During the course of this semester, my annotation skills have changed significantly. I feel like I have learned and grown as a reader and an annotator. In the beginning of the class, I felt that I was not fully engaging with the text itself. In the TED talk, “Metaphorically Speaking”, I annotated in a way that simply paraphrased the sentence and rewriting key words. This was so I could remember where main points were located in the passage. James Geary writes, “But metaphor is a way of thought before it is a way with words”, while I commented “way with words” to show that this was a key point of the argument. However, this has changed as the class has progressed in the way I annotate. Similarly, I connect with Susan Gilroy’s excerpt when she states,“get in the habit of asking questions”. Asking questions and making comments has helped me understand the text from a deeper thinking. I went through asking a lot of questions in The Future of Science…Is Art?. Throughout the course, I have gotten in the routine of asking questions based on how I feel to help me better understand for discussion. Some of my questions I have written are “Is this helpful or not?” or a one word question such as “really?” I have also found myself being able to feel more connected to the text my making comments. When I make a comment, it is simply based off my overall feelings of what I am reading in the moment. For example, I write, “I don’t get this” if I am confused. However, once I have reread the passage, I override it and will say, “I understand”. To me, I not only feel like I have a better understanding of the text in the end, but I overall feel like I am more involved. Answering questions after we have read the article has also helped me improve. Overall, I have improved in ways that I never was taught before. In high school, I was always taught to annotate one specific way with paraphrasing. From being a high school freshman to a first year college student, my skills as an annotator have improved for the better and I will continue to carry this with me throughout my life.
