9th Grade English Writing Reflection

My writing this year has far improved, more than in past years, as I have been thorough in each of my assignments. Even before this year I have strived to explain important facts in expressive details.  However, as some topics had to be specific in order to be original & make sense, I had problems with expressing details in a simplified way. I always wanted to sound sophisticated, so it became more difficult to simplify everything I wrote to where I couldn’t be as “expressive.”

When it comes to my writing, it’s mostly been issues with clarity and typically – as Dr. D told me – it’s not common for most 9th grade English students to have problems with being too "adult" in writing. However, I think my problems were mostly in word choice and sentence fluency. A lot of the phrases I’ve used were either overly sophisticated to where they didn’t make sense, or I never truly understood them. Sentence fluency is a major issue as well, mostly because I commonly build on my sentences to add more detail, and that clouds the main points with other useless information.

Starting from the beginning of the year, I was able to plan my topics well. In particular, I could write topics in short times. Our first assignment for summer reading responses had to do with the books Nation and The Housekeeper and The Professor. With those assignments, I was pleasantly surprised that I could expand on them so efficiently. This newfound ability also helped me succeed in the WrAP test, because I learned how to plan in limited time. I had always struggled with time management, and now that I have the confidence to plan topics, it’s easy for me to expand on them, whether they are vague or interesting.

First, my WrAP test was better than any results I’d ever seen. I had improved tremendously, going from scores of 3.5 and 4.0 to straight 5.0’s across the board. I took a lot of pride in my test because I didn’t know I had the willpower or stamina to develop a topic so well. This was truly a writing test that focused on how well you could develop it, but the genres we focused on in class required much more than how much you could write about something. The next major assignments got tougher for me. Although the literacy narrative was my biggest strong point and achievement this year, I didn’t find the next genres to be as open or free in writing. The comments I received on the narrative were little, but only good things were said to compliment my work. This assignment was perfect for me because I could express all of my real feelings of writing experiences in vivid details.

            I thought that if I carried the attitude of being able to write with personality throughout the year, I would succeed in each writing assignment. Of course, if I had had more knowledge of the rhetorical situation of specific genres, I would have been much better in the rest of my topics. For example, in the profile the purpose was to show the feelings I wrote about, and not just describe them.  I received the worst grade of all on the profile. The only reason for this mediocrity was because I didn’t follow the rubric. I struggled in voice, because apparently I lacked in “using vivid sensory details to bring the reader to the scene,” according to the rubric. There were also many misused words that I tried to make seem sophisticated, but they ended up being confusing.

            Besides voice and word choice, the ideas in the paper definitely were “clouded” but I think still gave readers a relatable interpretation. The problem in the profile – like most of my papers – is clarity. I have found that voice and word choice related a lot to ideas in my papers because I made everything more than what it needed to be. The over-sophistication of my words and sentences just made everything confusing, and I regret that. Going into the next years, I will make the best effort I can to be as clear as possible in what I mean to say, and do this by planning out my topics repeatedly.

            The next two assignments didn’t come to me as easy as the narrative or even the profile did. It required a lot more logical thinking and support to be successful papers. The main obstacles for me in Literary Analyses or Research Papers were creating a thesis. This step played a key role in both of those assignments. As easy as it may seem to create a thesis, I had to narrow it down, and I know I struggled with this because I wanted to make it as clear and as evident as possible. I said after making a thesis, “okay, now I’ll just have to find information relative to it.” In the Literary Analysis, it was most challenging throughout the whole process, and this is because my thesis looked at a broad view of literary elements. Looking back at these two major papers, ideas definitely played a major role in describing details with evidence from other sources. Now I’ve learned that in-depth assignments like the Literary Analysis or Research Paper require the use of other ideas the help get a main point across, rather than just using your own voice. It has been a growing process to learn about each genre and mode so that I can understand what I should do to present my information.

My biggest struggles overall were in voice, word choice, sentence fluency, and ideas. Voice, primarily because most of my genres required a formal tense with writing that was still made clear. Word choice, not necessarily because I wasn’t rich in words, but they were used in the wrong context. And sentence fluency was difficult because I built sentences that were commonly confused at some parts. Ideas were the most agonizing because it took time for me to learn how to distinguish what I mean to say between how I want others to respond when I say it. It was all a challenge of making my ideas clear in the quickest way I can say them, and that’s the motivation I’ll carry with me through English II. I think these priorities in writing were said a lot in the rubrics. I probably missed something that was key in succeeding in writing. I know that if I carry my skills in English I, and be aware of the genre so I know what I’m writing, I’ll be able to make myself a stronger writer.