Portfolio reflection

Develop a  persuasive, reflective letter addressed to a panel of readers composed of writing instructors. The purpose of the letter is to explain the texts included in the portfolio and to demonstrate and persuade how you’ve achieved the learning outcomes for ENC 1101. Your letter should be between 900-1200 words and include supporting evidence from the texts in your portfolio and descriptive details from the semester.

Your readers are interested in whether and how you’ve achieved the learning outcomes for this course. Try to use precise vocabulary from your studies this semester. Be mindful of what the audience may not know about the assignments and situations that inspired the works in your portfolio. And, importantly, back up the assertions you make about your learning by offering supporting evidence followed by explanation and reasoning. Some examples of supporting evidence might be: a link to a page in your portfolio; a picture or screen capture of the writing, feedback, text, or experience mentioned; and/or quoted or block-quoted text from your portfolio, an earlier draft, and/or a discussion post.

ENC 1101 Learning Outcomes

OUTCOME 1:  WRITING AS A RESULT OF CRITICAL THINKING AND READING 

This semester you have encountered the ideas of others in a variety of texts. You have questioned, analyzed, and evaluated those texts in order to enter into a conversation. When you have integrated your own ideas with the ideas of others through summary, paraphrase, and direct quotes; you have done so in an accepted and ethical way through attribution, and, at times, citation styles. As a critical reader, you’ve articulated and assessed the effects of an author’s writing choices—and sometimes even your own.

Writing Tip: Where do you see evidence of “Writing as a Result of Critical Thinking and Reading” in your portfolio? This is the evidence of your learning that you need to discuss in detail.

OUTCOME 2:  WRITING AS A PROCESS 

A successful text usually takes multiple drafts to create, and often the work begins before the first word is written. Recognize all the elements of the writing process you engaged in this semester: planning, drafting, revising, and editing. Recognize, also, the collaborative and social aspects of the writing process: feedback from your instructor, peer review sessions, academic support services, and open class discussions. This semester you have reflected often on your own individual writing process and the techniques your instructor mentioned. As a result, you have revised your own writing for complexity, clarity, organization, purpose, aesthetic value, and to follow the conventions of standard edited American English. Consider how a writing project from the semester grew and evolved from casual conversations, informal writing or sketches, and/or a first draft to the exemplary work you’ve included in your portfolio.

Writing Tip: You’ve used a writing process—that includes feedback from others—in order to present your best work in this portfolio. Describe the elements of that process in specific detail in relation to one or more projects in the portfolio. Be sure to address changes made based on my feedback.

OUTCOME 3:  WRITING FOR DIFFERENT RHETORICAL SITUATIONS

Because you’ve read and written a variety of texts, you can recognize how purpose, audience, and genre—the rhetorical situation—influence what writers write and how they write it. When you describe the work in your portfolio, discuss how the rhetorical situation for each text is reflected in your approach, organization, use of evidence, and word choice, for example. How do these pieces successfully speak to the intended audience, accommodate the conventions of the genre, and accomplish your purpose in composing?

Writing Tip: There are differences between the personal, public, and academic writing tasks you were assigned this semester. Discuss how differences in purpose, audience, and genre influenced composing decisions like point of view, organization, use of sources, variety of English, vocabulary, tone, etc. Be sure to refer specifically to the texts in your portfolio.