Antonio Sepulveda

Writing 37
Lynda Haas
November 7, 2015

Midterm Portfolio
Group work is something that I had to get accustomed to, because I'm used to
relying on myself to learn the content of the class objective. As well as splitting work up
and having faith that my group members won't slack off and will put in the same effort
as I do. A prime example of our trust in each other was shown in the culture fairy tale
video project. My group that consisted of Isaac and Cassidy split up the work and gave
each other a deadline, by which we had to have it all done. Since Isaac was in charge of
creating the website it was very vital that me and Cassidy get all the research done on
time. At the beginning I had some dough that we were going to be able to complete the
assignment on time, because with 3 hours left till our deadline we hadn't started the
powerpoint to literally lead to the video. But next thing you now all the pictures and
words were in the powerpoint and it looked great. We had all the research done and left
Isaac two days to turn it into a video. This assignment helped me learn to trust my
partners because like me they are not trying to fail the class. Another way they have
helped me out is going over the assigned reading from the night before and filling in
things that I may have not understood or picked up while reading. Seeing things from
someone else's eyes or mind is a good thing because not everyone thinks the same
and everyone has their own unique paradigm that allows them to comprehend things
differently. Another reason why I was open to working with friends was because it was a

great way to make friends. It being my first year at the school and commuting thought
that it was going to be impossible to make friends on campus because of the little time I
spend on campus. But now I feel that Isaac and Cassidy will be there if I ever need their
help and I will be there for them to.
Other things we have done in the class is doing Connect work and weekly blogs
to reflect what we have done and learned in the class. The connect work has helped me
improve my grammar and structure of sentences. It helped me realize that I needed to
brush up on some of the basic punctuations. My use of semicolons and commas has
improved thanks to the practices. I like how it doesn't continue your progress unless you
get the answers correct and monitors the topics you struggle with and are successful
with. The reflection blogs are something that when you first told us to do was just gonna
be busy work. But after doing them now for a while I learned that they are necessary.
They help me gather my thoughts and truly understand all the work we did for the week.
I think after writing my second blog I learned that I will be able to be successful in this
class along as I do all my work and keep my focus. I like the blogs because I express
my thoughts on the work and when I look back at them, I know how much time I should
leave myself to complete a future assignment like it.
The most successful thing we have done in class is the peer editing of the
rhetorical analysis rough draft. For my personal essay I learned that I could go into
more depth on the way that 21st century feminism has influenced the character
convention of women's roles in fairy tales. People seemed to really like what I wrote
about how same sex intercourse was deeply frowned append, since the christian church
had a strong power over the people of the time. I also thought that my rough draft was

great and wasn't going to need much help but after reading other people's drafts and
reading the suggestions I learned that it needs some work. Most people did not think my
introduction was on topic and focused mainly on me and not the fairy tale genre. By
reading others writings I now know what to add to my own essay to improve it,making it
more successful and something I can be proud of. I think that the peer editing in class is
more successful then the one in connect because we got to hear the person advice and
comments about our essay rather then just reading them.
I feel that I have become a better writer due to this class. I have also learned to
analyze a work correctly and that I need to talk about its overall affect, and not just stop
after summarizing or explaining what the quote says. The place I have grown the most
is in my love for reading. Before entering this class I never read a book on my own and
didn't even read the books that were assigned in my high school language arts classes.
Since starting this class I have read two books on my own. I have read the books Tell
No One and the book My stalker. My new love for this helps me pass time when I'm
bored and no longer tend to watch television or play video games. My vocabulary and
word comprehension has also improved from being exposed to the old tales by the
Grimm brothers and others from the 1800s.
The fact that for every reading assignment we were required to write a detailed
summary and write down important facts was very useful. When it was time to write my
rough draft I did not need to go back and reread any of the stories. All I had to do was
look at my summaries and from there I chose the stories I would use as my topic. I
really hated reading them and having to write down the summaries because it would

take a lot of time, but believe it was the most useful thing we did to help us in our
essay.
The one thing I have failed in is my time management. From work to school and
still wanting to do things with my friends for fun, I often find myself struggling to finish
some assignment on time. But now I have made myself a plan that allows me 2 nights a
week to do stuff with friends and every other night will be to do homework and to study
for tests. I will now be using my time more efficiently and learned that my education
should be my priority. UCI at first was not my dream school, I wanted to go to Cal Poly
San Luis Obispo, but I did not have enough money to be able to live there. But with my
time here at this campus I have fallen in love with the school and the environment it
brings. I feel that god sent me here on purpose because I will be successful here.