Andrew Barillas

Professor Lee

FYS 191

August 9th, 2022

FYS 191: Comparative Ethnic Experiences Class Reflection

Taking the FYS 191 class has allowed me to become a better critical thinker by allowing
me to learn what metacognition is and use it to take my thinking skills to a deeper level.
Metacognition means to think about thinking and by practicing this with the readings we had to
do for the class, has allowed me to properly process my thoughts and emotions clearer than I
have ever been able to do so previously. Before taking this class, I would read just to read, with
no thoughts behind it nor did I think about what was going on in my head as I took the
information being presented to me; and when It came time to summarize or understand the text, I
wasn’t able to retain the key points of the text. Now, having practiced metacognition numerous
times, I have realized that I am more connected and more engaged with the text and with my
thoughts, and because of it, it allows me to comprehend texts that are more complex and even
helps me overcome confusion. The reason behind this improvement in being a better critical
thinker is because the reading strategies used to help me think about thinking, lets me get in
touch with something deeper than regular thoughts, it’s as if I am having a direct conversation
with my consciousness which is needed in order to reach being able to think critically about
topics being discussed. Moreover, something that I learned in this class that I did not know how
to do before is learning how to be patient when reading. Every time I was required to read a book
for a class, I would skim through the pages and even at times skip pages, simply because I did
not want to do the reading and get it over with as soon as possible but in effect, it was ruining my
thinking skills. Over the course of this past month, I used the new skills I was taught in this class
and slowly became more patient when reading because these skills stimulated my brain in a way
that did not require me to resort to distracting my brain so that it’s engaged by the time I come
back to the text again. This gave me the patience needed to be able to read long passages for long
periods of time by giving my brain something to do while reading so that I don’t get bored of the
text quickly. In addition, something I would do differently if I were teaching this class would be
to make it more interactive. Rather than just focusing on the reading logs, I would have
prioritized discussion boards and the discussions conducted in class because it gives the students
a chance to express their thoughts freely while explaining how they got to their understanding
rather than reading logs where we are limited to only explaining our thoughts on one quote. I
believe doing it this way would make students want to learn even more than they do now and be
fully present instead of having some students dozing off and others sleeping in class.