Reflection In The Tragedy Of Hamlet And Germanna Community College

This past semester I was enrolled in DE English 112 at both Brooke Point High School and Germanna Community College. In the span of a few months, I accomplished the following essays: an annotated bibliography, a summary and response, an argumentative essay, a literary analysis, and a multi-genre essay. The argumentative essay and the literary analysis were submitted to Smarthinking, a Germanna sponsored writing center, where professors critiqued each essay in categories such as main idea/thesis, content development, grammar and mechanics, organization, and word choice. All other essays were critiqued by my peers. With the help of
Mrs. Miller, the Smarthinking e-structors, and my peers, I feel that I have improved the quality of my writing greatly

One of my more pronounced weaknesses would be my struggle of hooking my audience and keeping them engaged in the introductory paragraph. I believe that I have improved in this area, but not to the point where I could consider it a strength yet. For example, in my literary analysis essay I open with “Shakespeare’s famous quote ‘there is something rotten in the state of Denmark’ (I.iv.90) comes from his renowned play The Tragedy of Hamlet: The Prince of Denmark.” By beginning my essay with a quote from Shakespeare, I have automatically handed off my defining moment to another author and taken the submissive role before I have even had the opportunity to state my claim. Although my e-structor specifically pointed out how using a quote from Shakespeare was a great way to hook my audience, I have to disagree because it was not my personal hook, but someone else’s. I also struggle with adding new ideas into my concluding paragraph, which is something that I noted in my last reflection, but I am beginning to learn to morph that new idea into a statement that explains the purpose and the intent behind my paper instead of simply a floating idea. With some more time and practice, I know that I will master the art of concluding my