Reflection Paper

When I was in fourth grade, my teacher informed that I had a high school reading level and that I was advanced for my year; I was very proud. In sixth grade, my teacher informed me that I jumped to from a high school reading level to a college reading level. After learning about this, reading books became large part of my life and have helped me construct who I am today. I read books that intimidated other students and impressed teachers. However when entering high school English, I found academic reading and writing more difficult than I expected it to be. I always thought that reading was easy to me; reading novels and book series were effortless. During freshmen English, we were given the book”Of Mice and Men” to read and then write a

I was forced to write essays in a specific format with specific information and I feel that I am limited in my thoughts and ideas. I was always confused on how to start the introduction paragraph, how to incorporate my commentary with the concrete detail, and how to end my essay. In shorter terms, I was confused on how to write a simple essay. I tried extremely hard to comprehend the structure of the five paragraph essay but each paper that was returned to me was covered with red markings and a bad grade. I still then could not recognize the theme of the story or the author’s purpose for writing the narrative. English 2 and 3 were also a struggle because teachers could not advise me about my writing; they simply told me “The thesis statement must be very vague.The body paragraphs must have two concrete detail and commentary to follow. The conclusion needs to paraphrase the entire essay.” I thought “if my teacher’s advice is difficult to understand then writing essays is even more difficult to

My first essays were decent, which meant that I was finally learning the concept of five paragraph essays. Ms. Mercado, my expository writing teacher, suggested that I write down my ideas for my essay first and later revise my ideas into organized sections of the essay then correct grammatical errors. I have learned that re-reading my content after writing it will help me find spelling mistakes and grammar mistakes. My expository writing teacher also gave us novels that interested me for example “The Glass Castle” and “A Thousand Splendid Suns”. After reading, our class had literacy circles where everyone expresses their opinion on the book and their theories about the author’s purpose. From the literacy circles, I have learned to view the author’s purpose from different points of view and to have different opinions rather than being fixed onto just