Microlab Response/Reaction

Paige Hooper
Prof. Dixon
Composition 1
10/12/11
Microlab Response/Reaction
When I first knew about the microlab we were going to be required to do, I thought it was a great idea. It tested students’ knowledge over grammar and punctuation. I knew I wanted to know where I was with this and how I would compare to others.
I went to the writing center to take the lab and unfortunately I was disappointed with the test. I felt like some of the information we were being tested over wasn’t important to the day to day writing assignments we have. I thought some of it wasn’t relevant, I feel like we could have learned better things from the lab. I also felt like it wasn’t pushed to be an important test. I heard most some students just blew through it because they knew they weren’t getting a grade. These students didn’t learn anything at all because they didn’t take the time to actually read the information. I also didn’t understand the grading scale either. I got a 65 and thought I did horrible. But apparently this was average for students. I did not know what this meant. This is average for students? So I guess the test was hard or the grading was different then what I’m regularly used to. I think that part could use a little work or more clarification.
The format of the lab also through me off a little bit. You couldn’t go back to previous questions, so you had to be sure on each question before you continued. The multiple choice was okay, but some of the answers didn’t seem to work at all.
I’ve been told in the past and the present that I write with a lot of passive voice, and I’m still continuing to do that. I wish to go to the writing center soon to get help with this for my next paper. I know I’m also not the best with grammar, and making sentences flow together. The microlab helped me some in this area. It asked several questions on complete sentences and sentences there were run on and too long. I learned a lot about commas and semicolons that I didn’t know before. This helped me improve my punctuation for my papers somewhat. In general, the lab was disappointing to me. It either helped me with certain areas or had nothing to do with my writing and the things I wanted to work on.