Patricia Adele Darby
Without continual growth and progress, such
words as improvement, achievement, and
success have no meaning.
Benjamin Franklin
The Beginning
When I started college I enrolled in my mandatory English 101 course.
Originally I had thought that this would be just another writing class and seeing
as I had gotten through 12 years of those that a few more wouldn’t matter. I
came into this course with minimal interest or awareness of technology beyond
Facebook and other relevant cites to a teenager. I also was under the impression
that everything was to have a rubric, a set few points and a very direct
assignment along with a very structured essay impression. Little did I know that
my world of English was about to be turned upside down. The first assignment we
received in this class was to create our very own blog and write an ‘About me’
post. In this blog post we were instructed to say a lot about ourselves but one
thing specifically was to talk a little about our writing abilities as of that point;
“I will openly admit that the one thing I am horrible with is research papers, I
suppose practice makes perfect but for now it’s just atrocious.”
http://patriciaadele.wordpress.com/2011/09/01/all-about-me/) This is
something that I think by expanding the way which I write has improved a little
although I still have a long way to go. “Without continual growth and progress,
such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.”
Benjamin Franklin; Throughout this class I did not only grow in my research skills
but in a lot of aspects of writing that I will proudly share with you today.
The first step to fixing something is
admitting you have a problem.
Our first essay was to reflect on a personal experience and
relationship between nature and ourselves
(http://patriciaadele.wordpress.com/2011/09/19/environment-essay/ ).
“The biggest problem that I encountered was that I had a lot of
topics that I could created an essay on using this prompt but the
problem was that you told us to focus on a specific event and a
specific moment." (Darby,
http://patriciaadele.wordpress.com/2011/09/21/the-first-esay/ ). I was
focusing on the different environments in my life and the reason
for my feeling about my outside environments opposed to my
inside environment. I had a great idea on what to write about but
I couldn’t figure out where exactly to take my paper as I pointed
out in that refection. After finishing paper one and receiving an
average grade I went in to see Mrs. Cindy and realized that I was
focusing on irrelevant things, Cindy pointed out areas in my essay
where I could really have elaborated and painted a beautiful
picture with my writing . This essay along with conferencing taught
me that I need to take a step back when re-reading my essays and
make sure that what I wrote about has meaning and the reader
can fully see and understand where I am going. Clarity was lesson
number one, and from this essay I realized I had a problem, but
was determined to fix it.
Finding the big picture and making
connections
Something I have always had difficulty with would be with
reading something and making a connection. I have always been
aware of this problem but it hadn’t really gotten in my way, that
was of course until I came here. In the beginning of class we had
been assigned to read a lot of different readings and still they all
seemed irrelevant to each other. It wasn’t until essay number two
was I truly able to connect writings like I did, and I have to say I
am very proud of myself. After writing this essay I had even said
“In the midst of writing out the outline for this essay and picking
out topics I couldn’t help but almost relate or reference another
piece of writing we had read in the class or even back to the
movie. Overall I felt this was really a beneficial assignment”
(Darby, http://patriciaadele.wordpress.com/2011/10/19/essay-2/ ).
I had finally realized how exactly to relate different things and
now it was coming naturally. I think some of this growth was due
to time and growth in general about making connections but
also persistency. I was frustrated that everyone seemed to be
making connections about the readings except me and I was
determined to make them as well, so with practice and help from
the writing center and Mrs. Cindy I was finally able to make those
connections. This was my first big step in the right direction with
my writing.
Options and Responsibilities
For our last essay as students of English 101 we
were assigned to write a analysis paper on the movie
Wall-E. In this paper I had the opportunity to take all
of the things I have learned so far and put them into
action. I had a main focus to my paper that I had
never had before- “I would like to take a good long
look at the different aspects of how this mess no
matter what angle taken from is human kinds fault.”
(Darby,
http://patriciaadele.wordpress.com/2011/11/28/options
-or-responsibilities/). I learned through peer editing
that different perspectives will only have a positive
outcome on your work. I also learned from writing and
re-writing this essay that practice does not make
perfect, it makes progress. This last essay I felt was
strong and well written due to all the different ways I
have grown in this course.
Practice makes Progress.
Through this entire class I have done a lot of things that I
normally wouldn’t have done. I have learned that being creative is a
good way to improve your writing and coming from essay one where I
had said “I do not like creative writing at all. I felt as if I wanted to
learn how to creatively write I would have taken a creative writing
class.” (Darby, http://patriciaadele.wordpress.com/2011/09/21/thefirst-esay/ ) to me now saying that this helped is only confirming my
growth as a result of not English 101 but from Cynthia Bateman showing
me how to become a better writer. I am now able to make a focused
claim in any given argument. Make valid connections in not only things
that I read but also my everyday life. For example I read so much
about environmental problems I was able to point out myself what I was
doing wrong and now have a reusable water bottle to make a difference.
All of these are great examples of how I have changed over this course
but I feel that the most important growth I could have made was my
ability to reflect and utilize those reflections. Each time I reflect on
writings I then become aware of difficulties and use the reflection to
better my work.
Through this class I have grown in
many different ways; Learned how to
make valid connection, improved my
writing skills, and overall became a more
focused writer. Although I have
improved in many ways I know that I
still have a long way to go and I have
openly accepted that this journey of
improvement will never end.
Intellectual growth should commence at
birth and cease only at death.
Albert Einstein