1. During my experience in Writing for the Sciences, we synthesized several different types of essays that all relay information completely different, for all different purposes. The informative review was a type of science writing where we informed a secondary audience about cloning. The goal was to ease the public about cloning while not taking a stance on the topic or appearing biased. The Position paper we did was very different compared to the informative review, because we did the opposite and took a position and explained why the position chosen was the best option while acknowledging other positions. The position paper was written to be best relayed to mostly all audiences and more specifically those who are conscious about the environment. The Critical Research Paper was the most abstract paper we did. This type of writing required deep research about a topic of interest and advocate for more research. This writing was also to be written in a scientific format, including a hypothesis, methods, procedure, and conclusion. This paper was also accompanied by a presentation that guided the audience through your topic and raised interest on the topic you chose. Each of these papers were very different and each taught us a different way to read and write science writing from many perspectives to several audiences.
2. For reading strategies, I learned how to decide what kind of audience an author may be writing to. In science writing, your audience is important because their attention to the topic varies on how you write and relay information. We also wrote drafts and were allowed to turn in a first draft for criticism. Additionally, we were encouraged to visit the writing center. When collaborating, we would undergo a process called peer review, where we read another classmates paper and analyze what is great and what can be improved upon. The process has truly contributed to creating more refined assignments.
3. I learned that when writing to a secondary audience, using story telling and narratives while avoiding information that is too complex to understand is the best way to communicate. Providing the audience with sufficient background information about a complex topic so that they can understand your point is effective communication. However, when writing for primary audiences we assume they have the background knowledge that our topic is based upon. We do not omit complex terms and ideas in this writing because these ideas would be more understanding when communicating the audience and complex ideas will continue to engage the audience.
4. From doing peer reviews, I gained a several perspectives about what was good about my writing and what can be improved on. It was a great process that allowed me to see things that otherwise I may have thought were good. Blackboard posts felt like a forum where we can openly express opinions that favor or disagree with someone else’s ideas and encourage seeing different viewpoints about controversial topics. Being exposed to many viewpoints about a topic that differ from yours allow you to empathize with the other side of an argument, or change your own opinions about a topic instead. Discussion boards were the perfect place for this.
5. Visual imagery helped in making my writing more interesting. Finding the perfect picture that coincides with my title and ideas increases the appeal of my work, and makes it less boring to read through. Visual imagery also helps to better understand different topics, as many people are visual learners as opposed to auditory learners.
6. I learned in class that using the Gale Viewpoints database is a great place for finding peer reviewed journals and articles. Being introduced to this database in this class has helped me find academic journals for other classes about other topics outside of science. I prefer Gale Viewpoints because it houses several different topics with even more subtopics. In a single website, I can find information regarding any subject or current event. I feel as though science articles are often credible but can have holes in them. Even from credible sources, science writing can still have wrong ideas such as an article we read about the fracking industry. A few years ago, it held information that would appear true but with more research we found that the article wasn’t completely accurate. There is a term called “Peer Reviewed”, where a piece of writing would have been passed through several sources for a credibility check. This helps with looking for sources in this class because we can be more sur that our sources are true to what they say.
7. I objectively integrated my sources in situations where I had to not take a stance or sympathize with the other position. In the informative review, we had to use our sources to simply educate the audience instead of persuading them. This influenced the language used when communicating these ideas. I used the ideas from the sources and simply carried the information over. In contrast, for my research and position paper we were required to take a stance. This required us to find sources that worked in our favor and make our argument the more persuasive argument. We also included sources that educate the audience about the counter argument and how it is viable, but it isn’t the stronger argument in comparison to your main argument.
8. We learned to decipher scientific sources and studies by looking for inconsistencies in old studies. We evaluated the credibility of a similar study done by several individuals about low carb diets vs. low caloric diets. We found that these studies had striking extraneous variables such as individuals having previous conditions that may impact results such as diabetes. Additionally, in writing for the sciences we learned that we can find sources related to a source we have already found by looking at the citations made by the original author. The sources they used in their writing was great for finding other authors who have unique opinions about a given topic, or studies research done on already existing studies. Among several of these sources, they have abstracts that give a brief explanation of what the study or research is about. This allows us as researchers to get a good idea if this will be a good source to use and how we can use it to strengthen our ideas. I evaluated the method section of my research paper by reviewing an already existing study done. This source supported my idea of the flu shot not being effective enough by itself for the general public. For example: In the method section of the Oxford University experiment, I used the method section to decipher how viable the subject pool was.

“This study’s subject pool does not require many characteristics, the less characteristics screened for this study creates a study that best assesses the effectiveness of the flu shot for all consumers. The subject group did not need to be divided, they were only organized by age and ethnicity. The subject pool included 10,012 individuals, which is a fair number of individuals for this study.”

9. My ways of writing have evolved because I realize that there are more styles of writing than I had known of prior to taking the class. Additionally, this class taught me that knowing your audience can allow you to change your writing to better communicate to this audience. Identifying the main types of audiences before writing allowed me to produce much better writing by knowing whether to communicate from a narrative standpoint or a more informative standpoint.