Core Value 1. My work demonstrates that I used a variety of social and interactive practices that involve recursive stages of exploration, discovery, conceptualization, and development.

I believe I have met this core value. I used the feedback from Professor Hodges on all of my short arguments to perfect them and it truly helped me develop my Research Position Paper. After reading the feedback, it gave me a great wake up call to work harder and do a bit more research on my topic. The feedback helped me to become a better writer as well as a better researcher. The best example I have of this is the revision of my rebuttal essay. I was missing some very important parts that actually make it a rebuttal essay. I thought Professor Hodges’ feedback was a little harsh at the time but it made me realize that my paper was very confusing and that I had to explain my points a bit more and refute the arguments from the opposite side. The feedback was extremely helpful and showed me that I needed to research a lot more and make the essay flow better.

Rebuttal Original and Rebuttal Rewrite

Core Value 2. My work demonstrates that I read critically, and that I placed texts into conversation with one another to create meaning by synthesizing ideas from various discourse communities. 

No one can be a good writer unless they master the skill of critical reading. I believe I met this core value in my Stone Money Essay. There were many different texts we had analyze in order to write this essay. This is where the critical reading came into play because in the essay we had to explain a lot of the sources we used and how it supports our argument. With a lot of the texts provided to me, I had to pay close attention to everything in them as well as in the podcast to be able to write this paper.

Stone Money Essay

Core Value 3. My work demonstrates that I rhetorically analyzed the purpose, audience, and contexts of my own writing and other texts and visual arguments.

I believe I have met the requirements for this core value in my Visual Rhetoric assignment. I had to analyze every single part of a 30 second video to figure out what was going on and why things were happening. Watching the video with no sound really helped me to stop it almost every second and analyze why things were happening. For example, in just the first frame of the video I chose, there were a number of different things to figure out. Small stuff like the time of day, whether the tide was going in or out or whether the girl on the beach was playing catch with her dad or not.

Visual Rhetoric Assignment

Core Value 4: My work demonstrates that I have met the expectations of academic writing by locating, evaluating, and incorporating illustrations and evidence to support my own ideas and interpretations.

The best example I have that meets the requirements of this core value is my research position paper. This was a bit difficult because I was trying to research one specific cause of animal abuse. After looking through a number of different articles, I found some great ones to incorporate and help further my knowledge on my topic. However, there were a lot of articles that went against me but after finding some great ones, I was able to really get things going and write my essay. I found many great articles when I was perfecting this paper that helped me to add more to support my argument. Those articles refuting my argument actually helped me develop the rebuttal aspects of my paper.

Research Position Paper

Core Value 5. My work demonstrates that I respect my ethical responsibility to represent complex ideas fairly and to the sources of my information with appropriate citation. 

I think the best example I have of this is my annotated bibliography. When writing this, I had to make sure I demonstrated my sources in the correct way and cite each one in the right way. I had to make sure the background information provided a clear understanding of the article and I presented the ideas fairly even if some of the article refuted my argument. I also included all the sources I used just for background information in my annotated bibliography as well. I thought it was important to include them even if I didn’t actually cite them in the paper.

Annotated Bibliography