be changed, or things that should be eliminated or added the the piece. 

I think that when I go back and revise my papers, there will be a lot of things that I can clear up that may have made sense in my head the first time I wrote them, but are very unclear after reading them the second time aroudn.  It’s definitely an important process for all types of writing in high school, college, for particular aspects to jobs, and in the “real world.”

For this blog, I’d like you to reflect on your reaction to the work and what you felt from beginning to end. Was the essay too shocking for you? Too ridiculous? Upsetting? Did you find it funny? Clever? Did you understand the point it was trying to make by the end?

While reading “The Proposal,” I felt a lot of different emotions throughout the text.  The beginning of the text was a little shocking for me because it’s something that I was uninformed about.  I was surprised to hear that poor people were such a burden to their parents in Ireland.  I know a lot of problems with poverty, and mortality occur all over the world.  We see them everyday, but it makes me really think abobut how poverty affects people all over the world.  Some more extreme than others, but it’s still an everyday issue.  It’s upsetting to think about people who live almost a completely diferent life, than I do, and it really makes me look at my life an appreciate the people in it, and what God has blessed me with throughout my childhood and teenage years so far. It really made me sad, because I realize that some people aren’t half as fortunate as I am, and I take it for granted more than I should.  It’s literature like this, that make you really open up your eyes and see the world around you.  It makes me appreciate my life outisde of this “Jmu College Bubble World.”  I think sometimes I get so caught up and busy with everyday life, that I don’t stop and think about how fortunate I am to have have the opportunity of an education, a family, and friends who truly care about me.  Overall, I really enjoyed readin this proposal, because it made me stop and think about certain aspects of it, and helped me focus on the main goal.    

For this particular sorority, it seemed like they were almost trying to discourage stereotypes in a way.  Overall, stereotypes usually give off a negative connotation to a particular group.  I like the fact that this sorority would allow Muslim women to have more of a leadership role in society, and that it was open to all women, and therefore, was non-denominational.  Hopefully it would be a good way to get rid of some of the Muslim stereotypes that exist throughout different cultures.  By breaking stereotypes, hopefully Muslims can be seen as equals, and not outcasts.

Reading this essay made me think more about the way our society groups and divides different types of people.  It’s kind of sad to think about in a way, because it seems like people have a hard time associating with groups that are seemingly different from their own.  I think that if we just took the time to get to know someone who we ordinarily wouldn’t, we would probably see that even though everyone is different, we are all similar in more ways than we think!

I read the article titled “Healthcare: Must Focus on Cost Not Coverage.”  I didn’t find the author particularly funny, but the article was not supposed to be funny.  It was written focusing on a more serious matter about our healthcare, and the costs of it.  I found it interesting because I didn’t know much about the issue until I read the post.  I feel like this author is credible and presents a good amount of Ethos, because he is a political science and business management major at JMU, so he studies a lot of politics in school, and obviously takes an interest in it.  He wrote about some political factual information, but then followed it up with his opinion about how the administration should be run, and how the government should handle the rising healthcare issue.  The writing stayed on topic, and the context was pretty easy to follow.

 I disagree with him for the most part, because I think that all Americans should be given healthcare, regardless if they can afford it or not.  I do agree with him about the fact that giving healthcare to a greater population; will decline the quality and service of the healthcare we receive today, as there will be an escaladed demand for Doctors.  I think he brings up a good point when he says “Healthcare doesn’t just appear from nothing; it takes money and labor to produce it, both of which are scarce resources. Given this, if demand for healthcare services increases then prices have to go up.  But amazingly the president has also promised to only sign a bill that only reduces overall costs.”  He talks about how President Obama’s plan seems as though it will not work, and I can definitely see how the author feels that way.  Overall, it’s hard to determine what healthcare plan will work, but I liked reading this article because it made me think of the different options and plans, and also informed me on the subject of healthcare.

Often times I found myself rushing through these five paragraph papers because they became increasingly boring as the paper went on.  I feel like I do not write to the best of m ability in these type of papers.  If I am writing about a topic I am interested in, or a topic I feel strongly about, I beliee m papers would be stronger.  If I write about someting I am interested in, I will be more excited to write, or read information.  I feel as though I have a lot of work to do with my writing, but hopefully this classwill help me with it.