Reflecting: Alchemist Essay and Julius Caesar Essay

Reflecting on ones self

In my essays, I think my writing provides appropriate ideas and content. An example of this is that I have a clear and focused topic while writing. I know what I am thinking about, and I efficiently put that into words. While writing, I try to develop my ideas to their full potential so the readers are able to understand what I am talking about, and that the writing makes sense. "The Alchemist" was a difficult book to read and understand. I had to make sure that I fully understood it before others reading my essay could understand it. I feel I did a good job communicating the main ideas of the book so even though a person may have not read the book, they could still understand what it was about. I think I could improve on explaining how my quotations relate to the main idea. Sometimes I get a little caught up in a specific point, that I forget to link it back to the main idea. I should work on this because otherwise a person may be confused on the message I am trying to get across.

In my essays my writing is quite organized. My paragraphs are in order and it is easy to follow along. The reader does not have to look back up at my thesis statement to see what I am writing about; it is clear in the paragraphs. All my body paragraphs begin with a topic sentence which gives the readers knowledge on what I am talking about. I also do not end my body paragraphs without a conclusion or transition sentence. Including a conclusion sentence helps sum up the message/idea of the paragraph, and a transition sentence helps link to the next paragraph.Even though I include a concluding or transition sentence, I still find I could improve on them. I feel I occasionally just repeat my topic sentence, and it doesn't flow. Also, my transition sentences don't always help with the transitioning. In "The Alchemist" essay, I did a good job on my transiting sentences, but on my "Julius Caesar" essay, mine were not so good. This is probably because I had more time to work on the Alchemist essay, then the other one.

I think I have grown as a writer as the year has gone by, yet, I do not think that reflects in my Julius Caesar essay. This is because in "the Alchemist" essay I had a longer time to work on it. This way I could develop my ideas and content more and I could look over it without the stress of time. Also, the teachers helped me read through it and they helped me reflect on what I could improve on. I prefer when I have someone to guide me through the steps because I enjoy peoples feedback. When given only about 80 minutes to write an essay, I found it harder to put everything that I was feeling on paper. If I had been given more time I could have deepened my writing which would have improved it greatly.

An SLR that I think help crafts an essay is Communicating Effectively. The reader needs to know what the topic is about. They shouldn't have to ask questions about things they are confused about. In order for this to happen, the writer needs to understand the topic well, so that they can write their knowledge clearly on paper. When communicating, the writer also need to make sure it makes sense and is in order so that it is easy to read by everyone. Communicating effectively is essential to writing an interesting, well crafted essay.