This was an Honors special topics class that I took during the spring 2019 semester. It was philosophy based with lots of reading and writing. In the class, we read works by Plato, Aristotle, and C.S. Lewis. Our last unit was just watching a movie called Lars and the Real Girl that shows how all that we have learned can be tied together. At the end of the Friendship and Eros units we were required to write a paper on a question that had something to do with what we read and reflect what we had learned in the unit. I had never written philosophically before, so it was hard at first. It is pretty different to write and argue philosophically, but the required and optional revisions of these papers helped me to improve my writing. The professor’s comments were very helpful in guiding me to what would make the papers better. Sometimes in the class it was hard to follow along with what we were talking about because philosophy is confusing. I feel that I should have asked more questions than I did because I know that I had them. Most of the class was talking about the readings that we had done and answering questions we had put on a notecard that we handed in when we did reading quizzes at the beginning of most classes. These reading quizzes were small, but they were a big part of the grade in the class, so I’m glad I did all of them. This was a class of discussion between the students and the professor and I feel that sometimes I wasn’t participating to the best capacity. Maybe that is because I’m quiet and shy, but I want to start talking more in my classes when it is appropriate to do so.
Regarding my papers, they were a little choppy at first when I turned them in. Then the comments came and I decided to do the revisions for both of the papers, though it was optional for the Eros unit paper. Doing the revisions helped to slowly improve my skills on both of these papers. This helped me write the last paper confidently without an official revision because it was the final paper. In this paper I did my best to explain everything well and make everything go together smoothly. This paper is my artifact titled Relationship Advice, which is to give a fictional wedding toast that includes advice from the articles and books we read that help make a relationship be strong. I think that this paper shows how I improved clarity and flow in my papers, though I can always become better at these two things. This class challenged me to think differently and for that I am grateful.