My Argumentative Essay Reflection

My Argumentative Essay Reflection

Being that I am a person who loves to argue, when hearing about this assignment, my first thought was that it was not going to be as difficult as when I wrote the expository essay. However, as I learned more about an argumentative essay, I realized that an argumentative essay can have many fallacies. Some fallacies in an argument can be, appeal to authority, appeal to emotion, hasty generalization, etc.

When conducting my research I took notes on information that was common in all the sources. For instance, I searched for ways the sources were similar. With my research I was able to provide strong evidence to back up my claim. I gave a detailed explanations to the evidence I collected and developed my rhetoric as to why Earth Day should be everyday. I did not want my writing to be too wordy or repetitive, my overall goal was to get to the point. When I began to write this assignment my goal was to create a clear and concise paper that can properly explain the topic I am researching. While writing the introduction, I realized that it needed to be strong and hook the reader (draw the reader in) as well as,  identifying the claim. I then wrote the body paragraphs, the body paragraphs inform and strengthen the claim.

Writing this essay was different than the expository essay. This is because in an expository essay, conclusive language, or any statement that can be arguable, is not allowed. However, when writing an argumentative essay, I had to generate a claim and back it up using the evidence collected.

To complete this essay I used past approaches because like in any other argumentative essay, a claim is required, as well as the evidence needed to support that claim. Using this strategy was a success because the evidence I chose was easily explainable and supported the claim that Earth Day should be every day. Since the evidence I chose supported my claim there was no need to change or adapt my thesis. I made sure the thesis was valid by testing it. To test the thesis I read my explanations and made sure that it presented my stance on the topic.

My current understanding of  the process for developing skills for writing within the MLA “code” has enhanced. This is because I have exceeded the fundamental requirements of MLA. As shown by the use of sources and how to properly cite them. Such as, introducing the source, in-text citation, signal phrase, and end- text citation. Citing sources properly avoids plagiarism, shows a record of my work, separates my ideas from evidence, and credits the work of others.

Apart from learning how to avoid plagiarism from this argumentative essay, I learned how to write an effective topic sentence and make a strong argumentation. From this assignment, I knew how to give credible sources to support my viewpoints. Writing an argumentative essay, I need to find out a lot of facts and proofs to support my opinion and persuade my readers. As a result, I had spent about two to three days searching for relevant sources from Internet because they had to be current.

My understanding of the academic argument is clear. My understanding of an academic argument is that there is an argument that must be backed up with evidence to validate the claim you make. An academic argument holds no opinion and does not contain personal reasoning. My understanding of the academic argument gave me a guideline of what to do and what not to do to successfully write my paper . I knew that there could not be any informalities or any personal opinions in my argument and so I kept it professional, I used only evidence and in depth explanations to validate my claim.

During my review process I proofread for statements that were too wordy (run on sentences), sentences that did not make sense and fragments. This is because in my writing, usual problems in my writing are in my sentences. In addition, all the other components of writing are not as difficult for me to include.

When doing proofreading with a partner, the advice my partner provided was  helpful. My peer went into depth about how my argument was strong. My peer also pointed out that should make my counterclaim/ rebuttal stronger and told me that it needed some work. I can admit that I struggled while writing my counterclaim. The reason being is because I was not able to find evidence as to why someone should not support the act of celebrating Earth Day everyday. However, I did find sources that provided information as to why people would disagree with my ideas and beliefs. My peer also suggested I use more evidence in my rebuttal. Strong evidence in my rebuttal would imply that I did try to view my topic from a different view point/ perspective.

My writing and reasoning skills are improved; in the future, I will know how and where to find credible sources to support my argument or refute the opposing viewpoints. Something I kept in mind while writing my essay was, that I should keep an academic voice and be aware of my sharing of information.