Unit 1 Reflection 9/19/16

My first synthesis paper was much different than any papers I had written before. In high school we never wrote a paper more than one and a half pages so this paper was much longer. I personally struggled with finding enough things to write about and expand on my prompt so that was a challenge. Rewriting my intro in class definitely helped me a lot with thinking of the prompt differently. It helped me expand more and introduce my prompt more efficiently. This paper was slightly frustrating just because thinking about the length can really get in your head even though it ended up not being that bad. Knowing you have never done a paper that long before can give you anxiety because you might feel like you don’t have enough to write about. I often reflected on Lamott’s “Shitty First Drafts”. This helped me because it reminded me that it did not have to be perfect. Writing is a long process that involves many trials and errors. I feel like I have already grown academically in college. I am much better at citing my sources and introducing my quotes. I have also improved in relating my citations to my prompt. Having a writing partner helped me a lot. My partner helped me realize things that I did not know I had wrong or overlooked. In order to improve my work, next time I can work on my citations even more and be even more familiar with them. I can spend more time re reading my essay and making sure everything is correct.