Welcome to the English class overview

I just about to finish my 2020 fall term, and English class for engineer writing is so fun to take. The class is competitive and took a lot of works but it totally worth it. We have had many interesting writing assignments such as memo, reflection sheets, lab reports, and many other discussions. Other than improving my writing skills, I also learnt how to create a memo, and research for my potential audiances. There are also many other things that I have learnt.

To what extent have I achieved the course learning objectives?

We had several large projects such as memo, engineering proposal and tech descriptions. Each project require every student to write audiences sheet and reflection papers. There are also group discussions and peer reviews. From those projects, we have learnt rhetorical skills, and we also learnt how to find the right kind of sources to appeal the potential audiances. Peer review and reflection paper will help us understand what could have been improved in our writings.

In what ways have my perceptions on what writing is and does evolved this semester? 

Before learning from the professor, I thought writing is just about grammar and right kind of vocabularies. I didn’t thought much about rhetorical skills, citations, audience analysis, or where to find credible sources. After the course, I have learnt how to convey readers. Audience analysis is extremely helpful to understand what my audiences are and how to appeal to my audiences. Writing an engineering proposal will also help us gaining researching skills. I didn’t do well this semester, but I do improve my researching skill compare to before. I learnt where to find reliable sources, such as fundings, authorities so on.

How does the audience impact the content and purpose of my text?

Audience analysis is important. For engineering proposal, we need to know where to get the authorization for a project, and who can fund the program. We also need to know what are our potential audiences, and what literacy level they are in order to better present our proposal to those audiences.

Our team had 2 major projects. One is about blue light glasses usages. We need to know what are potential blue light glasses customers. For research purposes, we also need to know what are the potential candidate for this research projects, and their relationship with gadgets usages. Without knowing audiences, we could not have target the right customers. Another project is about flood resistance housing. We had some trouble with audiences analysis at first, as our team didn’t have a direction to work on. With the help of professor, we gradually realize we need to get permission for our project, and we need to do research on who can give those permissions. We also need to know where to get fundings for the projects. So I think audience impact the content a lot, and we should work more on this area.

What’s the challenge of moving completely online class during the COVID-19 global pandemic?

Schedule is one of the problem. As all courses have been moving online, my sleeping schedule have changed. I got up late twice, but soon I realize the bad habit of sleeping late, and I overcome the problems. I like online classes because I had social anxiety, and online classes help me feel more comfortable. Also we still have projects that require team works, so the online class isn’t completely isolated.

Writing for engineering definitely help me with my future classes. As in previous physics, biology, engineering classes, I got very bad grade in lab reports and I never knew why. Now I can definitely put my newly learnt skills into practice. I do appreciate the times the professor had spent with us.

Sincerely,
Will Takahashi

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