Hi everyone! Today’s reading reminded me of a quote my AP Bio teacher told her students throughout high school, “There hasn’t been a challenge in your life thus far that you haven’t managed to overcome.” I think this is a good motto to face challenges with, because truly, peer feedback is a tool we can use if we choose to, to elevate our papers to be as good as we know they can become, not criticism that's meant to set us back. However, I think I, as well as most people here, have experienced the scenario highlighted in Jillian Grauman's article, "What's That Supposed to Mean? Using Feedback in Your Writing," of "feeling totally deflated, I didn’t read any further. I stuffed the essay in my backpack, where it crumpled down to eventually form a clump with other unwanted scraps of paper” (Page 2). Feedback feels really personal in writing, because it’s not like a math problem where you retrace your steps and find the one mistake you made that made the problem go awry. With writing, there’s personal experience, author’s voice, author’s desired effect, etc. Comments like “this is confusing,” can make us feel like our feelings are invalid, or not understandable to anyone else, which is just an all around sucky feeling- especially since a lot of people write in hopes of being understood, empathized with, and related to. However, I think the article broke down the types of feedback in a way that makes feedback a lot more objective, rather than personal- in a way that challenges our metacognition, not our personal thoughts and expressions we pour into our writing. Metacognition is our ability to be aware of what we actually know, think of, and write. The author quotes composition scholar Howard Tinberg, in that “it is metacognition that endows writers with a certain control over their work, regardless of the situation in which they operate” ((76) 2). Rather than concluding that critique reveals flaws in our character or ability to communicate, we should view criticisms as an external view of what we’ve thought through, and focus on our goal to make our writing understandable to others. With a goal in mind, the personal aspect of criticism diminishes slightly, as it's less about what this reveals about your writing, but advises you on how you can reach your goal, if you choose to use criticism as a tool. The article further quotes steps that divert our attention from personal criticism to tools of improvement:

1. " Set own goals

2. Review feedback

3. Acknowledge emotional responses

4. Develop follow up questions

5. Act on your goals " (9).

I think this is very helpful in maintaining focus when receiving feedback. Looking at the types of feedback one receives is also helpful in “de-personalizing” feedback. The article quotes that feedback can come in the form of judgement comments, that “assess how well you are doing a particular thing,” coaching comments that “offer suggestions,” reaction comments that “explain the viewer’s understanding of your paper,” and other comments that merely “indicate confusion” (Page 5-8).

Ultimately, all first drafts require revision, and it’s never an extremely easy and clear cut process. It requires rethinking, rewording, rephrasing, deletion of sentences you thought were good but were admittingly unclear, clarifying statements that may have been obvious to you, or even changing an entire idea that calls for hefty revision for the rest of the paper. However, to achieve a product we’re most proud of, the acceptance of the necessity of revisions is a great first step in the right direction!