No one expected that the coronavirus would get out of hands and spread throughout the world. No one expected that the coronavirus would impact our daily lives to the greatest extent. No one would expect what’s coming next as the world begins to change. Everything happens so quickly. On March 12, it was Thursday night. I messaged my friend on messenger, “Are you coming to school on Monday tho?” He hadn’t been coming to school the past few days and not going to come on tomorrow as well. We both knew that cases of coronavirus are popping up throughout the borough and it would be too risky to come to school. He replied, “Idk I’ll see”. The next day, I came to school, and it was practically empty. I went from classroom to classroom and I gotta say, this is the least amount of students’ school attendance record I have ever seen. Not knowingly this was the very last day of in school learning that I attended.

The next thing I knew, school was closed, and was shifted to remote learning. Not gonna lie, I was excited about remote learning but then I later figured out it was very distracting and missed the social interaction with friends and physical learning. The only thing that kept me motivated was working and talking with my friends online in Discord. It was heartbreaking to know that we weren’t able to attend any senior events such as senior trips, proms, graduation, etc.

As time went by, I felt I was way more mentally exhausted, staying at home everyday, and doing work as well. Distance learning for me so far has been difficult but manageable. This semester has been tough on me especially with the huge amount of stresses from my other classes. But it seems like I can go with the flow with how this semester is going. It’s harder to manage yourself and stay on task. I got quizzes and a couple amount of homework assigned every week. I had learned a lot of things along the way and used them in my work.

During phase 1, I learned to recognize the role of language attitudes and standards in empowering, oppressing, and hierarchizing languages, and their users, and be opened to communicating across different languages and cultures. I recall my early past memory that involves the development of my language but has not ever given a thought of the importance of language until at some point later in my life. I never bother to stop and think how English language and literature affected me until now. Language is everywhere, around you, and within you. Since people would unconsciously speak language all the time, it becomes a part of them, and it would be so ordinary that one would usually not stop and question their own language. That is, until they experienced some issues or faced an unusual situation. Language has been a huge influence for the community. Additionally, language in some ways has impacted your life at least once before such as the social consequences or vice versa. Throughout the essay, I highlighted moments that are connected to my development of English language and literacy in order to draw a bigger idea and show where I am going. I wanted to convey the meaning of the situations into learning experiences for me.

In phase 2, I grasp the key rhetorical terms and strategies when engaged in writing situations. I personally was not able to fully understand and never like the rhetorical appeals, but it seems like I had improved in these aspects when writing the Rhetorical Situation essay. When my professor talked about how we will be doing a rhetorical analysis essay, I was kind of uncomfortable with it. I didn’t have any ideas in my mind. The process for completing this rhetorical analysis for this assignment seems challenging. It was like I was completely overwhelmed and didn’t know where to start. But thanks to the professor, step by step, I was able to prepare and brainstorm what to write with each assignment assigned to me. Also, I kind of forgot what Rhetorical Analysis is until I heard the Ethos, Logos, and Pathos. It has been a while since I heard these terms. To be honest, I didn’t like these appeals. I wasn’t able to fully understand them and get them over with it back then. Right now I was faced with these rhetorical choices again, and let’s get it done better this time.

In phase 3, I assimilate research sources in the library’s databases or archives and on the Internet and evaluate them for credibility, accuracy, timeliness, and bias. This was my least favorite essay to do. Personally, I do not like to come up with my own topic and do research on it. One can see that I lack to compose texts that integrate my instance with appropriate sources using strategies such as summary, critical analysis, interpretation, synthesis, and argumentation. Nonetheless, the information, practice worksheet, and formatting provided by the professor was helpful to aid me on my essays. I typically don’t like to come with ideas or topics so when this researched essay was something like that, I felt kind of uncomfortable and off track. I think my researched essay is a total mess. I don’t know the outline of what a researched essay would be like but I decided to do an introduction paragraph, then use rhetorical precis as my summary paragraphs for my sources, then use synthesis as my support paragraphs, and finally my conclusion. I feel this is almost like a science fair project with your own question put to test which didn’t really go well for me back then. I felt that my topic is kind of broad and that my thesis isn’t as strong either. I’m not good when it comes to writing essays, especially introduction and conclusion. It seems like the time has passed so quickly that we are already doing our researched essay draft.

Throughout the courses, I learned to develop strategies for reading, drafting, collaborating, revising, and editing. I wasn’t good when it comes to revising and editing my own essays but with the help of peers and professor, it helped me understand which aspects I can work on and improve. Additionally, we have been writing cover letters and self-assessment writing to help me know the extent of my abilities and to improve on. It helps me see my strengths, my weaknesses, my obstacles, and success.