Brooke Mauldin

Final Portfolio Essay

August 19th, the first day of Ms. Ingrams 1101 UWRT class. I had no idea what to expect. I used to hate writing, I despised english class in the past few years of high school so I kind
of dreaded this day. Arriving to class, I was nervous, it was only my second day of college, we
began to go over the syllabus. I was swarmed with information, I was so overwhelmed. We then
began to talk about the huge e-Portfolio assignment. I was speechless and intimidated by the
sounds of this project. It sounded like it was going to be the hardest challenge that I would have
ever had to face as an assignment. I had no idea what Weebly was. Leaving class I was
stunned, I went to my dorm, opened my laptop and began to create my account for whatever
Weebly was. Looking at this site I felt lost and hopeless, I had no idea how to work this complicated website. The thoughts of me having to figure out how to work it in order to complete my
e-Portfolio, which is the biggest portion of my grade, completely submerged me. I was about to
give up, but I stopped myself. Something came over me, I wanted to prove to myself that I am
capable of doing this assignment.
First came the blogs, and designing my Weebly site, which I soon changed millions of
times. Then came the writing assignments, reading response letters and all of the wild cards. Before uploading these assignments on Weebly I planned out which assignments I would use that
was the authors choice. I began to upload and revise everything on my Weebly site to keep everything organized. This assignment was the hardest, most challenging assignment I have ever
had to face but I enjoyed every bit of it. I was able to push myself and stretch myself as a writer.
I accomplished so many tasks and began to grow a new love for writing through this assignment.

Brooke Mauldin
Blogs. Before joining this class, someone could say this word and I would laugh or try to
ignore the subject. I considered blogging as for people that have no life. Honestly, when I
found out that we would be writing blogs throughout this class, I wanted to drop the class right
then and there. After giving blogging a chance I noticed something unique about blogging. Blogging is not for people that have no life it is a way to let your voice be heard by many of people.
To me, this is powerful. Just think about that statement, let your voice be heard , what does
this mean to you? In my opinion this means that we get to express our opinions. For example, in
my third blog post I had the opportunity to really analyze what dialect I use.
I come from a small town in North Carolina called Trinity. I have always been around the
southern states. My family comes from both North Carolina and South Carolina. I have
grown up hearing words like aint, yall, way down yander, bless your heart, yes
maam, etc. Hearing these words and expressions like Its hotter than two pigs in a blanket have had an effect on the way I use my dialect.

This was the start of changing myself as a writer. Realizing that I am able to let my voice
be heard through writing, gave me a whole new perspective. Blogging allowed me to connect
with not only my teacher, but my peers as well. This was the first time this has ever happened in
all of my english/writing classes. I was also able to get out of my comfort zone, I noticed myself
growing confidence by just blogging. Who would have ever thought that you could gain confidence from blogging? This crossed my mind as I began looking through my blogs. I see a lot of
progression, from my first blog to my last I can see the changes in how I approached my blogs.
Blogs. Hearing this word now can bring a smile to my face, blogging was the first step in my
process of becoming a better writer. From blogging I have learned how to express my thoughts
on a topic and also connect with my classmates while doing so.
Did you know that you can be literate in almost anything, not just writing? I did not know
this until discussing the Literacy Narrative paper we were assigned. I had no clue. Being able

Brooke Mauldin
to fully understand something whether it is a sport, a hobby or almost anything you can think of,
is described as literate. Once I became clear as to what being literate actually meant, choosing
a topic came easy to me. I am literate in my faith, I am a Christian and I have a good understanding of my faith. I have learned through this paper that I want to continue to grow to be more literate in my faith. There is still so much that I want to learn in order to have a full understanding
of faith and how to be faithful with my beliefs.
My first draft and my second draft are completely different. My first draft is more of me
talking about everything that I am literate in that involves my faith and what it actually means to
me. The second draft; Ms. Ingram wanted us, the class, to push ourselves further. She wanted us
to focus on one topic and to give an example of an experience. At first when Ms. Ingram said
this, I was confused, how am I supposed to narrow everything that explains how I am literate in
my faith to just one topic? Why is she asking us to do this? It soon became clear, she wanted us
to use a personal experience to connect with our writing and for us to also show an example of
how we are literate or what made us literate. I realized that I was responsible for figuring out
what to do. I was responsible for my own learning. After analyzing this information, the example
of my personal experience came easy to me as well. I realized that I needed to talk about the
moment my life changed, the moment I accepted christ and began my literacy in faith journey. I
remember when Ms. Ingram had the whole class close our eyes and imagine ourselves in that
very moment, the moment we chose to write about; I could see everything, smell everything,
hear everything; it was as if I was there all over again. Writing my second draft took me no time,
once I started writing I could not stop, it was like I had an adrenaline rush, even writing about it
right now makes me have that rush once again. I was able to relive a childhood memory that

Brooke Mauldin
meant everything to me, a memory that made me who I am today. For my final draft, I decided to
combine both my first and second draft, but mainly using most of my second.
Literacy; the ability to read and write? This definition is true, but literacy is not just having the ability to read and write, it is also knowing and having a good understanding of
what one partakes in. I would consider myself to be literate in my Christian faith.
He grabbed me by the hand, looked at me in my eyes, and asked, Brooke, are you
saved?
Here are both excerpts from my final draft, the first one was from my first draft and is the introduction to
my final draft. The second is from my second draft because it includes a personal story.

This paper was my favorite paper throughout all of my assignments. This Literacy Narrative allowed me to reconnect with myself and who I am. It made me realize that I want to become more literate and to strive to do everything that I can possibly do to become the most literate I can be in my faith.
Portrait of a writer. Writing a paper describing who I am as a writer. Even now I am
puzzled as what to say about this paper. First being assigned this paper I was just stunned. How
am I supposed to write a full-on essay talking about how I write? This seemed impossible to me.
I began to collect all of my thoughts together in order to try to get an understanding of this assignment. Who am I as a writer? I asked myself this question throughout the entire paper. My
thing was, if I am assigned to write a paper describing myself as a writer, it was essential for me
to keep this question in the back of my mind at all times. I did not want to lose focus on the topic
of the essay. I then began to sit down and truly think out how I write. What do I like to read?
This was my first question, if I can realize what I like to read and what keeps me interested in
reading, then I can get an idea as to how I want to portray myself as a writer. I like to read stories
that are interesting, stories that you can tell the author wants to keep their reader engaged. Realizing, engaged, this is a powerful word, not just keep the readers focus but to get the reader truly

Brooke Mauldin
engaged in the reading. This is how I want to write. I do not want to put my readers to sleep or
boredom I want the readers to be committed in finishing my story.
After I figured out as to how I want to write, writing the Portrait of a Writer paper came
surprisingly easy. After being puzzled and confused on this assignment I finally figured out how
to write this paper. During the process of writing this paper, I realized that I would need to pull
examples of other writings I have done in order to prove how I have changed as a writer from
high school to college. This assignment allowed me to truly see who I am as a writer and to see
what else I can strive to do in order to be the best writer I want to be.
The midterm. I thought this assignment was going to be the hardest assignment ever assigned. After looking at the questions I realized it was not as bad as I thought. There was a lot of
work and detail having to be put into this assignment, but I actually enjoyed it. I was able to ask
my own questions and I was able to reflect on what I have learned/gained from this class. I had
really helpful feedback on my midterm.
Brooke, I really enjoyed reading your midterm. Reading through what you wrote, I
agreed with a lot of it. I never thought about essays being graded like tests, so I now have
the same question too. Are they going to be graded at the end? Or will they just count as
participation and then be apart of the E portfolio? I liked in letter B where you talked
about finding yourself doing some of the key concepts in your writing. I caught myself doing the same thing as I was looking through them. While some of them are second nature,
there are still others that I have to consciously consider when I"m writing. Also, I liked
how you said that you feel like you're giving this class your all. Most of the time when people are asked to assess themselves, they give themselves the lowest grade possible, and try
really hard not to flatter themselves. I love hearing other students say they're giving it their
all in this class. I love writing so this makes me really happy. Over all, i think your mid
term was really well thought out. I enjoyed it!
This comment was left by one of my classmates and it was very encouraging and helpful.

I exceeded to the best grade you could get and I was proud of myself. I received positive
comments and I can say this made me become more comfortable with my writing. I was able to
gain confidence from this feedback. This helped me on other assignments as well. Also knowing

Brooke Mauldin
that Ms. Ingram agreed with me when I said I thought I deserved an A in this class. This was
comforting and I got a sense of feeling of improvement. Doing this midterm made me realize all
of my improvements and has made me want to continue to strive to be a better writer.
What is writing? Writing is expressing your words through personal thoughts and experiences, it is connecting with your reader. If I was asked this question a year ago today, I would
say, writing is researching a prompt and writing what you are assigned. I notice now that
throughout high school I had the wrong idea as to what writing really is. Through this semester, I
have experienced a whole new work of writing, writing that allows you to use your voice and
include personal experiences to connect with your writing. I can honestly say that I have grown
intellectually and maturely with becoming a writer. I have strived to be the best that I could possibly be at writing during this class. I have put in so much effort in order to receive a good grade
on this assignment. I believe I deserve a grade of an A in this class. I have learned so much from
this class and I know that I will take this experience and use it in my every day life.