In my English 150 class I have learned greatly on how to communicate with people either through visual, oral, written or electronically. I began to enhance these skills in this class, English 250, by going more in depth and retouching those areas I was a “novice” in. I believe that communication is an important tool for everyone to be an expert in and to know about. No matter what career path someone may choose, there’s only some type of communication, whether oral, visual, written or electronic, that people need to be good in. In my career, either as a social worker or lawyer, I need to, not only have good oral communication skills but also written. It’s important for me to know, in my field, how to speak and talk in front of an audience. English 150 was an introduction to my learning and English 250 was a continuation of that learning.

In English 250 I’ve learned to summarize, to revise different people’s papers (as well as my own) and to analyze. One of the assignment’s I thought was the most difficult was the one that I had to find what errors the author had in his writing and what were the possible “flops” the author made. As a sophomore in college, I felt stressed to think that I had to critique someone’s work, more importantly the work of a person who know’s what he’s talking about. Nevertheless, it was one of my highest grades and I felt proud of myself. It took the longest but I was happy that I did it. I believe the visual mode might be my strongest area just because I find it simpler to describe images, as well as entertain an audience when a picture, video or audio clip is involved. Throughout the class I realized how important it was to entertain the audience as well as knowing who the audience is. Whether it’s a professor, a student, a class or a potential employer, it’s important to learn who is the paper directed to.

My audience, when it comes to my career path, could potentially be a jury, a judge, lawyers and prosecutors. It could also potentially be a family, a child and a group of co-workers. The audience is important when learning how to write or orally communicate yourself. In my other classes, such as LDST 122, I learned that too. You wouldn’t speak to a child, how you speak to a judge. It’s important to learn how to change that writing and be able to be flexible enough to accommodate those people. I need more practice on my overall writing. I’ve come a long way since English 150 but I need a lot of more work to be able to follow the career path I want. Writing is important and without writing you can’t communicate accurately.  I learned the importance of summarizing documents, as well as how to make essays flow into each other. It was difficult changing words and making paragraphs flow into each other. I wouldn’t consider myself an expert but I do find myself more comfortable to write and with that I can better my rhetorical aspects.

In my rhetorical aspects I consider my low grades to be either delivery or organization, sometimes substance. These are the areas I need work in and in every assignment I worked on I tried my best to learn from mistakes. My grades show that if I put enough time and effort into my writing, I could be a great writer. I’ve always tried to revise my work with other people or take a step back from my assignment. It’s easier to work on it once someone else has taken a look at it because after a point it gets difficult to know where you’ve gone wrong. Most people considering looking for helping or getting assistance as as weakness but it’s also strong for people to demonstrate that weakness and ask for help when they need it. I’ve gone several times to the Writing and Media Center and have found it very resourceful when it comes to long essays or to revise a draft. Once you learn what you’re doing wrong you can fix those errors and afterwards, keep improving.

As I continue my college path and later graduate school I consider my writing to be essential. In English 150 I mostly learned how to write without fear of being wrong, and the overall importance of a terrible rough draft. I also learned how visual aspects can shape people’s perspectives of posters or advertisements. In English 250 I learned how important it is to summarize and to learn from prior mistakes. I also learned how to utilize campus resources’, such as the Writing and Media Center, to improve your work and have other people see your work. I also learned the importance of having valid arguments and how to be conscience. In my career path I hope to influence people by using my oral communication and portraying myself onto others. Confidence is key and we need confidence when it comes to talking with people personally and, most importantly, forming valid arguments.