Communication Skills
For our final project for English 102 we had to choose between doing an internship, writing a blog about a book, or studying for an entrance exam. I chose to do the blog and out of the options given decided to write it on the book The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. Throughout the rest of the semester I'll have to read the entire book and write two blog posts about it every week, totaling to 14 posts and a minimum of 5600 words to complete the project.
Which 21st Century Skill do you feel this assignment addresses, and why?
I believe this project addresses my communication skills as I have to read and understand then the book and then be able to communicate what I read as well as how it applies or relates to me. As with almost everything this semester, it also requires a lot of self-directional skills. Although this project requires more than usual as I'll have to stay on top of reading and writing the blog posts for the rest of the semester mostly by myself.
What are you most proud of from this assignment, and why?
So far, I'm most proud of how proactive I've been with starting this project. I chose what I wanted to do and created the website only a couple hours after the assignment was posted and far before it was due. This created a firm foundation for the project and will make it a lot easier for me to only have to focus on the reading and writing from now on rather than the design or formatting.
How did you develop and/or improve upon your 21st Century Skills with this assignment?
For the last couple weeks we've been learning about paraphrasing, quoting, summarizing, and using signal phrases in English 102, and this project has allowed me to use and improve upon all of those new skills which are crucial to using my 21st century skills.
What was most difficult about completing this task?
Since I've only just started this 7-week-long project, I can only anticipate that the hardest thing about completing it will be staying ahead or at least on time with all of my blog posts. Since it's all only graded at the end of the semester it could be easy for me to not feel it's as necessary to them but I know that if I fall behind on them I'll have a hard time catching up again.
How could you improve this work?
So far I think I've done everything about this project to the best of my abilities. I figured out what I wanted to do far before it was required or any other students did, I created early and was able to design it to my liking, and the writing in my first blog post is some of my most impressive college-level writing that I've done yet.
If you could start over, what would you do different?
With this project I've used what I learned from many past projects and I feel that if I started over I wouldn't do anything differently.
How can you apply this to future learning?
The writing and reading skills that I'll develop from this project will be incredibly useful for the rest of my life and especially the rest of my time in college. I also specifically chose to do this project on the book The Happiness Project because happiness is one of my main goals and motivators in life so I hope to learn more about it through reading this book that can then apply to my life.