Reflective Essay

Cameron Richard

Professor Jennifer Zukowski

ENG 121

24 April 2017

A Look Back

During the beginning of the semester I had a couple goals. First, to get used to the formatting and the style of formal written papers. Having taken a speech class prior to this one, some of the habits ended up transferring over. Namely the tendency to use wording that would directly address the audience. Second, to learn how to properly give in-text citations, something which came in handy in some of my other classes, History especially. This was also a great skill to have in my psychology class, as there are many instances which require citations.

These goals were, for the most part, met. I was not able to get 100% consistent with the papers I wrote in that I still had a tendency to say “I” or “you” even in my research papers (current paper notwithstanding, as it’s a reflection on myself). However, I believe that there has been a significant improvement. As well I successfully applied the concept of staying away from such language to my history class, greatly assisting in the professionalism of the paper.  The troubles I had initially with MLA formatting and the issues I had with creating works cited pages were not entirely remedied, however, I have easy to retrieve references for any literary needs.

During the research of my topic, which was an exploration of the concept of small-scale as well as self-sustainable agriculture as a new societal normality. I was quite surprised with the simplicity of the concept of small-scale farming. I had anticipated some fairly sophisticated agricultural techniques in order to compete with the industrial-scale, however it was all simple and natural approaches to the problems. As well it was much more sustainable even economically. I also found out that the larger a farm is the less they make per acre of land, which is contrary to my prior belief that larger operations would perhaps yield larger amounts of money. Equally surprising was how easy it is to grow staple crops such as wheat and corn. The former requiring much less soil nutrients as well as less water. I was also very surprised to discover that there was such a thing as the “Encyclopedia of the Great Plains” which came in handy as far as understanding the different regions of soil quality within Colorado.

If I were to analyze and give my opinion of the strengths of my paper, I would say the depth of investigation. It is always easy for me to find more questions which I think need to be answered for the end picture to be as crystal clear as I can possibly make it. While there are always more questions to ask and more avenues of approach to a subject, you can’t just write a 30 page paper for every topic. Which brings me to what I do poorly with in my papers. I have a tendency to have a sort of convoluted premise. I get so caught up with the details I forget to take a step back and establish the big picture and what it is I’m trying to say.

This class has certainly helped some of my writing and technological skills. Specifically, I’ve improved my typing speed. In fact, I can even sometimes type while watching the professor of my class or my surroundings or the literature on which I am taking notes. This is in stark contrast to how I used to type, which one can liken to a chicken eating seeds off the ground. As far as technology goes, I’ve learned quite a bit about blogs and blogging, something that I previously had no idea what they were really or how to get information from them.

I was pleased when I learned I would be undertaking a research paper. Mostly because I enjoy pretty much every part of the research process. I especially enjoy that “tunneling” feeling I get when I start to ask more specific questions that really get to the “meat” of the subject. The only part I’m not a great fan of is the management of the resources and understanding of when a source is credible or not. Assessing credibility is hard for me, though I am aware that .edu and .gov sources are usually fairly well looked after. The amount of research I do per week usually varies, but I can usually get what I need from 5ish hours of focused digging. I think this is a pretty good amount of researching as I have not had any trouble assembling my papers in time. I could improve my methods, however, if I spent more time going over the notes I’ve taken on the research. As well as assembling more notes as I do my research, rather than relying on flipping back and forth between sources.

My time in this class has certainly given me a few “tools” and tips which I can use for research in the future. There are a few tips I could recommend to those seeking to improve upon their researching skills. First, is the amount and specificity of key words. I often found that even depending on the absence or presence of even a singe word would be able to give me completely separate results. Second, pay attention to the formatting of the website you’re looking at as a potential credible source. If it’s flooded with advertisements and click-bait then it may be less of an informative piece and more of one that has the purpose of drawing in traffic to make money. Finally, be patient. Don’t jump at any source that has relevant topics just because it’s taken quite a while to find anything you can use. It’s much better to dig for your information and to ensure you’re credible rather than to jump on the first thing that looks good so you can be done, as you’ll probably end up looking pretty dumb when your sources are shot-down and all your information is off or just completely untrue. Sticking to these tips and exercising good judgement will ensure an easier time as well as it will expedite the research process and lessen the digging one would need to do.