How I Met My Learning Outcomes: Summing Up a Whole Semester into a Few Words

Since the Midterm, I have continued to progress in the "reading new books" department. I was able to read a lot of Modernist literature in preparation for my final analysis paper and spend some time trying to understand their respective points of view. I read "The Great Gatsby" and "Tender is the Night" by F. Scott Fitzgerald in order to read more of the works by my favorite writer. I also had good experiences with poetry by T.S. Eliot and Ernest Hemingway. I got a little tired of Ezra Pound's Imagism and trying to decipher the various poems without the trusty aid of a Urrim or Thummim. I enjoyed reading Hemingway's short stories and experiencing the alienation and yearning of the "Lost Generation." As it stands, I still want to read more novels from different genres and periods.

There is no reason for this...I just like Monet.

As far as Literary Terms are concerned, I tried my best to incorporate my basic knowledge of literary terms in my various posts about Drama and Non-fiction. I tried to learn more about these two genres because I was not very familiar with them. The basic literary devices (like tone, symbolism, metaphor, etc.) all exist within Drama and Creative Non-Fiction, so I was able to build off of pre-existing knowledge in order to understand new concepts. 

My biggest goal during the second half of the semester was to delve into more subgenres of literature. I feel like I had an advantage. Because of my unfamiliarity with Drama and Non-Fiction, I was able to experience the new genres and their subgenres for the first time without bias. I enjoyed learning about scripture as Creative Non-fiction and I immensely enjoyed the opportunity to write some of my very own "creative scripture" for the Non-fiction group's take home assignment. I also enjoyed learning more about the subgenres of Creative Non-Fiction that I did not previously recognize as literary: Music Reviews and Sports Writing. I had a great experience with an article about Muhammad Ali written by a sportswriter from Kentucky. Other great articles that I read were music reviews by Rolling Stone and NME. The imagery, allusions and metaphors in the various articles all impressed me by how literary and affluent they were. I thoroughly enjoyed the realization that Creative Non-Fiction is a powerful and pleasing literary genre.

As far as writing Literary arguments, I feel like I only improved. While writing my final analytical paper about The Catcher in the Rye, I was able to read various literary arguments and see how I could make my arguments better. I dabbled in literary criticism during the semester (as I stated in my blog post here) and I tried to analyze a couple of works from the different genres. I had a wonderful experience with The Importance of Being Ernest and I aim to become more familiar with the works of Oscar Wilde and the like. I feel like most of what I learned, as far as literary criticism, culminated in the creation of my final paper. 

To my surprise, I was able to get great feedback from my classmates over the semester. I initially wrote off the possibility of using multi media as a valuable source of literary help, but it proved me wrong. I had so many great conversations with classmates about certain works of literature, ideas, and thesis statements. I could relate to my classmates and see how their experiences and ideas could help me develop my own ideas and arguments. I received meaningful encouragement and ideas from people like Hilary, Danielle, Olivia, Briggs, Jamie, Charly and Kimara. Our conversations inside and outside of class were both meaningful and encouraging. I don't think that I would have had the confidence to write some of the things I wrote without the help from my classmates. Another pleasant surprise was the amount of positive, constructive feedback that I received from posting my thesis statement on Facebook. Various friends and family members showed interest and, even though I did not use my original "Facebook" thesis, I learned how multi media could really help with future ideas. I could potentially just "put one out there" and view the response from my friends. It would prove useful, I think.

I really feel like this course provided me with a new perspective of how I could potentially use multi media in my future writing. I aspire to become a writer of some sort and I think that the new multi media medium would be an extremely powerful launch pad for my future work. I became more savvy with links, images and other ways to make my blogs more interesting. My organization definitely improved. Before, I felt like it was a struggle to make anything look aesthetically pleasing, but now it almost comes as second nature. The new media also helped me organize my self-directed learning efforts in a consistently forward progression as I was able to track my progress with Goodreads and these blog posts. All in all, I feel like a seasoned veteran (even though I am not) when it comes to this blogging business and I know it will prove useful for future endeavors and opportunities.

As far as English classes go, this was the most interactive and genuinely fun class that I have ever taken. I feel like the class was a unified blend of different people from different backgrounds that learned and experienced the joys of literature together. It almost felt like a book club rather than a class. It was a much welcomed (and needed) atmosphere. I have greater confidence in my writing abilities and skill thanks to loving classmates who made the experience that much more pleasant. I can walk away from this class feeling great about the work I did and the effort I put into the class, as it was not always easy to remain diligent. Overall, I am grateful for the experiences that I had during the class and I hope to experience something similar in future classes. Signing of for the last time,

Best wishes to all,

Andrew