Writing 101, Fall 2009, Truong
Communication Skills Journal Entries
Journal Entry #1
Today I turned in my Profile of Research Community assignment. This was a really
difficult assignment for me to do at first. However with the group conference, I was better able to
understand the assignment. At first, I thought I was supposed to research the topic I chose, which
was Hate Crimes. I thought that the assignment was asking me to research the topic, and write a
research paper. But I was wrong. It was different then what I thought it was supposed to be. The
assignment asked to provide relevant information on the topic that may be useful for someone
who was to do a research paper on Hate Crimes. This assignment really opened my mind.
Journal Entry #2
I received my Personal Statement and Resume assignment back and did not receive the
grade that I expected to get. Thankfully, I have the chance to do it over. I misunderstood the
assignment and thought I was supposed to write and artificial personal statement. Nonetheless, I
was able to correct it. But being able to correct it provided me with the opportunity to express
my thoughts and hopes for my future graduate studies to the graduate school that I would like to
attend. This is not like any other assignment that I have done, but this is a positively different one
that I will definitely learn from.
Journal Entry #3
Addressing the class comes across somewhat difficult at times. Fortunately, I was able to
take a speech class while attending community college. This assisted me in overcoming being
nervous when presenting in front of a class. Though sometimes I am still nervous, I am not as
nervous as I was before I took that speech class. Now, when speaking in front of an audience and
giving information, I make sure to try and always make eye contact, define terms that are not
part of the normal linguistics, and speak as clear as possible. Different assignments within this
course have helped me to be able to address a variety of audiences, whether it is my classmates
or a university.