As a result of completing Writing and Rhetoric, I have acquired a lot of skills, knowledge, and writing strategies that I will bring with me in my continuing education and career. There have been many instances where I have already incorporated a newly acquired  skill or strategy to improve my writing from one paper onto another. For example, in one assignment I had unknowingly incorporated many drop quotes into my paper. A drop quote is when a quote appears in a paper without introduction and that can disrupt the flow of thought within the paper. After this assignment, I learned how to properly incorporate quotes into my papers so that confusion is avoided,  and my thoughts are enhanced and better supported by that quote. I have also incorporated many of the skills or strategies that I have gained from this class in writing and speaking outside of the classroom setting. I was offered a job after a successful interview which utilized my reading, writing, and speaking skills.  This class has taught me essential communication skills that I will be able to use in all aspects of life. We recently had the opportunity to work in research groups. People in the groups had to touch base and share ideas with each other while working on different assignments. We also all had to effectively work together in order to create a cohesive oral presentation. An improved ability to analyze visual rhetoric is my key takeaway from this class. I now know how to gather information and interpret the meaning of elements of visual rhetoric, such as pictures and films. Through conducting a compositional analysis, I now know that elements of a photo including lighting, contrast, vectors of attention, position of the photographer in regard to the subject, and the concept of the rule of thirds contribute to and can greatly alter the meaning of the photograph. The actual content within a photo is important, but the elements of its composition are just as important. After conducting a multimodal analysis, I can now understand different strategies of propaganda that are used within films, and I can analyze the intentions and strategies behind their use. Finally, I learned a lot about the process of research after conducting a contextual analysis.  I learned how to determine the credibility of a source because there is a lot of false information on the internet, and you have to make sure that the information you gather is accurate and credible. I really enjoyed this class overall, but I do wish that we did more creative writing. Creative writing is a great way to express the emotions of a writer, and I think it would have been beneficial to do some work with creative writing. This class has taught me to write in a clear, cohesive and organized manner. In my future endeavors I will have to construct and present lesson plans, as I plan on becoming an educator.  I have greatly improved on the organization of my writing and the transition between thoughts. It is vital that lesson plans are easily understood, and this class has really helped me with the structure and arrangement of my writing. Another skill I learned that will help me in my future endeavors is how to make a successful powerpoint presentation. We learned to make the slides very concise with few words, and many pictures since it is the presenter’s job to be knowledgeable about and present the information. The ability to skillfully present information, and not just read off of a slide is extremely important. Having to create an oral presentation really gave me insight on how to thoughtfully and successfully convey information to a group through a slide show format. The way that I think about writing, writing situations, and writing processes has greatly changed after taking Writing and Rhetoric. I realized that it is important to reflect upon and correct an assignment even after it’s finished. Having to correct all of my papers after they were graded really helped me understand what I did incorrectly and how I could avoid those same mistakes in the future. Without the process of correction, I don’t think my writing would have improved as much as it has. Additionally, writing a reflection about what I have learned from each assignment gave me insight on what skills I gained and how I could use those skills in the future. As I stated earlier, I learned a lot about the process of research through conducting a contextual analysis. By writing a reflection, I solidified my knowledge on the topic of research. I hope to be able to teach, and convey the importance of these skills to my students in the future.