Riley Bender, 5363924

Writing 2 Reflective Cover Letter Draft 1

Dear Mr. Radna,

Throughout this course, I have gained a lot of helpful knowledge that has completely
transformed my perspective towards writing. I have learned to love writing, which I have
realized stems from the ability to express my own opinions and perspectives. The assignments
given to us in this class allowed us to develop our own ideas and gave us a lot of freedom in
what we were able to write about. One of the most beneficial experiences I had during the class
was the journal assignments. I dreaded the first journal assigned to us in the first week because I
did not know how to analyze and reflect upon a text properly yet. The journal assignments we
have completed throughout the course have enhanced my reading and writing abilities
immensely. Throughout most of my academic career, when given articles that I had to reflect on,
I would always end up just summarizing the assigned reading. This was because I wanted to
display my understanding of the material and I thought that this was the way in which my
writing assignment would be considered correct. In the past, I hated receiving broad, open-ended
questions because I had no idea what to write about. But I have recently realized that developing
my own interpretations and perspectives is the best part about writing. Therefore, I am so
grateful that I have learned the importance of expressing my original thoughts because it has
allowed me to overcome this animosity towards writing that I previously had.
In preparation for the first writing project, I learned the true meaning of what a genre
was. Before taking this course, I believed that a genre was a type of creative work that shares
elements of structure, style, or topic matter. After reading our first assigned article, “Navigating
Genres,” by Kerry Dirk, I realized that although this may be true, there is much more to the
meaning of the concept of a genre. Even if two pieces of writing happen to fall under the same
genre, it is possible for them to not look the same at all. The context and location in which the
genre is being used makes a big difference. (Dirk, 2010, p.253) I learned that knowing which
genre to use in a certain situation is much more important to learn than just knowing the various
types of genres.
When completing my first writing project I applied this knowledge. For this assignment,
we were asked to transform a scholarly article into a different genre that was fitting for our
intended audience. The scholarly article I selected was a psychological study about how children
use imitation as a reinclusion tactic after being excluded from a group. I chose this subject
because it was a topic I was learning in my psychology class that I was very interested in. My
intended audience for my project was psychologists that are conducting research on a related
matter. After I established who my target audience was, I had to think of a genre to translate the
information into that would be most beneficial for them to receive it in. I thought that a
powerpoint that addresses the important aspects of the study such as the hypothesis, procedure,
and results would be successful in doing so. Therefore, the main lesson I learned throughout this
first project was that knowing your audience is crucial for successful writing and has a big
impact on the decisions you make in your work.
Throughout the process of completing my writing projects, an aspect of writing that I
believe helped me improve as a writer was the peer-review sessions. In the past, I have always
dreaded peer review because I never wanted to make anyone upset or suggest an idea that they
did not agree with or found offensive. In our assigned reading, “How to Write Meaningful Peer
Response Praise,” the author Ron DePeter highlights the importance of using substantive praise
in peer-review feedback. We can do this by praising their work, but then explaining what makes
the work good. (DePeter, 2020, p. 42) Learning to write detailed and conversational notes on my
classmate’s projects, and receiving them in return, has caused me to become a better reader,
writer, and peer-reviewer. By identifying what I enjoyed in my peer’s writing, it allowed me to
then apply those strategies in my own work. On the other hand, it was helpful to know what my
classmates felt was strong in my writing, so I could continue to utilize them. I am grateful for the
tips my classmates gave me on my projects because they allowed me to reach my full potential in
my writing and offered me the opportunity to see the perspectives of the readers.
 During the second half of the course, we learned about the idea of “Creating a Research
space.” This concept can be defined as the way in which researchers establish their participation
in an ongoing discussion about a specific topic (Wardle and Downs, 2020, p. 62). In the second
writing project, I was asked to research a topic about a question I had towards writing. After
participating in brainstorm activities, I landed upon the research question: what strategies can
writers use to gather their thoughts before writing? We were asked to use a database to find
articles that pertained to our research question. Ultimately, the project allowed us to use
knowledge we learned from our research to answer our research question and offer our own
perspective. When writing my final draft of my literature review I struggled with incorporating
my own ideas pertaining to the subject. However, this was exactly the problem that I was
conducting my research to resolve. It turned out that the idea of the prewriting process is a
conversation that has been going on for a while between many different researchers. The
knowledge I gained from my research has helped me grow as a writer. Although I encountered so
many different perspectives on the matter, and did not really find a specific correct answer, I
gained an extensive amount of strategies that will help me in the future to combat this
“writer's-block” feeling. A negative feeling that has affected my enjoyment of writing for a
majority of my academic career.
Therefore, I am incredibly grateful for everything this class has taught me because I have
learned so much about the subject of writing, but more importantly, about myself as a writer.
Thank you for a great quarter!

Sincerely,
Riley Bender
Bibliography
Kerry Dirk. “Navigating Genres.” Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing, Volume 1, Parlor Press

(2010)
Wardle, E., & Downs, D. (2020). Writing about writing. Bedford/St. Martin's, Macmillan

Learning.