Writing WrAP-Up Reflection

           My writing in English this year was less than what I hoped for.  I’m not sure if I expected to just get an A+ on every paper, but I certainly was not anticipating some of the negative feedback that I received. The causes of this dilemma are my own fault. My writing throughout the year has been shown to be undeveloped and not up to par with what it should be at this grade level. I believe I learned a thing or two this year by receiving heavy constructive criticism. Each time I turned in a paper I was thinking, “Man, I wrote well on this! This is an A paper for sure!” And each time, I was wrong. I plan to use the feedback I received to help me with my writing in the future.

            One of our first projects as a class was writing a literacy narrative essay. Going into this, I had no idea what a literacy narrative was and was diffident if I could even complete it. I thought I did poorly in my writing as I turned it in even though all I acquired from my peers was positive comments on it. As it turns out, that ended up being my best paper. I couldn’t help but wonder why this paper, the one that I assumed was deficient, was favorable in the eyes of my teacher. As we wrote other papers, I compared them with the literacy narrative and noticed that it was the only paper that I included original material in; the only essay I wrote that subsumed of developed writing, good sentence fluency, and near-perfect conventions.

            Another essay we completed, a profile, also had me uncertain, as well as every other paper we completed. I personally thought that I stuck to the assignment well, had good organization, and decent ideas. On this essay, I don’t believe we exchanged it with peers for assessment. The feedback I attained for this essay went along with my own. I thought the voice was too technical and unengaged with the reader. My teacher agreed. I believe if I had a chance to revise the profile I could make the voice more fluent and less drab-sounding than I did before. Other feedback I received on the profile included grammatical errors and things that were not supposed to be done in a profile such as inferring or guessing for the reader.

            Concerning the essays I wrote in general, I always acquired almost complete positive feedback from peers, but when I submitted the paper, I received negative feedback from my teacher. On the WrAP test that our class completed, I was informed that my support was inadequate. In other categories I did decently but my teacher informed me that my paper was probably not long enough for me to display my ideas as well as I could have. These assessments of my writing have shown me what needs to be done to improve.

            Proofreading my work after I complete it would be a valuable step to ameliorate my writing. I neglected to proofread in almost all of my essays, but I plan to initiate that starting with this paper. Feedback that I gave myself, combined with that of my teacher, included how my writing did not appear to be at the level it should. Although my writing was undeveloped I believe I interpreted the rhetorical situation accurately in all of the essays I completed. Another asset that I believe will help me in my writing is reading it as if I were the audience. This could assist in it being more appealing to that audience and therefore making it more effective.

            I will have to evaluate an efficient way to incorporate these boons into my essays in the future. Completing my essays timely should aid with that. Although we usually get sufficient time to complete our essays thoroughly, not everyone utilizes the time wisely. I fall into that category and am usually that person who does his essay the day before it is to be submitted, which is not a commendable habit.

            Never before have I had my writing assessed as thoroughly and complete as this year. It isn’t always a pleasant thought, but I am cognizant that it is to help me develop my writing to where I want and where it needs to be. I have had to write with much detail and precision this year which I know will allow for revised writing in the future. With much determination do I set out to accomplish these goals and use the knowledge of writing I have acquired from my teacher, peers, and others to advance successfully.

Common Errors List

     Errors that I made pretty frequently throughout the year include:

1. Awkward Phrases. Some of the sentences I wrote were not worded as best as they could be and therefore could be easily confused or misunderstood by the reader.

2. Long Sentences/Quotes. I've received comments on several sentences saying that they were too long and when I read them I agreed. If I had broken the long sentence into 2 sentence then it wouldn't be a problem.

3. Wrong context. In the research paper our class wrote, we were supposed to base almost all of our information on, well, research. We were allowed to input our opinion, but not too much. I for one did compute too much of what I thought into the paper rather than facts.

4. Conventions. I have misplaced words in some sentences such as having "this" where "the" should be. This was either a cause of me not noticing or just not knowing what the correct word was.

5. Word Choice. In just about all my essays, I received a disappointing grade in this category. In retrospect, I think this was just a cause of undeveloped writing and/or not enough words that displays the level I should be at.

6. Process Material Issues. On papers such as The literary analysis where we had extra materials that we were to turn in before the actual paper, there were problems such as me not turning them in on time or not doing them correctly.

Outside Reading

Outside Reading: 60 minutes - Human Legacy: Modern Era
30 minutes - Biology
45 minutes - Algebra

Last Class Before Easter Break

     The Friday before Easter Break was an exciting one, especially for most students in their last class. Some people got to leave early for carious reasons but for some of those of us who stuck it out it seemed as if the class was an hour glass with wet, non-moving quicksand. In our English class we were pretty focused even though I'm pretty sure in the back of our minds all the students were thinking, "All that stands between me and Easter Break is this class."

     We were all relived, excited, and happy to have a much wanted break. But now it is the Sunday before we go back to school, a day many students dread. We all have to re-adjust our minds and bodies into school-mode. We no longer get to sleep in late or go to the movies in the middle of the day on a Tuesday. But with only 3 weeks of school left as we go in, we should all still be pumped! I'll be looking forward to doing my best and getting through my first year of high school.

Song Analysis: "Umbrella" by Rihanna feat. Jay-Z

     Umbrella is one of those songs that I'm sure many people in relationships can relate to. The song as a whole to me seems to say that when our relationship gets tough we will still be there for each other, and that's why so many people can relate to and like it. The first verse Jay-Z rapped was full of metaphors: "Let it rain, I hydroplane to fame" is one of the lines in the verse. Since hydroplaning is when a car spins out of control(usually because of the wet road from raining), the verse to me means that he spins into fame when the rain(possible people's insults, negative media) pours down.

     The chorus seems to mean that when the relationship is good, we are both happy. It also seems to give out the message that since I made a promise, I'll keep it. And that since the relationship is at the toughest point its been in, we really need to be here for each other. This song to me seems to be visual as well. When I singing it I imaging it raining with someone under an umbrella maybe gesturing for someone to come under it with them. The song of course has rhyme, rhythm, and repetition but many look into the deeper meaning of it.

The Analysis of Poems

     This quarter, we are moving into the unit of poetry. We have already begun to delve deep into them and analyze each important phrase methodically. Our first poem was called "The Fish." And, as the name suggests, it is about a fish. The poem is fairly long and has many contrasting features such as dark/light and white/black. We analyzed it alone but also as a class, and the poem has so many meanings.

     I think this will be a good quarter for me. Not that I'm a poem enthusiast, but I don't hate them. I hear a lot of people saying poems are like puzzles or they are a mystery for Sherlock Holmes. Personally, I don't usually find poems difficult to decipher. Most of them are interesting, but the poems that rhyme are the best in my opinion. I didn't really find the first poem we analyzed, "The Fish" interesting, but, to each his own. I guess I should start going to English class ready for poetry, in a poet state of mind.

Outside Reading: 30 minutes "The Fish" 30 minutes "Hanging Fire" 30 minutes "Turbulence" 20 minutes Human Legacy: Modern Era  40 minutes Biology

Poem Analysis: "Hanging Fire" by Audre Lorde

     The poem I chose to analyze, Hanging Fire, is separated into three stanzas and has 35 lines. The poem as a whole seems to be about a 14-year-old girl who is worried about dying early. In each stanza shes says something like "what if I die before" or "suppose I die before." As you read through the poem, she seems to be the average teenager girl: saying she has nothing to wear tomorrow, saying she doesn't like her skin (since she is a teenager, this phrase made me visualize acne on skin), and that she doesn't want to wear braces. This poem also has quite of few line breaks, and all of them are caesuras. This seems to emphasize the phrase right after the line break and makes a new possible way to interpret the poem.

     The poem has more repetition than just her worrying about dying early. The last 2 lines of each stanza say "and momma's in the bedroom with the door closed." This could mean many things, but one that struck me was perhaps her mom is never there for her like a mom should. The closed door could represent her not caring, and the repetition could mean that she never does. Throughout the poem, she complains a lot about things about herself or her life like "why do I have to be the one wearing braces." The way she says "the one" could mean that she has a sibling that doesn't have to have braces. Like most poems, this one seems like just some words until you try to figure out what it means, and find out it can be deep on varying levels.