Self-Assessment
Dear Cynthia,
This quarter has been a short one but rather very hard in terms of the course, as it was made up of four objectives, which were determined by the four types of assignments. This quarter was made more challenging by the fact that all the objectives have to be covered within the given four weeks. By now, I have successfully completed two of the first assignments namely the annotated bibliography and the position essay. I must confess that this has made me very proud, as my biggest fear was that since there was much work to be covered in little time, I would either be unable to cover the requirements within the given time or offer poor quality work in the end.
However, when checking both papers, I note that they are rather good papers as noted in the following features. The annotated bibliography was on the topic ‘animal testing’ and therefore I chose the given sources according to what the course required. The five sources were made up of three academic journals and two books, which were good primary sources as they are peer-reviewed. This is as opposed to web articles that can be created by anyone. Another advantage with journals is accuracy; the journals are made up of primary materials that have been cited as scientific investigations since they have been tested within the provided regulations and found as being realistic. On the other hand, the books too have used previous experiments as secondary information, which also makes their work accurate. The third condition – objectivity -was realized through limiting the sources to issues about animal testing and this aided with the fourth criteria- relevance- by ensuring that the content and topic are the same.
The fifth criterion was currency and four of the sources were published in the year 2000 onwards, and they met the requirement. Only Breen’s article Why we need animal testing failed in this condition since it was published in the year 1993 yet I settled on it as it offered a point of view into how the debate of animal testing began. With the knowledge that only recent sources were required, I struggled with the idea of using it. However, since the starting point of the issue was very important, I included the publication but overcame the weakness by using only two citations in the position paper. This reduced the non-currency aspect. The content given in the bibliography clearly gives the authors’ assumptions and values by identifying the thesis and focus of the sources.
As regards the position paper, the strength lay in the nature of the thesis statement as well as the organization of the thesis. The thesis statement ‘indeed, animal testing should be stopped and alternatives used to ensure that…’ was arguable in nature as other individuals may not agree with the statement. The precision in the statement made it easy to organize the paper although getting the backup information from the publications in arguing against the thesis was challenging. The journals all argued for the discontinuation of animal testing while the books offered both advantages and disadvantages of the same. The challenge here was in the creation of the counterargument as is a requirement in a good paper since most of the content acted as support to the essay. I was actually tempted to visit online sites for opposing opinions but decided against it, as I knew it was only an excuse for avoiding critical thinking in between the lines.
With plenty of support material, the introduction and supporting paragraphs were easy to write and I first made the rough draft arranging the ideas on separate paragraphs to avoid a mix-up. Next, I could not locate a realistic argument for animal testing and therefore decided to note the alternative methods leading to the conclusion. It was very frustrating working on the opposing side as I was only able to identify one convincing idea. Being an international student acted as a limiting factor in the research area with most of the articles using big complicated words and technical terms that required a lot of reading and re-reading to understand an idea. I had to use a dictionary in most of the readings and this took so much time such that the compilation section had very little time before the handing in. The good thing was that most of the paragraphs, especially the first section were complete, as I had worked on them with a clear mind as opposed to the later stages that were rather difficult and written in my tired frustrated state.
Therefore, I used leading phrases like firstly, secondly, additional, and alternative to act as transitions statements from one paragraph to the other. After the first five paragraphs being the introduction and supporting body, I had to present the opposing side that I had only gathered a single idea. With little time left for the final copy and typing, I only worked with what I had and used it as a transitional phrase to provide a foundation for the introduction of the alternative approaches. I divided the idea into three separate phrases, keeping the other two for the counterargument section. This was smart but it was all I had against a grade drop or cancellation. I provided two paragraphs for the alternative approaches and only just mentioned the split phrases in short sentences before filling the paragraphs with countering statements. Due to this, the last two paragraphs can be seen as less developed in terms of size and ideas when compared with the rest of the discussion. With the conclusion fully developed I only needed the inclusion bit.
Another notable weakness was grammar because of the English limitation. However, the computer was very helpful in identifying grammar problems like split infinitives, wordiness, spelling mistakes, amongst others. I turned in the paper just in time having hurriedly gone through the paper for editing purposes. I deserve an A in this paper as I have met the given criteria in terms of sources identification, writing a position paper and handing it within the specified time. Through the compilation, I have been able to meet the desired writing skills by learning to analyze materials in terms of relevance and credibility; critical thinking as is shown by the counterargument section; offering a good argument using an arguable thesis and supporting evidence; and accurate writing without grammatical errors. These being the course’s objectives and I having met each, I deserve the given grade.
Your Student,
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