Welcome to my ePortfolio,
Throughout ERH-101 class I gained experience as a writer and a reader. In just four weeks I had to complete four essays, which is way more than I have written in a month during high school. This was frustrating the first two weeks but I got used to writing that much by the third. I feel like I only got slightly better at writing itself since it was only a month of ERH-101, but I started to like writing essays more and learned about the writing process itself. Overall this course definitely affected me positively and helped me to become a better writer. Most of my improvements were due to the 4 essays that I had to write in a short amount of time.
The first essay in this class was based on my previous experience as a writer. I decided to write about the final exam that I had to complete for English as a Second Language class. I put an emphasis on the importance of moments and how they can decide the future. For example, my thesis was, “Sometimes there is just one moment that can change the future, and I have to be very careful right now because this is that moment.” This sentence stresses on importance of a moment because all the hard work is pointless if I fail just one test. This was by far the easiest essay for me to write in this class because it was about something that was based around my past. It was very unusual for me to write 3 drafts, because in high school I used to write only one draft. Then I just reviewed it for grammar and structure at the same time. But this time I wrote poor first draft that was loaded with grammar errors and was not organized. For example I had to move a sentence, “I lived there too.” From first to second paragraphs because it started a new idea without a proper transition. I also forgot to place commas in most of the complex sentences. Most of the errors that had to deal with organization were fixed by the second draft. I believe that 3 drafts helped me to get a better final draft, because I was able to notice more structural inconsistencies and grammar mistakes. Even though I reviewed the essay multiple times, I still had many basic grammar mistakes such as forgetting to place “a” or “the” in front of nouns. I think this is because I work on most of my drafts late at night, when my brain doesn’t function as well as in the morning. This first essay was like a preview for me to see how good of a writer I was after relaxing for two months. It also prepared me for the second essay by understanding the expectations of my teacher, Mr. Hamilton.
Second essay was about a specific genre. I decided to write about pop rap musical genre because this is a topic that is familiar to me, and I notice that it is easier for me to write about familiar topics than the ones that I am not so familiar with. In this essay I decided to include three examples of pop rap songs: Staying out all night (Wiz Khalifa), Ride with me (Nelly), and Pursuit of happiness (Kid Cudi). My thesis was, “Some songs might contain different theme, different rhyme scheme, and different quality of vocal performance, but regardless of the differences, pop rap remains as something that is popular among modern generation.” By stating this I explained that some of the songs are different but most of them remain as “hot hits” among younger generation. I didn’t clarify thesis in my first rough draft but it was included after peer review prior to the second rough draft. I started off with writing a crappy first draft, just like for my first essay. After some feedback from my peers I added more information to conclusion paragraph and moved paragraph four to the very beginning. During the genre essay I learned things like how to incorporate lyrics in the text and effectively evaluate on similarities and differences. I also felt slightly more confident when writing this essay, even though it was tough for me to start off the first draft. Time management is something that I improved at when writing all the drafts while completing other academic and physical tasks at the VMI Summer Transition Program. I feel like I learned more about writing during this draft but my grammar didn’t improve at all. I still made similar mistakes as in the previous essay. I also wasn’t as good at organizing my paragraphs since many of my ideas in the conclusion were separated. This is also something that I struggled with for the next essay.
Third essay was about a discourse community that I was a part of, Virginia Beach Commissary grocery store. In this essay I introduced the audience to the Commissary, observed it as a discourse community, evaluated my observations, stated a problem, and concluded on how to solve a problem. This was the hardest essay that I have ever written because it incorporates so many details about a discourse community. The good part about this essay is that all the factual evidence was based on my observations so I didn’t have to conduct a research. To start of I just started to write everything that I remembered about the Commissary. Then after an hour I looked at my brainstorming and decided what will the essay be based around. I decided my theme to be lack of common sense between baggers. Then I planned out my essay. First I introduced the reader to this discourse community. Then I stated my methology, which was reviewing my past memories. Finally I discussed my observations and reflected on them. Most of my observations include stories about baggers not being able to think critically and making unnecessary mistakes. In conclusion I stated several ways how to solve this problem. I think that I put in my best in this assignment but it feels like I didn’t do as well as during the other essays. I didn’t have as much grammar errors but it was way harder to organize the paragraphs in order for the thesis to be effective. My thesis was about lack of common sense among high school baggers that work at the Commissary. I stated, “It very noticeable that lack of common sense affects the overall reputation of the Commissary.” This thesis wasn’t as developed in the early text as it should have been, but it should still be obvious to the audience due to the emphasis that was put on it. This essay taught me that I need to practice my text organization skills in order to become a better writer.
In this class I also got better at reading complicated text because few times a week I had to read one or two essays about different topics. I had trouble reading nearly all of the texts but I managed to get through by rereading them over in order to fully understand the points that authors are trying to make. I learned that without taking notes and highlighting text it would be nearly impossible to remember anything. I also learned how to write brief 1 sentence summaries. This was very tough for me at first because there was too much information but eventually I understood what should and shouldn’t be included in the summary.
Overall I don’t feel like I became a way “better writer” but I feel like I am able to organize, proofread, and evaluate more efficiently. I used to hate writing, but after writing so much for 4 weeks it became almost natural to me and I sometimes even enjoy writing. I also got used to writing three to four drafts for each paper. Confidence is still something that I lack during writing assignments, because I feel like my text is really crappy. ERH-101 was extremely helpful to me even though I struggled throughout most of the class.