Zachary Roberts

Professor I
UWRT 1102
Dec 9, 2015

ENG 1102: Writing and Inquiry in Academic Contexts

Intawiwat
Midterm Reflection
Complete in a Word Document, typed, double spaced and MLA
format to be turned in to Moodle by OCT 23.

Your midterm reflection asks you to consider various aspects of the course
and your work thus far.
SELF- assessment:
1. Assess yourself as a student by giving yourself a grade and providing
explanation/justification for that grade.
a. What are you going to be researching?
b. Have you sufficiently followed the directions for each thing we
have done so far?
c. Have you gone back to edit your journals or other assignment?
I am researching survival techniques and explaining to people what
you need to do and have if you want to survive on any trip you plan to

take. I want it to be vey generic so that it can almost fall into a

checklist. I have followed the directions for everything we have done
so far. Unfortunately I did not see this on the page until now when it is
very late. When this reflection was due I was up to date, and I still am
other than this assignment. I have not gone back to edit my journals
as of yet because I still follow the same topic and I have not changed
it. I have however read all of my responses from my peers and I have
learned a lot from what they say. I would rate myself with a B, because
I think I have put in a lot of effort into this class, but with my
demanding schedule I have not been able to work on this class as
much as I would have liked.
2. Assess your Participation in class by giving yourself a grade and
providing explanation/justification for that grade. This includes:
attendance, attitude and engagement, preparation.
My attendance in this class is one of my highest. I really enjoy the
class and my peers. I think that I stay engaged in the class
conversation and that I work well with my Hufflepuff team members. I
always have a good attitude. I even make sure that I pay close
attention on days where we go to the library or the computer labs. I
am also never late. I would rate myself at an A level basd on my
performance and how I perceive those around me.
3. Discovery and Proposal: Explain your involvement with your
extended inquiry so far. How did you get to where you are now with it?

DO you have a bucket list & How did you come up with your bucket
list? What issues did you run into that may have hindered your
research? How did you solve the issue? Did you make adjustments?
What process did you take with your proposal? Did you take the advice
or consider what others commented or questioned when it came to
your Discovery & Proposal?
I got where I am with it because I related myself with Chris and looked
at what we had in common, and that is Wilderness. I do not have a
bucket list, but I do have a basic understanding of what I want to do in
the future, does that count? My research is hindered significantly on
the fact that I focus on preparation and not how to fix the problems
once I am already in them. A lot of guides talk about how to get out of
sticky situations, and dont really talk about how to prevent your self
from being in them in the first place. I find that to be wrong and a bit
silly. I focused my attention on primarily research based topic and use
key words like prevention and research. With the proposal I focused on
the outcome I wanted then worked out how to get there. I think it
usually reverse t what I do, but in this case it just made sense. I was
very appreciative of my fellow classmates comments. The made a
huge difference to be because they helped my narrow in on the
specific topic I needed. A few classmates also told me what they think
I should avoid and I didnt think about that before hand so that made a
big impact as well.

4. What about the 3 discussions/journals/reading reactions so

far?
a. Discussion 1: Shitty First Drafts
b. Discussion 2: Understanding Types of writing
c. Discussion 3: Into the Wild
Do you feel these discussions helped you understand the class? The
material? Writing in general?
I think the into the wild discussion was the most helpful because it
really helped me to understand a lot more about the book and to think
on a much deeper level, and not just think about what is on the page.
Types of writing helped me narrow down what I am good at writing and
what I am not. And finally shitty first drafts was not as important
because I always map out my papers with a basic outline. But the way
I write is I write as good as I can the first time and then constantly edit
it once I have the exact outcome I am looking for. Its not a 2 or 3 step
process, its a lot of little things and edit that occur throughout the
entire writing process.
5. Grade Your Progress for above numbers 2 4. Choose one of the
following as guided by the Grading Expectations chart found in Moodle:
Above & beyond or extraordinary
Above average
Average
Below average

I would love to give myself an Above and beyond ranking but I think that
because I have bad time management and I never seem to do think on time
that I deserve and above average. I think the work that I do turn in is very

good and take a lot of time. I genuinely insert a lot of effort into what I do for
this class. I think that I do better than what is deserving of average.

Overall Grade . . . so far. (Remember that this is merely an estimate

based on the first half of the semester. Nothing is final until the end of the
semester, and the final portfolio is a primary deciding factor.) Again, use the
Grading Expectations Chart as a model for what you think your grade should
be.
*Above & Beyond or Extraordinary; *Above Average; *Average;
*Below average

Explain your response by giving/citing the examples given in the Grading

Expectations Chart and how this coincides with the grade you hope to
achieve at the end of the semester. Also, cite what you could do better in
order to achieve that grade. Do you have any questions or concerns about
your performance or your expectations for the rest of the semester?

Has a clear thesis and organizational strategy. Each paragraph

provides unified, coherent, and developed support for the thesis.

Everything in the paper should relate to what the thesis statement is

trying to explain. If the information does not back up the thesis, then it
does not belong in the paper.

Has an insightful thesis statement (or implied thesis)

I am constantly developing my thesis statement to explain perfectly what

I am looking to explain. I think the thesis statement is one of the most
important aspects of the paper. It says everything you need to know in
one sentence.

Attempts complex strategies of development and pays attention to

audience.

My audience is anyone looking to go into the wild; that means pros

looking for more information all the way down to first time campers.
The language has to be basic enough for the first timers to understand,
but complex enough that the well-seasoned campers dont get bored.
That will be a challenging task but I think its manageable.

Strong evidence of editing: relatively few grammatical and/or

mechanical errors.

I always check and double-check my grammar; I think one bad sentence

or confusing paragraph can ruin a paper.

I think I fight everything under the A and B category except I am not always
on time. I will be from now on though because I am dedicating a lot of time
to being more punctual. I think I assumed you would update the progress
bar with everything that we needed to do and so when I saw that everything
was green I just moved on. I know now that I need to look hard for dates and
to do everything on time. My only question for you would be if you could
update the progress bar because that would make it easier to stay on track?
Overall I would say I deserve a low B at the minimum, But I will be improving
that even more in the time we have left in this semester.