Alexandrea Enfield

Zack De Piero
December 02,2015
Metacognitive Reflection: Finding my Voice

Some of my fondest memories of my life date back to those good, old grade school days.
Despite being teased for always smelling like mustard,(which to be fair I totally deserved since I
would eat mustard packs like they were candy) these were the easiest and most relaxed years of
my life. I always received 4s and 5s on my report cards and it was a time where math hadnt
adopted the alphabet quite yet. I was even thrown into some program called GATE which is for
the academically gifted kids--although now that I think about it, I think every student was told
they were apart of the GATE program. Above all though, I truly blossomed in writing. I was
always told that I was a strong writer by my teachers and by my parents, so obviously being the
nave little kid I was, I believed them.
Grade school eventually ended and I transitioned into middle school, then eventually high
school, with each year growing a bit more challenging academically and socially. I always
figured that in high school I would truly be able to develop my voice as a writer. I mean I was
leaving behind my confused and awkward years of puberty, for more exciting and mature years
that come with being a pre-adult. So I took honor language arts classes throughout all of highschool and I eventually took the advanced placement literature class my senior year. I was taught
throughout all my four years of high-school to write a certain way. You begin your essay with a
catchy little grabber, maybe an interesting fact or a quote and then you write your XYZ thesis.
Your next three paragraphs then cover the X,Y,and Z that your thesis discusses, you include some

quotes from a source that is relevant to the topic of your paper, and then you analyze these quotes
a bit. Lastly, you end your essay with a conclusion paragraph summarizing up your essay and
restating you XYZ thesis. I thought that there was nothing wrong with this structure, it was easy
and fast, so why change it? Besides, even if I did change it the teachers would have me rewrite
the essay to fit the structure that common core says is acceptable. Then I realized that I no longer
enjoyed writing. It became a chore that I no longer reveled in and that I dreaded more than
picking up the dogs poop. I missed being able to write about what I wanted to write about, or to
choose the genre or at least the structure of my own essay. Every time I would write a paper, I
felt as if my voice had been sucked up out of me and I was just spitting out essays like the
SCIgen does.
Although I didnt enjoy writing anymore, I figured well I must be pretty decent at it, so I
minus well take it as a class for my first quarter of college, it should be pretty elementary. Fastforward to the first day of writing class, and I see my teacher with his Birkenstock sandals,
grown out facial hair, and long locks, and Im pretty sure he had already dropped the f-bomb
within the first ten minutes of class too. Honestly, as laid back as Zack looked, I figured that the
class shouldnt be anything challenging. Well after the first writing project, I began to realize that
this class was not going to be one of those classes where I can get by, by putting in hardly any
work. I learned very quickly that this class definitely required a lot of dedication and hard work.
After the first writing project, which I thought I had totally hit out of the ballpark, I received
back a score of 7 out of 10 points. For the first time in my life, I was struggling in a subject that
teachers and my family have always told me is my strongest subject. I began to read through
Zacks comments, this thesis statement isnt arguing anything about genres /conventions and,
Ok, I'm wondering: so what? What does this have to do with your argument? For my second

writing project, Zack commented, this is a tough one, but try inserting more of your own
voice into this. It was really refreshing to actually receive back some critical analysis on my
writing. I finally felt that I had the freedom to write in a less conventional manner. I just needed
to get back in touch with my own voice again, which can definitely be a difficult thing to find.
A lot of the course readings helped me to develop my own voice in writing again. From the
course reader, Murder!(Rhetorically Speaking) by Janet Boyd, I learned that when it comes to
writing, choosing how to express your meaning is every bit as important as the message itself,
which is really what rhetoric is. I noticed right away that this class focused a lot on genre
conventions, which was something that I had never covered in my high school writing courses. I
knew what genres were, and I could differentiate a piece of fiction from a non-fiction piece, but I
had never given any thought to the conventions that surround genres. Even when we began to
learn about conventions in class I didnt think that they were necessary for me to learn in order to
become a better writer, but of course I was wrong. As Kerry Dirk writes best in Navigating
Genres, knowing what a genre is used for can help people to accomplish goals, whether that
goal be getting a job by knowing how to write a stellar resume, winning a persons heart by
writing a romantic love letter, or getting into college by writing an effective personal statement.
Focusing on genre conventions has helped me to understand what an author wants me as a reader
to take from their writing piece, while also allowing me to find structure in my own essays.
I notice that before I read an article now, I consider what genre it is and the specific
conventions that surround that genre. It makes it easier for me to keep an eye out for those
conventions and to then analyze what is really being said. Although there are conventions that
surround every writing piece, this doesnt mean that you have to follow them all. That is so
important for me to understand, because when I first learned about conventions I felt so

overwhelmed by how many exist for each genre. Writing takes practice and it takes finding your
balance between your own voice and genre conventions that really makes a piece unique.
Another interesting concept that Ive learned this quarter is how to explore an authors moves.
An authors moves can be anything from their diction, tone, or structure of their essay.
Writing is like a dance, you have to try out new moves until you find your flow and youve
created a beautifully, synced, final result.
I know that this may sound very clich of me, but after taking this writing course, I can
honestly say that Im a changed writer. I finally had a teacher who was there to give me honest
feedback on how to improve upon my writing. I feel that I have also found my voice in my
writing again, and that I have grown to become an overall, stronger writer. I know that I will
need a lot more practice in writing if I want to improve upon my skills, which is part of the
reason why I will be taking another writing course next quarter. I have also grown to learn that
every teachers opinion on what a good writer looks like varies, so I should never set my goals
to be to impress my teacher, but instead to impress myself. I feel a lot more comfortable with my
writing abilities and I know that I am prepared to tackle on any genre that comes my way. I know
that I will be perfectly capable of writing a job resume now, which is something that I actually
need to hop on fast. Most importantly though, writing is a way to make observations about what
is going on in the world around us, and to then make sense of it. I know that I will continue to
take what I have learned from this course to apply it to my future writing pieces. I am thankful
that this class has taught me to appreciate the importance of writing again.

Work Cited

1. Boyd, Janet. Writing spaces: readings on writing. Volume 1. Murder!

(Rhetorically Speaking). Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication
Data,2010. Parlorpress.Web. 03 December 2015.

2. Dirk,Kerry. Writing spaces: readings on writing. Volume 1. Navigating

Genres. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data,2010.
Parlorpress.Web. 03 December 2015.