Portfolio 7

I have always been spending more time doing things that I like and neglect those I am not familiar with. I attribute my poor command of language more to this “vicious cycle” rather than my lack of aptitude for writing, partly because I believe I could have done more during my pre-university education. I was initially reluctant to take this writing module because I believed the time spent on it could be better used. However, after reflecting on how I struggled to write the Qualifying English Test essay, I felt it was time for me work on this weakness.

To be honest, before this writing module, I have never made a proper attempt to learn grammar because I thought that structured learning of grammar is useless. As long as the sentence sounds correct to me, it should be correct. Verb Tense, Parallelism, Articles, Pronoun Reference, fragments. As familiar as they may sound to me, I did not know what they mean at all, not until I take this module.

This module has taught me 2 things which I feel is particularly important for academic writing. Firstly, I have to learn to appreciate the different operators in grammar. Finding mistakes in text editing is more of a systematic process to me now. I can apply the same concepts when I check my essays for grammatical mistakes. Secondly, I have learnt how to cite sources and references using the APA format. Even though I am still quite unfamiliar with this format, I believe, eventually, I will get the hang of it when I use it more often in future.

Writing is a skill that requires a lot of practice; therefore, I do not think there is a lot of improvement in my writing after these two writing assignments. Nevertheless, I will continue to read and practice more. Only through this will I not forget the knowledge I have acquired from this module, I will also become more comfortable and proficient in writing essays.