Matt Hultzapple

Ms. Hussey

April 16, 2020

Final Reflection Draft

Over the course of this semester we covered an array of strategies commonly used in

writing, with the hope of it making the research paper more manageable. The first step to this

process was writing the Exploratory Essay. This assignment was meant to be the foundation of

the course. We were given a list of articles to choose from, then based our first paper in response

to it. Unfortunately I misunderstood the assignment and wrote more of an analysis rather than an

inquiry, which cost me points upfront, and time spent on this class in the long run. Overall, the

Exploratory Essay wasn’t a huge success for me due to the nature of the paper, and how it set up

the rest of my semester. Looking back now, if I had spent more time looking into this

assignment when the semester began, I could’ve set myself up in a better position. Instead, I

chose to respond to an article about the environment, not realizing that would be what I’d have to

write about the rest of the semester, unless I wanted to do more work to change it. (We were

already working on research by the time I got my paper back.)

The Annotated Bibliography, our next assignment, was used in response to our

Exploratory Essay. After finding out what interested us from the articles in the first assignment,

we used databases to research our questions. From the research portion of this course, we then

transferred our sources into an outline of sorts, just much more organized. This process was

helpful for really laying out your research and showing where there could be possible gaps of

information. I found this assignment the most helpful throughout the semester solely because of
the database usage. I don’t think it’s necessarily crucial to write out the sentences that were

required with the citations, but the research step will prove beneficial throughout the rest of my

time at the University of Alabama.

The third phase of this course was really just putting everything from the last two

assignments together, formulating a rough outline of the Research Essay. Had you completed

everything up to this point with diligence, this would likely be the easiest part. Unfortunately,

due to the fact I had to start the semester slightly behind due to unforeseen circumstances,

instead of piecing everything together, I was writing my Research Essay at the same time as the

Annotated Bibliography, which I had fallen behind on. This also leads me to the point that my

timing has been slightly off from everyone elses, which I believe may have led to rushed, less

meaningful work. For example, instead of turning in the first paper and realizing the whole

course was going to be based off of it, when I turned it in I had to immediately start working on

the next thing in order to meet the deadlines, diminishing the value of some of my work. With

that being said I still found this assignment helpful to my development as a writer and researcher,

and think that no matter what you write a research paper about, it will always be a valuable

learning experience.

On a different note, this course truly shows how to break a research paper down just

about as far as one could go, along with showing me areas of improvement I can work on in

future writings. From a feedback standpoint I found the peer reviews to be inconsistent, because

it all depends on how people are feeling that day in class, along with the fact they're not the one

who will actually grade it. I know at least for me, some days I feel like giving an in depth
review, but others I’m just watching the clock, so for that reason I found the teachers’ rubrik

more beneficial.

As a writer I view myself as pretty well rounded, with room for improvement across the

board. I think for me it really comes down to the subject matter and my interest in it. If I’m not

legitimately interested in learning about a certain topic, it can be difficult for me to find

motivation and get it done efficiently. While it may be surprising, I actually think that my

writing habits got worse throughout this semester since I had to catch up on all of my classes at

once. Although my writing may not have actually gotten worse, I can say with certainty my

attitude did. It was definitely more difficult for me to sit down and write an almost scientific

paper after realizing I would have to discard my sources completely and start over if I didn’t

want to stick with the environment. I think had I understood the Exploratory Essay better and

wrote it as an inquiry, the whole process would’ve been smoother, since that was really the base

of the building for this class.

Once again, I found this course to be helpful in my development as a writer, but want to

reiterate the point that I believe I could've gotten much more out of it, had I not been playing

catch up in all of my classes at the beginning of the semester. With that being said, there isn’t

much more I can do for this year, so I have to look forward and take this as a learning

opportunity for the future. As I look ahead at the rest of my college career, and even past

graduation, I believe writing will always be a crucial skill to have at your disposal no matter

what you major in. For that reason, I hope my writing continues to progress throughout my time

at the University of Alabama.