With project 2 the SLO’s have presented in a different way than they did in for project 1.

With
the SLO “rhetorical situations and genres” this has been important in learning witch articles,
books, and research topics I wanted to pursue and what materials would support my argument
and answer my questions. I chose to research postpartum depression and its effects on child
development. This topic lead me down many different avenues and I had to look at each
carefully to see which of the articles contained the information I was looking for. This topic also
allowed me to look at many different forms of writing like studies that we're purely factual and
medical journals as well as a lot of forums from moms who suffer from postpartum depression
(PPD). I feel this portion of the SLO’s is important because outside of academics it is important
to be able to look into multiple different forms of information and to know how to identify
where the author stands and where the evidence is based on and how they support their
claims. It is also important to know how to navigate different systems to find the information
needed, like looking under googles “scholarly” section and navigating the UNM library system.
Writing as a social act has also been a key point in this project because I am looking at texts,
articles, studies, and journals from other people and reviewing it to later use it and put pieces
of their research into my own word and ideas. Part of this is also looking into the forums I had
previously mentioned and seeing how each mom in those groups builds on one another with
answers, more questions, and overall life experiences. During my research I found a lot of out
of country studies that added another level of information on the struggles of PPD around the
world and what factors may exacerbate these symptoms in different stations. This has been
helpful to my learning because it has helped me navigate relevant information and narrow
down my research question and where to look for the most relevant articles.
Writing as a process has become a bigger part of my project this time around. I personally feel
there is a big difference between writing a script and writing this review. With the script it was
mainly all my personal opinion because the review I did was on a show I liked. This is reviewing
individual pieces of writing and research and forming my own opinions and ideas based on
others. The process has also been different because I have been writing, proof reading, and re
writing this assignment vs. doping the script where I kind of gave myself a rough outline of what
I wanted to say but was able to improvise parts that would add quality to that assignment. Part
of this process has been the peer reviews which I feel have been more helpful this time around.
With the peer reviews It was mentioned that I should find another article that answers how to
help PPD in order to benefit not only the mom but also the child and family unit, this is
something I had briefly considered but wasn’t sure if I should add so having that feedback gave
me the “green light” in a sense.
Grammar and usage are a big part of all writing assignment (probably for obvious reasons)
but for this assignment in particular. I have needed to get creative. Going through research
ideas and looking at articles to use when I write my own paper, I have needed to find other
ways to phrase the ideas I want to present so it is not plagiarized. The use of synonyms has
been a big part of this as well because I find myself saying and using the same phrases over and
over. Above where I mentioned that some of the articles, I came across from other countries so
there were a few differences in the way they worded their research but also the organization of
the articles. I also feel this SLO ties into the previous one, I have had to go through and re read
my papers as part of the editing process and have changed some of the verbiage and grammar
used to make the paper easier to read and understand but also to ensure that the piece each
paragraph transitions smoothly.
For reflection the biggest part I have done is making multiple attempts at the same paper and
rereading and rewriting it to make sure that it is a cohesive piece. This process has differed
from processes I had before this class. I feel like this learning curve has benefited my writing a
lot which will be a skill that I take from this class and use in my real-life situations and other
classes. In high school I can’t really remember ever taking the time to reflect on my work before
submitting it so this has been a helpful skill to practice with this assignment. This skill will also
be helpful outside of an academic setting, often at my job we have to write a summary of our
patients experiences and this writing process has been easy enough to “expedite” in a way that
allows me to relay what the patient is saying and needing without taking too much time.
With the research portion of the SLO’s I feel I have touched on it throughout all my other
explanations. Obviously, research is a big part of writing a research paper, but this go around I
have learned what a good article to use is vs. a poor one. I have been able to identify who the
author is and when an article was published and last updated. These bits of information have
been helpful in identifying if the chosen information is still relevant. The assignment that sticks
out for me is when we had to look for two separate news articles, identify the writing style (if it
opinionated), who the author(s) is, and when it was published. I had chosen two articles from
the same site but written by two different authors but they both we're about nature. It was
interesting to see that the two could talk so differently about the subjects, but this made it
easier for me to see how important it is for me to choose the most factual materials and to look
a little deeper into what the authors are saying before I choose to base my papers off their
research.