As an international student, I have been struggled with English. Despite the fact that I graduated from a U.S. high school and took several literature classes, composition was never easy for me. At the beginning of the quarter, I treat English 131 as one of the required courses for my major. But before I took English 131, I already took several writing-credited courses. I had been told by my professor once that he cares more about the argument and the reasoning I made instead of grammar, styles, genres and so on. So, I was expecting that English 131 class to be a huge difference from those writing-credited courses as those aspects of the composition will be covered.

          On the first day of the class, we are introduced to the course syllabus. At that time, I thought it was just a normal procedure for every course at the beginning, but now, nearly the end of the quarter, when I go over the syllabus again I can recall what I have practiced and achieved. Throughout the course, we learned how our views can be changed through various ways of seeing, how the words like “nature” and “exile” are romanticized in the literature, how the ideas of “embodiment” and “archive” are used in the composition. Through various readings, discussions, assignments, we practiced the outcomes of composition embedded in this course. I believe that I not only developed the skills and strategies for being a good writer, but also extended my view for what is the meaning of writing. By developing those crucial techniques, I have grown as writer through the duration of this course.