At the beginning of the semester, my first composition was an introductory essay concerning my relationship with writing and the writing process, my views on myself as a student and writer, and what I hope to accomplish by the end of the semester. The introductory essay served as an initial self-reflection and first look at my strengths and weaknesses as a writer.

Introduction Essay

In all honesty, I’ve never really been into writing. All throughout my time in high school I dreaded English as it was the class where the most writing took place. In fact, English became my least favorite subject. I attribute part of my dislike to the fact that I am not confident in my writing ability and/or skills. While writing, I tend to constantly second guess and overthink as I irrationally expect that what I get down on the page as the first draft must be good. In this way I suppose I try to be a perfectionist. However, this has done more harm than good. Because of this mentality, I tend to make writing assignments -especially essays- a larger task than what they are. As a result, writing usually seems like a daunting task to me. Adding on, I would usually procrastinate on writing assignments because of these feelings which, in the end, would not be beneficial to me at all. Yet, I cannot say I’ve never enjoyed writing, even for an instance. I enjoy writing when I get to be creative such as crafting a story, writing from a different perspective, keeping parts of narrative but changing the rest, and so on.

Despite what I’ve expressed above, I can write a relatively good paragraph(s). Throughout my years in high school, my English teachers taught me to be very analytical when reading and writing about a text. As opposed to just presenting quotes as evidence for my arguments, I thoroughly dissect the chosen quote(s) in ways that either heighten or add to my argument. Additionally, I’ve been taught to pay attention to language and form as well. Clarity and concision are also important elements to writing. Although at times my writing can be clear and concise, I sometimes struggle with these elements as well. Even though I do not regard myself as a terrible writer, I know there are areas and aspects of my writing that very much need improvement just as there are aspects of writing that I execute well.

As a student, I am always listening and engaged in the classroom. It is important for me to listen to both my professors and peers as both may ask interesting questions, bring up new arguments or points of view, express an interesting thought, and so on. At the same time, I can be very shy. Because of this I barely participate, even when I may have a response or an answer. However, this only applies to open class discussions. When discussing in groups or with a partner, I always participate and share my thoughts and encourage the other person to do the same. In terms of assignments, I put much effort into completing them and completing them well. Moreover, I am a student that enjoys learning new things and questioning. Yet, sometimes I may question a little too much which probably isn’t a good thing. In terms of my weaknesses as a student, throughout high school I was not the best at time management. On top of that, I would also procrastinate a lot of the time on working on assignments.

This semester I’d like to be able to stop second guessing my writing and myself as a writer. It would be beneficial for me to grow some confidence in my writing skills so that I no longer view writing assignments as daunting or with such intimidation. Not only that, I want to let go of the habit of thinking that my first draft must be good. I want to be able to just write the draft even if it sucks on the first try. An upside to this is that I’ll be less stressed when writing and will be able to get lots of feedback on ways to improve my paper. Also, I want to work on improving my time management and getting rid of the habit of procrastination as these qualities are only harmful in the long run. I want to make sure I attend tutoring or ask for help whenever I am stuck or confused because many times I assume I can just figure it out all on my own. At the end of this semester I want to be able to write clear and cohesive essays that present complex and interesting ideas and/or thoughts. This would also be accompanied by improving on skills I currently struggle with in my writing.

This composition was then followed by a reflection on the introductory essay. The goal of this essay was to explore the rhetorical situations within my paper. Using the Norton Field Guide “Rhetorical Situations” article as a reference, I demonstrated my ability to explore, analyze, and communicate the purpose, audience, genre, stance, and medium.

Introductory Essay Reflection Assignment

My Introductory Essay consists of several purposes that all work to inform the audience of my views on myself as a writer and student. The essay informs the reader of the thoughts and emotions I associate with writing and why. This is exhibited in the lines, “I attribute part of my dislike to the fact that I am not confident in my writing ability and/or skills. While writing, I tend to constantly second guess and overthink as I irrationally expect that what I get down on the page as the first draft must be good.” Informing the audience of these thoughts and emotions ultimately helps the reader better understand my experiences with writing, which I share in the later portion of the paragraph. For example, towards the middle of the paragraph I express, “As a result, writing usually seems like a daunting task to me.” If I had not expressed my thoughts on writing prior to this sentence, the audience would’ve been unable to comprehend why my experiences while writing are so negative. Another purpose is to inform the reader of what I, in this moment in time, view as my strength and weaknesses as both a writer and a student. The final purpose is to inform the audience of my goals, what I view as important for me to improve upon.

The audience of the essay is professor Greenspan as she is the intended reader of the essay. Being that Greenspan is my professor, I regard her as both a known and unknown audience. Professor Greenspan is a known audience in the sense that, to an extent, she is someone I know. The first day of class she introduced herself and spoke to class about where she’s from, her past as a mime, what she’s currently into, and something about herself that we wouldn’t be able to tell just by looking at her. As the class progressed, we were also learning about what she’s like as a teacher or teaching style. In addition, she also informed us of some of her expectations for the Introductory Essay assignment. She informed us that the essay must be two to three pages long, the essay must answer three questions she proposed, and the essay must be formatted in Times New Roman, 12-point font, and must be double spaced. While writing my introductory essay, I made sure to keep professor Greenspan’s expectations in mind as she is my audience. Yet, she is also an unknown audience in the sense that I have never written a paper for professor Greenspan before nor am I aware of the level or type of writing she wants us to produce. Professor Greenspan may want us to write, think, and approach writing in ways I am currently unfamiliar with. That being said, the Introductory Essay was professor Greenspan’s first impression of my writing abilities and myself as a student. Taking these circumstances into consideration, I made it a point to be elaborate in my essay as there is a lot she does not know about me.

The genre of the Introductory Essay is an essay. The guiding questions of the assignment allowed me to express opinions, personal experiences, and include some self-reflection. An example of an opinion I express in my essay is, “I can write a relatively good paragraph(s).” The question “How do you see yourself as a writer and as a student?” allowed me to include this type of content. An example of self-reflection is, “it would be beneficial for me to grow some confidence in my writing skills so that I no longer view writing assignments as daunting or with such intimidation.” The question “What do you want to accomplish this semester?” facilitated reflection on weaknesses and methods of improvement. Moving on, this genre requires me to write in paragraphs and use specific formatting as previously stated. Another requirement is the use of formal language along with a respectful, scholarly tone. Let’s take a look at this sentence from my essay as an example: “I attribute part of my dislike to the fact that I am not confident in my writing ability and/or skills.” I could’ve simply expressed this same idea as, “I do not like writing because I’m not confident in my skills.” The second version of my sentence is much more informal, as though I’m speaking to a friend. The sentence utilizes contractions, simple language, and is significantly shorter than the original. In contrast, the original sentence uses much more complex language, thoroughly expresses the idea, and does not use contractions. These qualities are seen throughout my essay and ultimately give the paper the formal, scholarly tone typical in academic papers.

While writing my Introduction essay, I’d say I took a critical stance on myself as a student, writer, and areas of improvement. Just as I am able to point out my strengths, I wanted to demonstrate that I am just as capable and aware of shedding light on my weaknesses. Examples of this are scattered throughout my Introductory Essay: “I am always listening and engaged in the classroom”, “I was not the best at time management”, “I thoroughly dissect the chosen quote(s) in ways that either heighten or add to my argument”, “I would also procrastinate a lot of the time”, “I assume I can just figure it out all on my own”, and so on. Throughout the process of writing the essay, it was important for to include these views for my audience as they would demonstrate my ability of deep self-reflection. In addition, doing so contributes to showing my audience what I can do. In this case that means showing my professor my abilities as a student, writer, and overall thinker.

Lastly, the medium of my essay is both printed and electronic as it exists as both. My Introductory Essay was first typed on a computer (electronic) and is intended to be printed in order to be handed in (printed). As stated in part two of Norton Field Guide’s “Rhetorical Situations”, we are expected to pay close attention to appearance of the material we write electronically. NFG’s statement proves true even for my essay. Apart from the content, the design of my paper was a major concern. As a result, I included the following characteristics: a proper heading at the top left corner of the page, a proper title that is centered, Times New Roman font and 12-point font size, wrote my paragraphs to be no more than two-thirds of the page long, doubled spaced the entire essay, and evenly distributed the text between the margins instead of aligning them to the left margin. Not only do these design aspects make the paper more visually appealing to the audience, they also give the text a more scholarly, formal look.

In order to prepare to write my Introductory Essay, I collected my materials –laptop, notebook, and syllabus- and found a quiet place to sit where I wouldn’t have distractions. After reviewing the requirements for the assignment on the syllabus, I began to think where and how I wanted to begin my essay. However, this took up about an hour of writing and rewriting possible intros that, in the end, I was not comfortable with. In order to break this cycle, I did a little brainstorming session. To do so, I reread my answers to the three questions we had to respond to during the writing activity on the very first day. This gave me an idea on how I wanted to start answering the question “how do you see yourself as a writer?”. My response to the question during the in-class activity partly talked about my feelings towards writing and the rationale behind those feelings. I thought this would be an appropriate intro and would help me better explain my experiences as a writer. From there on, writing the first paragraph was pretty much smooth sailing.

For the second paragraph I knew I wanted to focus on my strengths and weaknesses as a writer since I felt that I hadn’t fully responded to the question yet. After sitting for half an hour conducting an internal dialogue questioning what it is that I do and don’t do well, I decided to make the process easier by typing out a list of what I believe to be my strengths and weaknesses thus far. I then wrote my paragraph based on the list. I repeated the same process for the question “How do you see yourself as a student?”, and was able to write the paragraph faster using this method. After completing the three paragraphs, I decided to take a break from my essay for a few days since I had time. Once I returned to it, I tackled the last question by reflecting on what I had already written within my essay: my insecurities, my frustrations, and my weaknesses. Doing so allowed me to effectively create goals.

My successes in exploring and analyzing rhetorical situations in my essay were in part due to my close reading and understanding of both the “Rhetorical Situations” article and my paper. Apart from demonstrating comprehension and application of rhetorical terms in my writing, the reflection essay also exhibits my ability to select and use pieces of evidence that support and further my claims. In turn, this helped strengthen my critical analysis of my Introductory Essay.

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