Friday, October 29, 2010

Reflective Essay

   The other day in English, Mr Sutherland asked us to reflect on our writing goals for the second quarter. Throughout the first quarter, I was introduced to lots of different writing styles and have recognized new things and bad habits in my writing.I noticed that I don’t have the easiest time being able to write a 500 word blog post/essay easily with no difficulties. But a bad habit that I’ve had for a while now has been procrastinating on my assignments. And lastly I would like to work on not getting writer’s block.  

     Right now I have a tendency to write about a 300 word essay. This is not a good thing because I have to go back over my essay and try to add in extra words so i can meet the requirement of 350 words. This also happens when I have to write response posts too. It can get very annoying at times because once I am done and have written my assignment, I don’t like having to spend another hour going back over it trying to get 350 words. One example is a quick write that I did last month. I read back over it and it was a pretty good blog post in my opinion, but it seemed very short and there were things in it that weren’t necessary. I could tell that I was just putting in extra details to try and so I could lengthen my post. Therefore, I would like to practice and learn how to write at least a 500 word essay without any problems whatsoever.

    Secondly, a major problem I have in school in general is procrastinating. Sometimes I wait until the morning the assignment is due to do it. I think  do this because I like hanging out with my friends and playing on the computer rather than taking hours out of my day to do my schoolwork.  Procrastinating is a bad habit that I have always had and would like to break because so far, it has made one of my grades go from an A+ to a B-. I am worried that if I don’t do anything about this soon, the pattern will continue and soon I will have an F. Then things will be all bad. But mainly the only times I do procrastinate is when I have to read something like a chapter book or have to respond to a text that I have read. It’s really sad, but I do not like reading because I don’t have the patience at all to sit and focus on one thing for over an hour. I guess you can say that I have a short attention span. Therefore, to stop procrastinating is one of my main goals this year.

    Lastly, I want to have the ability to stay focused and not run into writer’s block when I am doing a quick write or any type of essay. I tend to get it about once out of every two quick writes/essays we do when I have lots of things on my mind that are bothering me. Rather it’s in or outside of school. When I do get blocked, I start to write about these things that are on my mind. But once I do get all of the stuff off my chest and onto paper, new ideas on the original topic that I was writing about tend to pop up in my head. This process happens every time I get stuck on an assignment. Hopefully, by the end of this quarter, i will be less stressed and getting writer’s block will only happen rarely.   

    Over time, I have been writing better and it has gotten fairly easy for me to write essays and blog posts. Back in middle school, I hated writing essays and would’ve never imagined having to write two essays a week without breaking down at some point. Surprisingly, blog posts, essays, big projects, and labs almost every week has not overwhelmed me yet. Comparing one of the first essays I wrote this year to my most recent, you can see how I have grown as a writer. My essays now, are more organized and they sound like I am actually writing about something important. At least that’s what I think from perspective. Writing basically two essays a week has definitely helped me become a stronger writer over time. In conclusion, I have a few goals that I would hope to achieve this second quarter and become better as a student overall.  

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