To start off I want to compare on my perspective of a writing into the day question to display if I have changed. At the start of the semester the prompt given for writing into the day was “What do you want grading to do for you?”. My response to that was “I want grading to motivate me to do better and help me improve”. Then at the end of the semester we were asked the question again and my response after was “I want grading to give me a reality check of where I’m at in the class but not be so major that I am stressing about it”.

The difference about these phrases is that the first phrase, “I want grading to motivate me to do better and help me improve,” expresses a desire for grades to serve as a positive motivator, encouraging the individual to strive for improvement and success. The second phrase, “I want grading to give me a reality check of where I’m at in the class but not be so major that I am stressing about it,” indicates a desire for grades to be realistic in terms of one’s progress in class, but not overly stressful or significant. In general, the first phrase highlights the potential for grades to be used as a tool for motivation and self-improvement, while the second phrase acknowledges the importance of grades as a means of tracking progress, but also emphasizes the importance of avoiding unnecessary stress or pressure. Both phrases suggest a nuanced understanding of the role that grades can play in the learning process, and the importance of finding a balance between the use of grades as a motivator and the need to maintain a healthy and stress-free approach to learning.

Another example of my growth/gain in this class was learning about other scholarly citations and learning about other rhetorical devices. For one of the writing into the day prompts the question was what scholarly citations am I familiar with and is it hard or frustrating to cite them and I stated “The main scholarly citation that I have experienced has been mla format and that’s pretty much it. It has become very known so there are websites that format it for you but it is frustrating when websites are missing information”. This is saying at the time I only really knew about mla format but after that we had a whole lesson on the different ones and now I know about apa and chicago also. I also learned that the one that is required to use is varied depending on what major the student is studying for.