Throughout the course “Writing for the Sciences”, I have learned much about myself and have used this year to reflect on my writing. I never really considered myself to be a strong writer, however, I have my strengths and weaknesses. While taking this class, I have learned the importance of each course’s learning objective for this year’s course which will be discussed all through this essay. The most significant objectives this course has taught me is the importance of drafting, reading, writing etc and the exposure to collaborative and social aspects of writing processes. 

         Beginning from the first objective, I find that when writing the rhetorical analysis, “The Epidemic of Spiking Your Best Friends Eggnog”,  I wanted this work to be different from my previous analysis. What helped me achieve this goal was the exercises given for homework that we then had to discuss in class. An example would be the “Rhetorical Analysis in the Real World: A Useful Thinking Tool” where a picture of a woman standing in front of the cops was analyzed and interpreted. Reading and understanding the different ways an analysis is broken apart, ranging from how the woman is standing in the photo to answering and asking questions that may be unsettling to the reader about the indirect messages. Thus, when writing my rhetorical analysis I made sure to dive into the side of the ad I chose that came from the controversial perspective which many people would find uncomfortable to read, however, the purpose of the analysis was to break down the purpose of the ad in the first place. Because I wanted to learn and grow as a writer I also needed to improve my editing, revising, reading and drafting. Prior to Writing of the Sciences I often did not write drafts. I felt as if a draft was pointless and unnecessary. However, when we began peer editing that not only changed my perspective on drafting but my abilities to revise, edit, and read. Seeing the work and ideas that other people put into their own writing opened my eyes to the opportunities my writing capabilities were missing. My drafting skills for individual work still lack, but I have begun to open up to drafting and the benefits it has to my writing. 

        Collaborative work was generally new to me as I have not created a children’s book or split research with my peers. My group members were great to work with and I didn’t find a challenge between finding the balance of my writing expectations and the audience based on our topic of eating disorders as I put myself in the position of the audience. I understood what they were looking for while also being able to meet my writing goals. My personal goals included covering each subtopic as thoroughly as possible, informative while also engaging and staying on topic. As the audience I would want each section to be easy to understand while also keeping my attention. The literature review was very informative, thus the genre being strictly non-fiction. In addition to the genre, the audience could relate to some of the information provided hence keeping the readers engaged as the rhetoric appealed through pathos. Therefore, by putting

myself in the perspective of the audience, I was able to write in a way that satisfied my goals as a writer but also as the reader. Finding sources for this research project was important because I needed correct information thus why I used the library database. Using the library database wasn’t a challenge for me as it is similar to google scholar which I frequently used last semester. I found that research projects this semester were different from previous because I had to thoroughly read and understand the articles that were provided so that I could articulate myself in the best way possible and incorporate the specific details related to our topic. I also did not want to bring down my group with my subpar research. My group members were also very dedicated students and worked their best, however, this was not the case in my previous group projects. We split the work into three sections as there were three different topics discussed, making it easier to assign responsibilities. When working in a group, however, I found that ideas may clash and the work of one person may not be acceptable to another. This was a challenge faced during the project, but as groupmates we worked together to face these challenges and came together to create a project that everyone could feel proud of. In order to find inspiration for our project we brainstormed children book formats that could be used for non-fiction. During our search we found several different examples and ideas. It was important to study different styles of writing because it gave us a broader understanding of how to write a book targeting a specific audience. 

Lastly, when creating a presentation me and my group wanted to make it clear that eating disorders are not condoned and are a serious problem amongst adolescents. Therefore, throughout the presentation we provided the effects of the eating disorders (i.e. binge eating, bulimia, and anorexia nervosa), risk factors, and what to do in the case of having an eating disorder or knowing someone that does. We kept the presentation strictly informational and included several case studies for the children to diagnose the patients to keep it engaging as well. Addressing course learning adjective eight, I did have a problem paraphrasing the information from the collaborative project into the slides because I wanted to include as much information as possible. However, a children’s book can not have too many words a page in order for the children to stay interested so we had to learn how to further summarize and paraphrase the details. The case studies required the students to analyze the subject and find a solution, therefore, we had to make sure the content of the book included a clear analysis of each eating disorder and how to prevent them. 

Writing for the Sciences was a great learning course for me as I was challenged and learned how to grow as a writer. I will take these learning objectives into my future courses and continue to learn how to become a better writer,  reader, and editor and apply what I learn in future courses to this year’s objectives as well.