I felt that our instructions for each paper where very clear and specific as to what was expected in each paper. With such detailed instructions I found that writing this semester was much easier for me than it has been in the past. I didn’t have to do as much revising and I think this is because I worked really hard on building an outline for each paper. In the section that follows I will explaine the work that went into each paper, i.e. research, audience, and strategies used to appeal to my readers.
Community Writing Campaign- This is a newsletter I created for a group community writing campaign. My group chose to visit Whitier Elementry school in Salt Lake City and give a presentation to the first grade classes on good dental hygiene. We were able to provide a dental hygiene kit for each child to take home along with the newletter. This newsletter was to inform the parents what their children learned in class about how to take care of their teeth. When writing this piece I felt that it was important to filter the information offered to the parents. I didn’t want to scare the parents with offering anything too overwhelming. I felt that it was important to offer informative information but also give a few eye catching statistics to draw their attention to the seriousness of good dental hygiene. This was a fun project for me to work on and it allowed me to be more artistic than some of the other genre pieces.
Visual Analysis Paper- This paper was meant to show my readers my stegnths of writing good descriptions and painting a good visual picture for them. I decided to use a picture from the 4th Street Clinic website because it is a very well known clinic that offers services to all different walks of life and receives a lot of page views. I was interested to analyze the effectivness of these pictures chosen to be displayed on their site.
My audience was meant to be someone who is interested in website development or advertising. This paper was writen to show the importance that pictures play in conveying messages to readers. Pictures can envoke emotions that words can not. Words and pictures together are extreamly powerful and this piece shows that power.
I took the suggestions made in my peer review and worked them into my paper. For example, I moved the picture to a different location giving the reader time to visualize the picture I was painting for them, then provided the picture at a latter time so the reader could compare it to my description. I also seperated my last paragraph into two parts to make for a more structured conclusion.
Rhetorical Analysis Essay- This paper was chosen to display my ability to think criticaly. I evaluated the website for the Ronald McDonald House Charity. My intended audience was website developers or anyone looking to learn more about what is effective and not effective on websites. The Ronald McDonalds House Charity website was well managed and well designed. Writing this paper helped me understand the importance of visual appeal and easy navigation on websites. This was an important lesson because shortly following this assignment I was asked to develop real world documents with visual appeal and develop a website to display them.
In the second to last paragraph I added to the paper by giving more insight to my reader who might visit the site and why they might visit the site. I also gave some further detail regarding some of the tabs on the site such as what they may be used for. To round up a solid analysis I changed the title of the paper in hopes of drawing in my readers.
Public Report- I chose this piece to display in my portfolio because I feel that it was a stong piece of work. Writing a report was never my strong suite and what made this even harder for me was writing a report for the real world. My biggest challenge when writing this paper was keeping my voice and opinion out. This paper took many revisions and peer reviews to get to the point it is at now.
This paper took the most research and required a lot of attention to detail. Another challenge was geting the information and putting it into my own words. Additionaly, finding and interpreting the information and selecting what information to include in the writings required much effort. There is so much information offered in books, on the internet and school resources, that making sure my resources were credeble was a tetious task but possibly one of the most important. Writing a public report requires that one include informaiton that people care to read and assure that the information provided is valid. I feel that my paper, Sex Education in Schools, addresses a topic that many parents and children alike are interested in reading about.
Position Paper- This was my favorite paper to write because I got to share my opinion. Coincidentaly, I felt like this was my strongest piece of the semester. This paper really illistrates my stregnths of design appeal, ablitity to draw in my reader and think criticaly. Although this was an opinion piece, I was able to think outside the box and look at my opinon from different angles and offer that to my readers. I feel that this piece is somthing that could truely be published in a Planned Parenthood newsletter, magazine or even an online article for a variety of websites.
Critical Reflection on a Public Policy- On this paper I had to be really careful to not take sides. What I did try to do is show the reader how my experiences with the Planned Parenthood organization had changed my feelings and views on the topic of abortion. This paper was challenging for me. I had to learn how to incorperate credible sources, opinons, facts and critical thoughts all in one paper. I believe that this type of writing could be used as an article in a newspaper, or even on the Planned Parenthood website. Although, it is MY refection on a public policy, I believe that others are interested in hearing my opinions. I feel that I was able to reflect on the a public policy with an open mind and that is what will make my paper stand out against others.
For the final paper I revised a little at the end of the paper and added more on how my opinions where formed. I added words to encourage others to challenge there beliefs as well, so they can feel confident in their positions.
