The engineering classes that I am under-taking this semester do not require much writing in the English language. Besides EG1471, I have no other modules that require me to write essays. However, there are still some difficulties in writing that I am still facing, mostly due to a transition from a Junior College style of writing.
Academic writing requires citation and referencing, and coming from a Junior College education, I must say that this additional aspect is rather difficult to grasp first time. Although I have done many readings that include in-text-citations, I have not written one myself. Citation and referencing in APA style has many rules to follow, and there is little time to fully grasp the citation and referencing techniques. However many of my peers are able to reference and cite effectively in APA style, so it can get quite embarrassing sometimes. To correct this perennial mistake of mine, I will do a direct comparison with the APA style website provided whenever there is a need to do academic writing. Furthermore, whenever there are academic articles to read, I will take note of their referencing style and do an APA style conversion. Hopefully this will help me improve in the areas of citation and referencing.
Another difficulty that I am facing is having the lack of vocabulary especially during paraphrasing. The strong stand the University takes on plagiarism, plus the requirement to submit your assignments to turnitin.com forces me to paraphrase. Sometimes I find it difficult to find suitable replacement words or phrases due to the lack of vocabulary, and I often substitute these words with more general forms that cause the sentence to lose part of its meaning. I could resolve this difficulty and continue to improve by analyzing how my other peers paraphrase and by participating in paraphrasing exercises during class.
I feel that EG1471 is a very useful course in helping students transit from Junior College to University and after resolving these difficulties that I am currently encountering, I will be able to successfully tackle writing assignments in my future engineering classes.
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4 comments:
Acturally, I am not familiar with APA style, either. I have never written a reference in APA style without looking at the APA website or book. I think I should do more practices, too.
I think it should unify the referencing style into one type. It was rather confusing sometimes, because what you learnt in high school (referencing), cannot apply in University due to different styles.
APA style is totally new to me and it has many rules we have to adhere to like whether the day comes before the month or the year should come first can rather be frustrating at times. I guess we have to practice more often so that we will get used to it.
From your portfolio, I can see you are diligent student. I believe you can conquer the difficulties you mentioned soon. Come on~ You can do much better.
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