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Charles Mikeska
Professor Collins
ENGL 1302
15 August 2016
Reflections from a Semester
Eleven weeks goes by very fast, especially taking three classes. This class in particular
was especially challenging. Even with Composition I still fresh in my head having just taken it in
the spring of 2016, I struggled at first finding my writing style to align with the course
requirements.
The first assignment analyzing famous speech, of which I chose William Faulkners
Nobel Prize acceptance speech, employed using a rhetorical device in order to dissect the
writing. Utilizing ethos, pathos, logos was not intuitive. I had touched on this method briefly in
Comp I, but we went more in depth with it in this class. At first, my mind struggled with how to
identify the rhetorical device used, analyze it and then to dissect and write about it. This
assignment required me to think about the structure of the speech in a different way than I had
ever anticipated. Additionally, I found myself struggling to extrapolate more subject-matter from
the speech due to its smaller size as compared to longer speeches I could have chosen. In the end,
I was able to pass the assignment, but only with a B. The major pitfalls I succumbed to were the
structure not following the order of introduction and grammatical MLA formatting errors in the
citations.
The second assignment of the summer consisted of writing an argument. Now this was
something I could get behind. I feel like I have a decent ability to present a fair argument,
providing counter-argument support for the point I was making. I chose to write about a subject

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near and dear to my heart, which was golf-related. While I could have droned on about
something to which the average person might have no relation to, I wanted to discuss the debate
surrounding the anchored putting ban which was just put into effect in January. The main
struggle I faced in writing this assignment was keeping the thesis statement in mind. While I was
able to find arguments to support my thesis, the structure of the paragraphs gave me trouble. I
also still had difficulty in the basic order of my points, at times forgetting to stick to the order
described in the introduction. The grade was much improved at 89, but reflected comments in the
grading that showed I clearly had more work to do regarding citations. Ive learned the detailed
world of how to properly cite in MLA format, although Ill probably still get it wrong and need
to reference Rules for Writers.
For the third and final essay, the proposal was to be related to the argument. The
assignment required proposing a related topic to the audience and convincing them to support
your efforts. With this being the longest assignment, the level of difficulty increased. I continued
to struggle with flow of the points in support of the introduction topics lined out. By having more
time to get input on rough drafts, I think that this additional time to work through drafts helped
get the flow organized. I also felt much more comfortable with the works cited. The grade result
of 92 showed the continued improvement in my writing, making one citation error and just a few
word choice errors.
In the end, I feel like this class helped me set the stage for more advanced writing I will
need to complete later in my college career. As writing requirements for classes may narrow in
focus as far as topic, I think that this class has rounded out the tools I will need in order to write
well organized, thoughtful and properly cited papers. I take away a better understanding of the

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tools which can be used to structure complete writing thoughts. While Im certain I will not be a
writer of William Faulkners character, I think Im much better off than when I started.

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