Hi! My name is Linda Vo and welcome to my ePortfolio! In this portfolio, I will introduce to you a reflection of how this semester went for me in English 1102-XX with Mrs. Morris. Onto the right of this page, there will be inserts of several pages including written essays by me with a reflection of how those essays went and magazine articles that my Health group worked on.  I hope that you enjoy!

Semester Reflection:

When I entered this class, it was a hybrid class. I have never had a hybrid class, and I was nervous about this class. It was either nervousness or excitement. I could not figure out what emotions I had for the class. I know that an English class needs a lot of time put into the class. Since it is a college course, a lot of devotion for time is needed. Technology is of course needed for a hybrid class because internet usage would be a great deal and so is using Microsoft Word Documents. There were four papers in total, but the “wiki’s” took some time. However, I did not know how much work I had to do, and I still have not received an A. This made me push for more and I tried to work really hard in accomplishing an A. I really am trying hard, and the work that I have put into, has been a great deal compared to any other class. Regardless, I am still trying hard to receive a good grade now.

            My expectations have not changed because I am still working hard with my work. I have not stopped yet, until I deserve a grade such as a B. I turn my work in time, and I put thought into my work. My expectations have stayed since work load was the same and nothing of mind set has changed either.
            The thing I dreaded the most in doing is the essay part of the work load. I absolutely hate writing, but when I do write, I cannot stop. Basically, the introduction of a paper is very hard to write, but once it is written, then the essay is a little bit easier to work with. I am looking forward to getting a good grade! That is the most I can say at this point.
            The essays were very straight forward. The teacher gave all the information, but it is just the essay itself that made it hard. The subjects were of choice by us, so we really cannot complain about that. This is a hybrid class, but it is based on arguments so all the essays were argumentive. The most interesting essay that I wrote was the “Human Interest” paper. The reason why I liked it was because it told stories of how people react and their opinion. This paper was no ordinary paper that consisted of facts and arguments, but it consisted of feelings; feelings that hit the heart very well and there was some arguments. Mostly the essay was to prevent any future people from following the same path of what the people in the essays had to endure. The easiest essay was the first one because the essay was to ease us into the course. It was to also ease us into writing the paper. It was difficult to start, but the topic choice was easy.
            The human interest paper was my favorite because I documented stories off of “youtube” which made me gave more heart out to my paper.

I did revise all of my essays because I was not satisfied with the grade I received from the teacher. I was very disappointed in myself because the papers seem to be not good enough. I do edit my paper and try to add more information, but arguments were never enough. I revised by going through what the teacher was commenting, and some things were taken out by myself. Sometimes I would just mark out sentences that would not make sense, but the papers did develop more structurally and factually. I would revise the draft of the paper as soon as the paper was already graded from the teacher. I did not want to wait and just went to revising my paper since I had a little bit of extra time to do so.

I do like peer reviews, but sometimes the students in there would not grade the paper correctly. They would just mark an area or two and then say the paper is good. I really do not like that part, but out of that, I get more opinion rather than no opinion at all. The conferences helped me a lot because I had one on one time with the teacher. The teacher would actually confront me on my mistakes on writing the paper, and I would go home and try to correct it the best I could. The calendar reminders and modules of “blazeview” would help me with the course work. The schedule also helped me because I would not know what is due or when is something due. I like to work ahead of times also, so the schedule and calendar really helped.

The wiki made me very skeptical in the beginning because there was so much work due every week. There was one point that I wanted to give up because of the work load, but I pushed through it. I came to find that the research was easier because I combined some of my essays pertaining to my topic for the research and I used my wiki. It was a little bit easier, but I still had to work hard for that paper.

I have honestly never used an online portfolio before in my life. This is the first time I found out what a blogger is. However, the portfolio is something to organize the work to submit in an organized fashion. Since this class is designed to be half online, the portfolio does make sense to submit with a technology based website. Ghost grades helped me because my grades on the essays would drag my grade down, but the ghost grades helped it. I think revising just helps a little but because it makes the paper better than how it was written. Since this class is based on arguing, the arguing helps with most things, but sometimes, arguing is hard since facts have to be presented and cited.

The use of technology is intimidating because these websites used were not familiar to me. I had to spend so much time to figure out how the website worked. It was somewhat exciting but more intimidating because I felt like I was going to delete all of my work. Then if I were to do that, I would freak out and not know what to do anymore since I am not that great with technology based stuff.

I think the wiki was easy once I got use to it. It was easy in my opinion because all I had to do was post stuff about my article and that was it. The wiki was very straightforward.

The wiki did a major dent in course work; it decreased the work by more than half. It was useful and also very showing since the wiki is like used online kind of.

The magazine was successful because the work was put into a group. The group overall did their best to post their sample of their article. My group’s article was amazing because I did not think that it would all work out. I was so nervous on what was going to happen. Sometimes, the information would not save or that the other person would not save their material, so then it was deleted. Things got complicated for a little bit, but then it was fixed. The collaboration of small groups within a class was better than other classes. Doing it outside of class and using an online magazine would have worked because that is what my group did.

My web presence has changed from Facebook to blogs on the internet and also articles that I have written. I think that I have established myself in the internet community more than I can say. My web presence has changed in a more adult feature because I did work by using technology.

I feel more than prepared to do the extra work. I went the extra mile to do this much work in this English class, then I can surely do work in another English class. If an employer gave me as much work as the teacher, I could probably handle it since I handled this class. This class taught me some things and it prepared me more for things.

 With all the work that I have done, I deserve a grade that speaks for the work. I only missed class once out of the whole semester in this class, and have turned in all of my work in. I have not been late in turning in an assignment, and I have always made sure when things are due. I even email the teacher whenever I have a question because I am a hard worker. A hard working student deserves a grade that stands out for the work that has been done. This process reflection for the semester is taking up more than four pages because I believe my grade should be earned with the amount of work that I am doing. Even in class, I would ask questions to the teacher to make sure that I have not done anything wrong. I would stay up all night to finish revising work so that I would have a good grade on my essay. Arguments might have lacked in the first essay, but I know for sure that I have corrected myself. The human interest paper was the paper that said a lot of my work because I kept rewatching the videos and put my heart out on that essay. I am a hard worker. I even designed the cover of the magazine and did my article plus revised all of the essays. I even went through the wiki’s and revised everything on there also. I deserve a good grade in this class. However, you stated that you do not give out A’s in this class because nobody is perfect. Well, all I ask is a B because it is the next best thing. A B states that I have done all the work, but some mistakes were there, and it does not state that I am perfect.