I was in my environmental class during the first semester of the year. Unfortunately I took English the semester after, so the excerpt from my writing below has a lot of mistakes. If I were to carry over the information I had learned in English class I would have done many things differently. The first thing I would have done differently is to have my paper peer reviewed. The peer review process is very important because other people may be able to pick up on mistakes that the writer could have looked over. Another thing that I would have done is properly use an in text citation. Through the presentations we have done in class I have learned how to cite sources after paraphrasing or quoting. In the excerpt below I state “According to WWF”, but I never follow up with an in text citation. The in text citation would have properly given credit to the author. Here is the excerpt from my environmental class:

A very popular example of a flagship species is the giant panda. According to the WWF the giant panda is one of the most important symbols in the conservation of species biodiversity. This black and white species has been a very important symbol to China and the World Wildlife Fund since it’s very creation back in the 1960’s. These creatures are adorned around the world, and have brought awareness to many people. Because of these gentle giants, the Chinese government has begun to change it’s ways on a path to conservation not only helping the pandas, but also many other species that have been affected by habitat loss. Some changes that have been made to help conserve the habitat of the giant panda are, giving villages different energy sources such as wood saving stoves and bio-gas from pig manure. This is important, because people will harvest less wood from the forest with these different technologies. Another very important change is, providing families with different ways of earning money to maintain a sustainable income to avoid the bad impact of plant harvesting for medicinal use and poaching. Small changes and awareness have helped slowly bring the giant panda population back on the rise.