For my college Research Writing class, I’m writing an essay on sustainable engineering. This assignment has, so far, greatly reflected my Information Skills. I’ve had to use a variety of sources that all related enough to the topic (not too broad). I’ve had to choose reliable, CRAAP tested sources as well. I’ve been taking notes and dialectical journals on the individual sources so that I could use those notes in my essay. I’ve created outlines and used many different types of sources.
From this assignment, I’m most proud of the visual essay outlines that i created. They have really helped me organize my thoughts and in a visually appealing and creative way. I’ve even received compliments on them. I don’t know if it’s something other people do too, but I figured out that I could decorate my outlines using related pictures to help illustrate the points I want to talk about.
I developed on my 21st century skills by learning more about new note taking methods that help glean information from sources as well as reflect on them. One method I learned about this semester was Dialectical Journals, which I’ve found very effective. I also learned how to apply the CRAAP test to all of my potential sources. Finally, I’ve devised new ways of mapping out and outlining the information i’ve gained so far for my essay.
The most difficult part of working on this essay was probably time management. “Information gleaning” can be a long, time consuming process. I’ve found that I need to set aside at least a few hours a week to simply look at sources and map out my thoughts. I also ran into a sort of ‘information overload’ dilemma. There’s so much information on the web, but not all of it is useful. Sometimes it’s hard to assess this information and figure out what you want to use. Finally, I’ve had trouble staying organized. It’s a big issue for me but I’m taking baby steps. My professor suggested to the class that we should create special workspaces for our essays. I’m currently working on that; I’m trying to clear off one of my desks to designate it as a ‘sustainable engineering research center’.
As for improving my work, the assignment isn’t finished or due yet. But, I plan to start interweaving my outlines so that I can focus in better on my topic and weed out unnecessary subtopics. I want to create an organized study and research space for collecting information. And, finally, I want to start typing up paragraphs containing information that I know I want to include in my essay.
In the past, took English 100 and our final project was a research essay. The knowledge I gained from that experience has really helped me with my current essay. I also learned MLA in the past and I’m pretty sure I can do most of my citations with my eyes closed at this point. I learned about the CRAAP test in the past and I also learned basic note taking skills. I was also very aware of the importance of outlines. For all of my writing, I must have an outline to stay on track. What I’ve learned thus far from this assignment will probably be very beneficial in my future learning. For one thing, research writing is very important in college. Also, I want to be affiliated with academia in the future and this type of writing is crucial, basically non negotiable. I’m hoping that what i’ve learned will help my writing in the future and possibly prevent me from becoming one of those boring academic writers (like the majority of the people that write textbooks). Hopefully I will be able to add a little bit of sparkle into my academic writing.