During my time in the FIQWS course I was able to excel greatly in my analytical reading and writing skills through the enlightenment of my two professors Caitlin and Molly. Throughout this course there were multiple writing objectives that we were encouraged to have the knowledge to utilize, and these objectives are some of the greatest takeaways I have personally grasped onto. For it has made me a better analytical reader, writer and has made me more self critical of my work when I am starting any essay or assignment. 

Writing about language differences pertaining to AAVE definitely helped me to achieve learning goal number one, which is “recognize the role of language attitudes and standards in empowering, oppressing, and hierarchizing languages and their users, and be open to communicating across different languages and cultures.” Learning about this helped me be more understanding of the influence that language attitudes have on certain cultural groups. In my research process I definitely learned the skills necessary to help me achieve learning goal number two, “explore and analyze, in writing and reading, a variety of genres and rhetorical situations.”  These skills ranged from knowing what to look for exactly, to interpreting the importance of a subject matter and how it would apply to my work. I have since learned how crucial these skills are when it comes to doing research for a research paper, mainly due to the complexity there is within researching a direct subject. 

In doing the discussion boards and language narrative analysis it helped me to achieve learning goal number three, “develop strategies for reading, drafting, collaborating, revising, and editing.”  By allowing me to collaborate with other students and work constructively to provide different perspectives I have seen for myself how productive and influential it can be to have someone else interpret your work and provide feedback on it. Whether the feedback is constructive criticism or praise, both have very beneficial and lasting effects to a writer’s development.  When it came to reading the language narrative by Gloria Anzaldúa, and drawing out certain points to base my essay on, it helped me to achieve learning goal number four which is “recognize and practice key rhetorical terms and strategies when engaged in writing situations.” I was able to achieve this learning goal by really reading the narrative by Gloria Anzalúa in a more analytical perspective. Doing this allowed me to carefully extract all the rhetorical strategies she used in her narrative and to analyze it in a way that made me appreciate her narrative all the more. For when it came down to my realization of all these techniques, it made me realize how important this paper was to the author and her reason for writing it. 

Within the Class facilitation for professor Caitlin, and peer reviews in Professor Mollys class it helped me to achieve learning goal number five, “engage in the collaborative and social aspects of writing processes.” After completing the class facilitation and peer reviews I was able to further explore the benefits there are within working with others to complete an assignment. Not only was I able to achieve this goal, but I was able to learn much more on how to work in a group setting with others that may have opposing or aligning views toward the completion of the assignment.  Within doing my research for the Class facilitation and the I- Search Project I would say it helped me to achieve learning goal number six, which is to “understand and use print and digital technologies to address a range of audiences.” I was given the ability to achieve this learning goal after both professors had meticulously provided the different ways to analyze these resources thoroughly and efficiently. 

After completing the library visit in both Molly and Caitlins class it  helped me to achieve learning goal number seven, “locate research sources (including academic journal articles, magazine and newspaper articles) in the library’s databases or archives and on the Internet and evaluate them for credibility, accuracy, timeliness, and bias.” This library visit allowed me to really understand the many different databases, and media outlets I have access to though our school’s library.  The process of learning how to properly write a rhetorical precis definitely helped me to achieve learning goal number eight, which was “compose texts that integrate your stance with appropriate sources using strategies such as summary, critical analysis, interpretation, synthesis, and argumentation.” This process requires a specific amount of direct information as well as a bold argument to be made, and with there being many instances in my writing this semester when I used direct information and made a bold claim, there is doubt that this writing goal was achieved and carried out quite swiftly.

Before beginning my research for the I-Search project we as a class reviewed the proper ways to cite different text sources as well as video sources. Doing this helped me to achieve final learning goal number nine, which is to“practice systematic application of citation conventions.” I find this to be the most crucial and important learning objective since it requires us to thoroughly understand the different ways there are to properly use citations in different scenarios. Without the ability to understand the use of proper citations, it can have a damaging effect on the authenticity of our writing. 

Learning these many skills has been crucial to my learning as an analytical writer throughout this course. Through using, practicing, and understanding these many different learning objectives I have been given a new outlook on writing more thoroughly, with more detail, and knowing how to be more direct with information I’m using in my papers. I am more grateful than anything for these incredible writing skills as I know I will continue to utilize them as the many years come.