FYS Final Reflection

In this reflection, I will discuss the many aspects that contributed to my achievement of the FYS goals. I will examine my progression in learning to write an argumentative piece and the places where I felt I succeeded and struggled, as well as looking into my critical reading and oral communication skills. The majority of this reflection will focus on my writing, because that is where I felt I struggled, learned, and improved the most. Although I learned a lot on every assignment, I will draw on a few pieces that I feel really showed my strengths, weaknesses, and overall progression.

We started off the semester with a short response paper in which we were asked to imagine how a utopian community would live. Being that I had very little background knowledge on utopias, this question really made me think. I found myself describing what my utopia would look like, but I failed to describe how they would live. I wrote that there would be no violence, stereotyping, or poverty, and opportunities would be equally distributed among the members of society. I think I was able to successfully describe what my utopia would look like, but like I said, I failed to answer the question of how the community would live. From this very first assignment, I realized just how hard writing a fully thought out response would be in 500 words, and this proved to be even more of a challenge in the second response paper. This question asked us to examine how Plato teaches the reader about justice through Socratic dialogue. I ended up summarizing the plot, by giving the definition of justice that each man had said and then Socrates’ response. For example, I wrote, “The first definition came from Cephalus, a wise old man who claimed justice is ‘to speak the truth and repay what one has borrowed’[i]. By refuting this statement, Socrates is teaching the reader that justice does not necessarily have a legal basis and that by following the law, one is not necessarily just”(response paper 2, page 1). Although I think this is a good point, I realized it does not answer the question. I then continued this pattern with the remaining definitions, before turning to the creation of the city, where I once again summarized what the city looked like. In the first few assignments of the year, I found myself having a tendency to summarize what I had read, which made these response papers difficult for me. As I pointed out in my midterm reflection, I attribute this tendency with the way I was taught to write in high school. I was used to pulling out textual evidence to support an already given argument, which is exactly what I found myself doing in the first few responses. I was not making my own argument, but rather I was summarizing the author’s claim and finding evidence that supports that claim. It was not until our first big essay that I began to understand the idea of forming my own argument.

For essay one, we were asked to discuss the guardians’ way of life and the happiness derived from it. I think this paper is where I can see the biggest transformation in my writing. With the workshop we did prior to writing this essay, it became clear to me that I needed to come up with my own arguments, rather than just stating the author’s argument. In this paper, I was able to pull out what Plato was trying to say about the guardians, as well as formulate my own argument based on textual evidence. This is evident in my thesis, where I wrote, “According to Plato, the guardians’ communal lifestyle makes them the epitome of justice; therefore, allowing them to achieve happiness for themselves and in turn, the city as a whole. Although in theory this seems likely and attainable, it is questionable as to whether the guardians are truly just, and consequently, whether they are able to ensure the entire city is both just and happy” (essay 1, page 1). I think I clearly stated my argument, and I was able to back up this claim with textual evidence. After realizing what it meant to make my own argument, the next couple of response papers were easier for me to write and I was more successful in writing them. For me, response paper five was my best response because I was able to make an argument and effectively back it up. I argued the importance of More’s background in liberal education and his views on idleness for the writing of utopia. I found many connections and parallels between his personal beliefs and aspects of the story utopia, which I used to prove my point. I feel as though all the corrections I had been given on past responses I fixed in this one, and I was able to write a clear, argumentative essay in only 500 words.

We then moved into learning how to write our own analytical question to which we had to write a response. It was difficult for me to come up with questions, and I found myself coming up with ones that were way too broad. This is evident in my response paper six, where I asked the question, “How does Rousseau distinguish the savage man from the civilized man”. Reading over my response again, I realized how broad that question is and that is encompasses basically the entire book. It was a very open ended question where I could pick one specific difference between the two and then elaborate on it, which is what I did. However, my question was so broad that it was hard to have a definitive answer and I found myself more describing the difference rather than analyzing what the difference meant. Although I ended up writing a fairly good response, the question I came up with would have worked better for a longer essay, so I would have more words to elaborate and analyze.

For the most part, my writings for the rest of the semester went fairly well, and I continued to try to formulate my own argument. I do not think I made any big improvements since learning that I needed to come up with my own claim. However, the last essay for me was a bit of a struggle and major step backwards in my progress. I did not make my own argument, but rather I stated the arguments of both More and Rousseau. Before receiving my grade for this paper, I thought this would end up being one of my better papers. I understood the arguments of both authors and thought I clearly weaved them together throughout my paper. I thought that I answered the question perfectly, but after receiving my grade and comments I realized I was wrong. I went back and read my paper along with the comments and I found I completely forgot to make my own argument. I realized that I misunderstood the question, for when it asked us to compare the arguments of the two authors, I just did that without making my own claim. I also realized that I misread parts of the text and made assumptions that I should not have made. I think part of this has to do with my reading comprehension skills.

When it comes to reading, I have never been the best reader. I usually understand what I read, but often times I have to reread passages to make sure I completely grasped what the author was trying to say. Sometimes however, I tend to make assumptions about what the author is trying to say without enough evidence to back up my assumption. As I already stated, this was the case in my essay two. This was also the case for my response paper three. For example, I misread Plato’s ideas on women and education. I thought he was in complete support of education for everyone, but I failed to understand the elitist attitude of Plato and that he only believes those who are smart enough should be educated. Although there were times I misread the text, I think one of my strengths is being able to find adequate evidence from the text to support a claim. I also think I am good at pulling out the author’s argument, which can be seen in my response paper four, where we were asked to read an article and find the author’s argument. The one thing I have definitely learned this semester about reading is the importance of active reading and taking notes. This not only helped me understand the material, but it also made writing my papers a lot easier because I could go back and look at my notes and the passages I marked as important.

The final aspect of my learning that contributed to my achieving the FYS goals is my oral communication. As I stated in my midterm reflection, I did not participate as much in class discussion as I had wanted to in the beginning of the semester. I never felt like it was the right time to say something, and I did not want to take away someone else’s turn at speaking. However, I soon became a lot more comfortable with our class and realized that me speaking out did not inhibit any else from also talking, and in fact it was beneficial to my learning and the class’ learning. I think the second half of the semester I did a fairly good job speaking my mind and contributing to class discussion. I felt most comfortable speaking during presentations because I knew I was 100% prepared. I think that was evident in our first big oral presentation, when we had to read the exhibit source and connect it to More’s utopia. I also felt I did well speaking during our more informal presentations, when our small groups were asked to prepare questions and lead discussion on a particular part of the reading. One place I struggled with my oral communication was my final presentation of my research. I think the reason my final presentation did not go as well as I had hoped was because I did not prepare as much as I would have liked. I knew what I wanted to say, but I did not put enough time into preparing, and therefore it came across as unclear and unorganized.

Although my research presentation did not go as well as I had hoped, I think the overall research process was a success for me. Despite a very modern topic, I was able to find sufficient sources that helped answer my research question. Although my question was quite broad, I think it worked because it allowed me to fully discover everything that makes Camphill a utopia. I learned a lot about the research process, designing your own research question, and how to create a proper annotated bibliography.

Overall, I think I achieved the goals of FYS. I definitely learned what it means to write an argumentative piece, and although I am not super consistent in my writing, I know what it is I am supposed to do. I did not follow the typical progress timeline, where every paper gets better and better and the final one is my best. Rather, I learned what it means for a paper to be argumentative and I was able to see where I was successful in my writing and where I needed some work. I definitely feel as though I am better able to communicate my ideas, as well as read and think critically.

 

[i] Plato, Republic, Translated by C.D.C. Reeve, Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 2004, 5