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What are you most worried about as the winter break approaches before the final exam?
Write 300+ words and stay up.
(Pictured is Kurt Vonnegut, phenomenal essayist. No, not the baby. And Toni Morrison, an even better writer.)
afflictor.com
98 comments:
My essays have the most passion when I am arguing my point. They are not the best, nor are my sources easy to find but that just means I have to be more passionate to get my point across. I do better when I know the strengths and weaknesses of my argument, and where people are going to most likely attack said argument. This helps me because I can plan better and allows me to get a better idea of where to go. For instance, if I have to compose an essay on arguing the morality of the death penalty I would know where to begin research, how to get people on my side and even how to shut down my opponents. I would never say that my essays are the best, nor are they the most polished. They are effective however, it just depends on what essay that the effectivity matters.
what worries me most on the final exam is the terms and grammar portions. I have never done well with the short answer term questions. I do not mean that I do not know the terms, I just do not know them well enough to get them off the top of my head. The grammar portion is another matter altogether. With all the rules that need to be memorized and the various uses of those rules, I have little to no hope on this portion. The reason why is because of the various uses of the rules, they do not seem to have a pattern for me to recognize. Like the difference between two sentences could be one word and that one word mean one is complex and the other is compound, but in another sentence the word does not even matter. It is highly confusing to me.
I do enjoy essay writing, though I have not felt much passion in any of the presented topics presented to me this year. Due to my lack of passion, my essays have been lackluster and borderline terrible. Polishing my essays would be much like putting lipstick on a pig, in the sense of attempting to fix something that is unfixable. Although you may change a few sentences, add a few literary techniques, and an allusion, it is still a passionless, haphazardly written essay. Any writer worth their salt would know to put passion in each writing; I, however, am not a proficient writer and still have an incredibly long road ahead of me before I can call myself one. I am able to research with little to no difficulty; however, the actual act of citing my sources within the essay, as mentioned in my previous blog task, is quite onerous and not enjoyable in the least bit. I do not dislike the act of citing, I simply do not understand it and would appreciate any help or practice of any sort to improve my citations and, in turn, my writing. The approach of winter break and, more importantly, the final exam for the semester that we have just completed brings an uneasy feeling and anxiety. It brings fear for our grades, not only in high school, but also the grade that carries over into college. It brings stress for our GPAs. The idea of the final exam does not worry me in the least; the concepts, however, frighten me. The complexity. The amount. There is nothing like a final exam after (that is right, after, not before) winter break. Winter break for me always seemed like a reprieve from the tension that is felt at school. I generally stress about tests, but closer to the date (the rapidly approaching date, if I might add) I become a nervous wreck. I do hope I will be more prepared for this exam than the exams of the past.
Writing is something I very much enjoy, although often times I let the stress of writing consume me. Some days I can produce idea after idea and shoot those ideas out page after page in a matter of a few hours. Other days I struggle to form a simple sentence. Passion in writing, for me, all depends on the topic and the circumstances I am placed under. I am able to indulge in my passion for writing when I am not forced to deal with a lot of stress. This stress arises from requirements and due dates. Often times for school it is a requirement to write about a certain topic. It is nice, however, that although there are topic requirements I am still able to choose my own topics within the required conditions. The ability to have a say on what I am to write, contributes a great deal to my passion put in.
One might not always take this into consideration put the setting I am involved with while forming my essays play a key part in the outcome of my work. During class I am not one to be able to fully put my focus into the task at hand. When I place myself into more comfortable surroundings such as a coffee shop, or my desk at home, it sends a signal to myself that I am able to relax. Working under time constraints ( 50 minute class periods) means that I do not have much of a say as to when I can complete my thoughts. Often times the bell rings, meaning I am required to close up my work, which leads to incomplete thoughts that become hard to carry off on in the future. Being able to work in an environment that I am able to start and stop my thoughts on a time schedule of my choosing allows my passion to strengthen.
Polishing essays is something that I enjoy. Not only does polishing strengthen my essay, but it means I am that much closer to my final project. Making corrections allows myself to reestablish my reason for writing and see if there are any points I can expand on or even reconsider. I enjoy polishing essays so much that I make it a point to help my classmates and friends to polish their essays after I have taken care of my own.
Along with all other tasks of writing, I would say I am highly capable of researching to offer credible proof. I find myself researching topics frequently for a better understanding of detail. If I am able to research topics without an obligation to offer credible proof (simply for my own recreation) then I am certain I am qualified to research to gain proof as well.
Worry for the final exam will set in for me once we have hit Christmas break. I am not sure how I feel about the break before the test. In some ways I think it will be nice because it gives me a break to study over the time we do not have school, but at the same time I am not sure how much of my break I will actually end up using for studying. I am nervous for the final exam because I wish to perform well but I hope I do not worry so much to the point of stressing out. As essays slow down before break I will do my best to begin preparing for the exam to ensure nothing comes as a surprise to me.
I would say I have the most passion in my essays when it is something I really care about and I think it matters for people to have the right perspective or information on. For example, when we had to write our causal essays. I choose to write mine on evolution and how people have been deceived and made to believe certain things as rock solid truth when in truth they are just the scientist way of trying to disprove God so he can live however he pleases without answering to a superior being. During this essay I was extremely passionate because people have been fed the wrong information for too long. Also atheists always say science disprove the bible. Which could not be farther from the truth. They just have a different world view to interpret the information science gives them. Science supports the bible and creation in 6--24 hours days. During this essay because I was so passionate about it I researched it with great vigor. I wanted people to see that it just wasn't my opinion or the Riley model but scientifically proven and valid. I also didn't want readers to caught up on the wrong cited or poor facts, but focus on the content and the point I was trying to get across. So I researched and asked many question to make sure I had the exact form I needed for success. However, I had to ask another student to polish or edit my paper because I do not understand fully many of the little grammar things. I am can arrange sentences in a way I like but grammar, commas, spelling and word choice I struggle in. I think the hardest thing I am most scared of going up to the final exam would be actually know the format of the test and how we are going to tested. For example fill in the blank, matching, multiple choice, etc...
My essays tend to have the most passion when I am composing something that I am very passionate about. Likewise, why would your essay be passionate if you did not have passion for the topic you are discussing. I usually am able to be highly compassionate when I am arguing or persuading someone on a topic that I have a lot of knowledge in or something that I do often and enjoy. Some examples of things I would be passionate about would be soccer, my religion, my family, animals, world crisis views, volunteering, elderly people, children, and many others. It is easy for me and enjoyable, to write an essay that is to be of great length when I have passion about it. For example our causal essays, I was passionate about my topic, therefore, writing the required amount of pages was fairly easy for me.
Polishing my essays is a love-hate relationship for myself. I enjoy polishing them because it makes your writing better and more enjoyable for the reader, but on the other hand, I do not like to polish my essays because this can require arduous work and can be fairly frustrating at times. As I go through my essay I may realize that I have made many mistakes, or the grammar is incorrect, or even the structure of the entire paragraph may not make sense. It than results in time consuming efforts to alter and redeem my writing.
Researching topics goes hand in hand with the subject of how passionate you are about the topic assigned. I am capable of researching a topic thoroughly and citing my sources correctly if I am passionate about the subject. Researching and gathering information is interesting and builds your knowledge and curiosity about your essay. If I am passionate about what I am discussing I will research and look into multiple sources and gather as much information about it so I can build a strong foundation for my essay.
Something that I am dastardly afraid for for the final exam is that I am not going to remember 100 terms and how to identify them in a sentence or pick them out of a line up of answers. I am horrible at grammar so I believe that the hardest part of the final exam will be the different types of sentences or AKA grammatical classification. I was bad at identifying these sentences at the beginning of the school year and I do not foresee myself getting a tremendous amount better at it. Mr. Christensen do not take this upon yourself if I do poorly, I am just extremely horrendous at this and I am frankly, quite nervous for this part of the exam. I am sure that most of the exam will be challenging so all I can do is review I suppose. Prepare for the worst, hope for the best and Godspeed.
With citing, my knowledge is basic. I know what a works cited page looks like. I know how to use it to backtrack through the research to find the original information. I know how to make a MLA format citation through easybib.com, but writing one out myself? I am about as confident doing that as a college freshman during finals. I should be confident in doing so, but I always feel as though I am forgetting something, or doing it wrong. I also can not help but feel inadequate in that I believe it is something I should know how to do, but I do not. I know citing is easy, like most things it is just requires you to use it often enough to do it through muscle memory. Off the top of my head, I can barely tell you how it is formated. Something along the lines of Title, Author, copyright and Date published. Another problem, one that is just as hindering, is that I have trouble finding out the information required online. In books it is easy, the information is easily found in the first few pages. Websites however lack the information, or it is hidden somewhere on the page.
“I am what I am an’ I’m not ashamed. ‘Never be ashamed,’ my ol’ dad used ter say, ‘there’s some who’ll hold it against you, but they’re not worth bothern’ with.’” This is a quote from Hagrid in the goblet of fire. Not exactly the most understandable character, Hagrid always is able to convey the meaning, if not the words. What is interesting about this quote is that you can understand Hagrid has a thick accent. Rather than writing that hagrid said it in his thick accent or something along those lines, J.K. Rowling decided to write it in the accent.
I would say that when my essays have the most passion is when I am writing about something I am interested in. I also have passion when it will better help someone and their knowledge. No matter what the essay requirements are you can make a difference or be passionate about them when the writer chooses the topic. People with no passion at all for an essay will not exell to their highest potential than writing about something they love greatly. Having passion for an essay with require more time and effort just like my causal essay. I am passionate about how the mind works and relays emotions towards a certain thing but how does the mood or the emotions relate to health was very intriguing. For the causal essay it required a passion to create something that is proven that has a cause and effect. Many more of my essays have passionate but in many different ways. I am not great at polishing my essays. It is hard for me to go back and reread stuff 5 times to see if it sounds correct. I sometimes think a whole sentence in my head and then type it and leave out words. It is a struggle to identifying sentences in they way end product of my essay. I am good at researching for credible proof but have hard trying to do a drop quote and adding the quote to my essays. I research sites to get more insight on a topic. It is not hard to actually physically look up the topics nor do the works cited but citing them within the text is my low point. The final exam is around the corner and it scares me because I stink at memorizing things. Looking back at the terms from past term tuesdays it is hard to remember all of them. I am curious to what exactly is on the test and the lay out. I am also worried we have to write an essay.
Throughout all of the essays I have written in my life, there have been some that I delve myself into and other essays that I have struggled to write, and generally do not care for them. It is always way easier to write about a topic that you are passionate about. The essays that I care about and the essays that are pertinent to me are the ones that I write about most passionately. Another thing that evokes passion from me is when I do not know much information about a subject. This lack of knowledge makes me want to learn more on the topic, which makes me passionate about the research and essay as a whole.
I believe that I am average at proficiently polishing essays. However, I am undoubtedly better at finishing essays than starting them. Starting an essay is usually somewhat difficult for me. I think this is likely as it is a result from procrastinating. I never like starting essays, but when I finish polishing up my essays, I am immensely satisfied. I believe that I am a fairly-good researcher. I generally never have problems researching a topic because there are so many different resources at the disposal of humans. The internet has an unlimited amount of websites that can be used, and Google makes it even easier to research subjects with their Google Scholar search engine. The school library is also a fantastic resource to use to check out books pertaining to the subject that someone would be researching.
With Christmas break seemingly approaching faster and faster, I would have expected my worries to increase, but they have not. I am pretty confident in everything that we do now. I just hope that I do not lose a significant amount of knowledge over the long break; it is unlikely that would happen. I think that the reviews we have been doing are very helpful and I am grateful for them.
1 Peltier
When writing my essays I am more passionate to some essay more than others. I may gravitate towards one more than the other due to the content that I am writing about. I am the most passionate when I am writing about the sport that I have dedicated my life to, soccer. I believe this is so because it is something that I have known my whole life which allows me to really express how I feel. As well as I am extremely knowledgeable on the subject. Therefore I am able to express my views, explain parts of the game, and even put in personal experiences, causing me to have the most passion.
When it comes to polishing essays I find myself not succeeding or excelling as I probably should. To be honest I think I just become to lazy to go through and ready all of the pages that I have written. Therefore I just skim through my paragraphs to search for spelling or grammar mistakes. I do all of this and become complacent when it comes to looking for ways that I can embellish on points in my work in order to improve my writing to make it the best work that I am capable of producing. Usually when it comes to polishing my essays I turn to somebody else to give me feedback, such as my sister, who then goes through and reading it then
suggests things that I could improve or do differently. I am capable of researching and offering credible proof. I actually find that fun and interesting and quite frankly one of my favorite things to do.
One thing that I am most worried about as winter break approaches before the final exam is forgetting everything. I am scared that during break I am not going to want to stress over school and then when we come back from break I will not remember anything. I am also worried about how to study for this exam and how to properly prepare myself.
I do not have a passion for writing because I usually do not like the topic. Writing has always been difficult for myself since I am not gifted with the ability of transferring my thoughts onto paper. However when I write about running my thoughts become a bit easier to write down. I think many of my fellow classmates can relate to the ease of writing when the topic is liked. Luckily, essays in Composition 101 have had large subjects for each assignment but with no topic. Imagination runs wild with no restraints of specific topics.
Mentioned earlier, I am not skilled in the spectrum of writing and grammar. Song lyrics are easy to memorize but all the comma and spelling rules are way over my head. Polishing an essay can be difficult when one does not know certain grammatical rules. Also my writing makes sense to me in my head but as the words come onto paper, thoughts get jumbled when fingers can not kept up with flowing ideas. When I get to a point in my essay where I think I am done, I ask a couple friends to proof-read and they always find something. I revize the confusing paragraphs and try to find correct spellings.
Researching topics is do able with any essay but the passion behind the topic simplifies the work put into the research. If I am given a topic that I do not care about I will find minimal sources with information easily obtainable by everyone. When I have more passion for a topic my creative mind searches for small, surprising statistics that benefits the essay.
As winter breaks approaches I am ready to relax my mind of the thousands of things I have to worry about weekly. Right now I am worried about remembers all the terms that are hard to pronoun because they are not self explanatory like simple terms such as dependent clause. The only thing helpful to learn these terms is to use them in my essays more and study.
Hammond pd. 7
I feel as though my essays have the most passion somewhere between after school and late at night. When I am in composition class, I am more than a bit distracted on most days. I enjoy socializing, and the class has allowed me to get to know my peers much better. I enjoy taking full advantage of that, so I find that I am most productive when I am not at school. I also feel like my partner essays, or essays that involve an opinion are more passionate. When I write a partner essay, I feel as though I have a higher standard. I must write enough that I pull my weight, and what I write must be written well so as not to embarrass me in front of my partner. Naturally, a more opinionated essay with a definite stance or point to it is more passionate. I feel like most people write best when it is about something they truly have feelings for, such as their opinions, rather than something that is merely assigned to them.
I would like to think that I am good at proof reading, and in some cases better at proofing that at actually writing my own essay. Several people have come up to me before and asked for help in writing their essays, which I would gladly read rather than do my own.
I research moderately. This class has most definitely increased my proficiency in my ability to cite sources and research.
I am most worried about my calculus two final this Tuesday. I am going to be very busy Monday night, as I have a bowling match and a band concert that evening, which leaves little time to study. I am also worried about composition final exam, however, I feel like that will be easier than the calculus exam. With the upcoming and eventual passing of both brings in a New Year and winter break, which is the physical manifestation of hope for me. I am excited, but also shocked that it is almost a new year.
I tend to be a reserved speaker in everyday conversation. Of course I will tell someone my opinion if they press me--I do have strong opinions on most matters--but given my choice, I would much sooner listen to what someone else has to say. Looking back on my essays from this semester (and bearing in mind my natural reticence), I am rather surprised to find the most passion where I am expressing my opinion.
I write at a crawling pace. I always have. This often bothers me, especially when there is an imminent time crunch at play. Timed essay tests are my bane: by the time I have collected my thoughts, the clock has already begun running low--and I have scarce set a word in ink. Yet I still love to write; there is something strangely calming in the whole affair. All the same, I admit I am a terrible polisher of essays. Once I have written something, I seem incapable of it revising it myself without someone else’s advice. This may seem strange (it is quite frustrating, if anything), but doubtless it stems from my plodding pace. I take so long to write and rewrite every consecutive sentence I am practically revising as I go along. Perhaps that is my problem! I should probably learn to just whip out a rough draft and save my rewriting for later. Oh well. Everyone is used to his own system.
I have thoroughly enjoyed our research essays this semester, especially since we were given free choice of research topics. History is one of my favorite subjects, so I have had a blast researching World War II for my argumentation and expansion essays on Adolf Hitler. Historical nonfiction has long been my favorite genre for enjoyment reading; stories about Ernest Shackleton and Dietrich Bonhoeffer somehow seem to teach lessons fiction will never rival.
I am rather apprehensive for semester finals--if for no other reason, the marching band is headed south for the latter half of our Christmas break. I sympathize with the underclassmen in the band, since they will not have much of a chance to study over the break (granted, the chances are slim they would be studying up north either). I suppose we will have a couple weeks in January to get back up to speed before semester tests, but I am still absolutely flummoxed by the whole shift in the school calendar. I am biased; I do not like change. The new calendar must make sense to somebody.
I am most passionate about my essays when I am composing something that I am excited or fascinated by. When I am excited about writing something the words flow more easily and I believe it reflects in my writing. I have more ideas when I am passionate about the topic I am writing about due to the prior pondering I have done about that topic. I often am passionate about writing things that have to deal with my interests such as sports, human habits, and health. I also love to tell stories so the narrative essay was an enjoyable essay to write. I do believe I polish my essays quite well. I often read over my essays often before the due date to make sure that everything is how I want it to be. I am able to research well but it is often hard to find credible sources that pertain to my essays. I am most worried about remember all the different terms for the final exam. I want to make sure I study all of the topics thoroughly. I am afraid I will forget the easy terms and make those more complicated than they truly are. I am no longer nervous for the classification part of the test due to all the practice and studying we have done in class. The quizzes have helped immensely and so did the teaching. I will have to study the other terms better to be fully prepared for the final exam.
Writing is one of my weak points when it comes to school. However, this class is helping me become a proficient writer while teaching me many new key aspects of writing. I have also learned a lot about myself, writing wise. Rarely do I ever find a topic or essay that I like. I believe because I am not good at writing, it is very hard to find something that I am passionate about. However, there are some essays this year that do indeed bring out some passion. If a topic relates to my life or it sparks my interest, then I believe I will become more passionate about that essay/topic. The length of an essay also plays a key role into whether or not I show a lot of passion in my essay. The shorter an essay is, the harder I will work and therefore, it will show more passion.
When it comes to correcting and revising my work, I am not good at it. The topic or the essay itself plays a key role into whether or not I spend a lot of time making my essay perfect. If I am writing about a topic that I care about or I am passionate about, I will spend more time revising it in order to feel confident about my work. The length also plays a role into this. The longer the essay, the less time I will spend revising it. However, I do try to spend time correcting it after every page I write. As with researching, I will in order to get a good grade. I spend a lot of time researching when I find a topic that I am passionate about.
I quite worried about the final exam in this class. I am terrible at grammar and it is, in fact, one of my weakest subjects in school. I am also not good at memorizing things. Having the test after winter break will either break or make my grade. Yes, there will be more time to study. However, what student focuses on school during winter break? I have a feeling that I will forget everything and try to cram it all in the day before. I will need to try and set a specific study time everyday in order to memorize all of the terms.
I feel as though my essays have the most passion when I am at home. Personally, when I am at school, especially first period, my brain really does not function properly. I get easily side tracked when I am at school. There are many people typing in class, and I also like to chat with my friends when I am at school; however, when I am at home, I am alone and am able to grasp my brain and perform my duties properly and suitably. It also helps when I eat a little while working on my homework. I feel as though food helps and assists the brain in functioning and creating that smarter spark in your head. Also when I am at home, I feel like I am more capable of proficiently polishing my essays. Like I said previously, I am capable of much more intellectually when I am at home. When I do polish my essays, I feel as though I do it very well. Before each essay is due, I tend to check it over a few times and make sure everything seems and looks good. When I research topics, I sometimes feel as though it is rather difficult to find credible sources pertaining to my essay. As the winter break approaches, I am very worried about remembering the final exam terms. There are so many of them. I will have to study them in depth otherwise I will not be able to know which is which. I am not so worried about the classification part of the test because of all the practice that we have had in class. It has truly helped me immensely. Although I understand the classification part, I will have study the final exam terms more.
My essays have the most passion when I am interested in the topic I am writing about. The narrative essay was my most passionate essay due to me being able to express a personal experience. I enjoy being able to express myself through writing, and the narrative essay was a perfect way for me to do so. It is hard for me to be passionate about an essay that I am not interested in, such as the causal essay. It was hard for me to be enthused about spending so much time researching and creating a works cited page. I believe with the proper amount of time and effort, I am a proficient polisher of my essays. Sometimes it is difficult to perfect an essay with so many things going on in my life such as work, other school work, and cheer. I also like to polish others’ essays when I have time. When writing the argumentation essay I was able to research and offer credible proof well. I am not a huge fan of researching for my topics because it can become stressful for me. I do, however, enjoy learning more information about my topics. It can be slightly boring to go through the actual researching process, but when I put my mind to doing it, I am successful. I am most worried about trying to stay focused on studying for the final exam during winter break. There are a lot of things on the final exam I feel that I am not prepared for. I have not put enough effort in trying to learn all of the things I need to due to my procrastination habits. There are many vocab words that I do not yet know the meanings of completely. I hope over winter break I study our Term Tuesdays and try to better understand the concepts for the final exam.
A common pattern I have begin to notice is that my essays only seem to include passion when the essay is very personal to me. Although this is a weakness of mine, the essays with the passion are phenomenal, while those which lack passion are merely mediocre. Finding it easier to express emotions, essays involving myself and my life seem to glide off of my fingers much easier than a topic I have little interest in. My causal essay had great depth into my life and my dreams/passions, therefore the topic was rather easy to compose. From grammatical errors to titles, polishing essays is a strength of mine. I enjoy critiquing my fellow classmates and my own essays to make them as outstanding as possible. Researching becomes easier for me when I know minimal facts/information related to my essay. This motivates me to become as knowledgeable on the topic as the intelligent people composing the many articles I scour to learn more. Since middle school students have been taught the infamous phrase "Wiki is Icky." When attempting to write a scholarly essay, I try extremely hard to find reliable sources and I believe I do a rather great job at this. As winter break is approaching unbelievably swiftly, my greatest fear is forgetting materials I have learned in the first semester thus far. I believe it would be beneficial to have review packets handed out before break to study over any free time--which is undoubtedly a lot. I am aware that college courses do not make finals as easy as high school with the study guides and review games. This slightly intimidates me because I have a difficult time focusing on studying materials I find boring, although they are important for my grades. I am hoping studying and focusing will come easier over time and with more practice.
I show the most passion while composing essays with topics I am familiar with. Being able to pull information from the top of my head and incorporate it into neat sentence style boosts my confidence in that essay. Also, being familiar with a certain topic allows for me to research and obtain valid information that can be used to strengthen my essays.
Polishing essays and perfecting them to my best ability goes smoothly for the most part. Being able to take a sentence and reform its structure is quite entertaining and gives interest to the reader along with myself. Proofreading and scanning through them to make sure information is not repeated nor false is another way I like to polish my essays.
Being able to research ideas and points on my topics comes easy to me. I like to check multiple sites for the same information to be positive that it is true. This allows me to insert it into my essays and provide better reasoning. Even if I am certain I know the information, comparing my knowledge to that on multiple internet sources is an extremely useful practice.
From seeing the results, it seems as if the complex sentences are what stump me the most. On the past two grammatical classification quizzes, there were two or three sentences that were complex but instead I marked them as either simple or compound complex. My eyes often seem to look past the dependent clause(s) and search right for the independent clause(s). Another idea that worries me more is the number of final exam terms that are to be understood. There are many terms that I am familiar with, but there are more terms and phrases that are new to me. Some terms are just so close in meaning to one or more which confuses me. Overall I believe the in-class practice and studying will help me better understand them and boost my confidence for the final exam.
When composing an essay I try to find ways to display passion. The times where I show passion the most is when I get to pick my own topic or I was given a topic that I relate to. If there is an essay that I am passionate about and have a lot of feelings and emotions towards that topic I tend to have more input on that situation and never seem to have trouble of not having enough to talk about. You can tell when I do not feel passionate about a certain topic because it looks like my essay is filled with gibberish and not interesting, intriguing facts and stories.
My skill at polishing essays have definitely improved over this current year. I used to not know what to correct to to change when looking over my essays in the past. But in my composition class I have written so many essays and went into detail when writing an essay that I can go over the essay and find the littlest mistakes but just reading through it. The tiniest details of flaws stick out to me. For example, I can point out if I had an extra space between a word or see if I need a space by just polishing and glancing over my essay. This skill helps me make my essays better and find mistakes that I need to fix and improve in future essays. I also learned better techniques when researching about a topic or a story that relates to my essay. I learn to read most of the article or the whole article and then pick out main points to incorporate in my essay. Of course I will then cite the source that I used from that research as well.
One of the main things that I worry about as winter break approaches before the final exam is that I will not study as much with the test being after christmas break because I will just want to mess around and be with my friends and not worry about school. But, I will try to get myself to focus on school on some days and put time aside to study for the end of the semester test to succeed. But, getting time after we get back from break to study in class will benefit me the most.
7 Hoffman
My essays have the most passion when I am writing about a personal time in my life that happened or when I feel strongly when arguing a point. When writing about a personal story, nearly writing with most passion seems to make the most sense. Talking about personal stories such as the Manhood, Narrative or even Compare and Contrast, having personal views are easiest when being passionate about your composing. Along with personal, arguing should be passionate as well almost always. If I argue that walking is better then running, I should feel passionate about the topic, not just arguing to make someone else feel wrong, but because I know I am right.
I do not believe that I am exceptionally better then anyone else by any means at polishing of essays; but, I do believe if I know little knowledge and having sources in the essay that I could offer help. Having credible proof in an essay is massive. Showing that you have offered proof to the reader that what they are reading is completely true information will help them believe what they are reading to be true. Having an argumentative essay with credible sources and proof, it will help win the argument by a landslide.
I am greatly worried that by the time this week is over and winter break approaching that slowly I will lose knowledge on some of the final exam terms that I know now. Everybody always says that they will study over the break for the terms, which would be the smartest thing to do, but a small portion will follow through. Not even with the final exam will knowledge be lost though, every class will lose some little knowledge. So, studying over the break, even a little bit, will be needed.
Wardlow 6
I have discovered that my essays have the most passion when I enjoy what I am writing about. I give my best effort on all essays I write, however the most passion is displayed in topics that I either enjoy or know most about. When I was working on my clausal essay I struggled to put the same amount of passion as I put into my comparison essay. When writing my clausal essay I had to do a lot of research to fully understand the topic I was writing about. In my classification essay I easily poured passion into it since I was writing about theater. I know a lot about theater and enjoy it making it easier to write. When it comes to polishing my essays I have advanced greatly this year. The grammatical classification quizzes have contributed greatly to my essay polishing abilities, along with term Tuesday. The grammatical classification quizzes have helped me to better understand what I write when I am constructing sentences. Adding term Tuesday terms to my essay has also helped me improve my essay polishing skills. By creating sentences in different styles I am better understanding what I write and why I write the way I do. Before this class I never would use semicolons in my writing because I never understood how, but now I find myself using them much more often. Winter break coming before semesters worries me much. I like having semesters before break that way over break I can relax without having to stress over school work. With semesters following Christmas I will not have much of a break. Over Christmas break I am going on a band trip my plan is to study on the bus ride there and back. I am nervous about the terms that we learned in the beginning of the year since those terms are not fresh in my mind.
Paauw 6
Passion is desired and detected by the many hordes of readers. If a writer over exudes passion in their works, there is a far greater likelihood that the reader will pick up on that. In turn, the reader will become more passionate about the essay topic. My essays have the most passion when I really care and either, understand or crave to know more about the topic I have chosen. For example, I had very little passion during the argumentative essay about curfew. This is because I already know both side’s views and there was little for me to learn or take out of the essay. Though I understood the topic, it was not something I care deeply about because my parents already set nightly curfews and I abide with them with little, to no arguments.
I am a fairly proficient polisher of essays, especially when I have put a lot of passion and work into it. Without passion in the essay, I do not enjoy the time reading through and making corrections. But, if I pick a topic I care about and enjoy doing, I love going through it and embellishing every sentence. I put many new things in the essay and read each line with care to see if an improvement can take place.
Research is something I have always been above average at. I am able to either find someone with the same viewpoints as me or someone who is able to answer the questions I yearn to know the answer to. I am also good at picking reliable sources that will hold up against opposition.
I am more worried about the oncoming winter break than I thought I would be. I’m not as worried about knowing and learning the terms, but more about being able to apply them on the test. I am kind of worried about the format of the test and the individual questions. I know I will be able to learn many terms, as I have for many previous classes, but I feel like the final test is more of an application test than a straightforward memorization test.
Overall I do not see myself as a very passionate writer. Out of all of the essays this year I would say I wrote most passionately in the argumentative essay. I found myself to get more engaged in this essay due to the fact that it was a partner essay. Being able to bounce ideas off of another person seemed to help ideas flow. Through all of our essay assignments we are allowed a large amount of freedom. However I feel when adding in final exam, and vocabulary terms it only seems to add stress and take away some of the enjoyment of writing. Also being with a partner helped in the polishing aspect of the essay. When writing by myself it is hard to know if what I am writing will make sense to someone reading the essay. With a partner I constantly had someone to proofread, and give feedback. I also believe the argumentative essay was a great way of research, and credible proof. Before this essay I was unaware of what an annotated bibliography was. After learning what they entailed, I found myself to enjoy them. Knowing that I can read an article and get ideas without having to directly quote it in my essay was very helpful for me. This also helped in backing up and fact checking some of my works cited.
What am I most worried about as the final exam approaches? I think a better question would be what am I not worried about. My understanding of sentence structure is still a little blurry. All of the “fluff” built within the sentences really throws me off. Also I worried I will not know how to decipher the difference between some of the similar final exam terms. I worry that being out of town for most of Christmas break will set me back on studying.
Bickley 6
When writing essays, I find I have the most passion when I am able to pick and choose what I want to write about. I find a topic that I can relate to and that I am passionate about, which makes my mind get in the zone. I often times think of events that I have been involved in and what I have learned from those experiences. I take those experiences and see how I can twist and turn them to fit the topic of the essay given. I find it fun when writing about events that have occurred to me because it brings back memories. When having to put in certain literary devices, I find that I sometimes miss details that happen in the time of the event but adding the literary devices makes the essay a lot better. For example, when writing my classification essay about state track, I noticed that inserting the literary devices helped me remember little things that had happened in the time-span of the event giving the reader a better understanding of the essay. When writing essays I am able to research to find credible proof. When researching about my topic I find information that will help give me a better understanding of my topic that will give the reader more background and knowledge about what I am writing. As winter break approaches before the final exam, I am worried about remembering all 104 literary devices we have learned over the semester. I believe that participating and doing Term Tuesdays gave me a better understanding on how to use each device. It is interesting to hear how other students teach the terms making it easier for me to understand. Each student teaches in a different way just like every teacher we have had, listening to how each student teaches gives me a better understanding of the literary devices.
Jacobson 6
There are multiple things in life that I am passionate about. Discussing these topics are not a problem for me, but transferring my passions into writing... that is a struggle. Writing has always been difficult for me, and out of all my passions, writing is not one of them. It's as if my brain forgets how to function when I write. I overthink things and lack the ability to carry my passion over into my writing. Punctuation and the proper grammatical rules totally leave my brain, and leave me staring at the screen for minutes hoping I can dig something up. I am not passionate about writing.
When it comes to polishing essays, proficient would not be the word I'd use to describe me. Incompetent would be a better and true description of my polishing skills. English is a fairly easy class for me, but I seem to forget all the rules for everything when I write. Therefore, polishing does not go well.
Can I research? Yes. For me, it is a matter of knowing what to type into the search engine to get the results I am looking for. If I type in the right thing, then yes offering credible proof is not a hard thing for me to do. With the help of easybib.com, citing is no longer a struggle.
With winter break quickly approaching, I am worried about studying for finals. I know for a fact I will have no motivation to, and with everything I will have going on, I do not think I will have time. Break is a thing I need, for my mental and physical health. I am constantly stressed and it would be nice to have nothing to worry about while on break. These finals being after break is going to throw me off. I am worried about forgetting everything.
My essays have the most passion when I am very driven to a certain topic. I will be able to write the most about a topic that interests me and I know a lot about. By having passion towards a specific topic, it is the easiest to write the most of. For some essays, it is arduous to stay focused and type away at ease. If there is a topic that is more difficult than others, I normally get side tracked and wait till the last minute to get it all accomplished. For my most passionate essays, I put in as much effort as I possibly can to achieve my goal. I unfortunately am not that much of a proficient polisher of essays. Although, I do enjoy reading and complimenting others on their work. I normally find it difficult to give others a suggestion or idea that they could fix. It is easiest for me to correct grammar, punctuation, or spelling errors instead. I find it simple to include credible proof in my essays. I have normally been able to search any topic that needs to be searched and provide factual information. I feel that I am most worried about being able to stay focused as we get closer to the end of the semester. The most issued problem is having to take semester tests after winter break. By doing this, I will have to look over and study the final exam words throughout break-- which is meant for a “relaxing” two weeks with no school or school work. I am going to encourage myself to study otherwise the final exam is not going to go too well. My goal for the final exam is to get a good enough grade that I am comfortable and happy with. I want to show myself that I learned a lot throughout the semester of my first college course of my High School career.
Ever since I was a little girl, I have loved listening to stories from my elders. In my opinion, writing an essay is just like telling a story. I am passionate about writing essays that tell a story. For example, my narrative essay was my favorite essay we wrote this semesters. I wrote about my car accident and the revocation of my license and how it has affected my life drastically. I enjoyed writing it because the topic was something I actually enjoyed writing about. I believe that is when I have the most passion when writing. I also think I have the most passion if I am arguing something I feel strongly about. I am able to write pages upon pages when I write something I am passionate, unlike when I am forced to write something specific for school.
I definitely believe that I am a proficient polisher of my essays. I always reread my essay about 5 times after I finish and before I turn it in to make sure it is spectacular and I did not make any mistakes. If I have extra time on my hands, I sometimes correct my friend’s essays to help them excel in their work as well. If an essay needs factual information, I always look up sources on the internet and in books to help further my essays point.
I am very terrified for the semester exam. I have a feeling it is going to be extremely hard. I am trying to do my very best right now so if I do fail the semester test, I can still keep an A in the class. I think trying to learn over 100 terms is going to be difficult, especially since it is after Christmas break and it usually takes me a few weeks to get my brain focused and back into school mode. I am going to try my hardest to succeed and get the best grade I can because I really do not want to go into college with a B on my college transcript.
Polasky 6
When writing, I like to write about things that I generally am passionate about. Things that I like to do in my free time, experienced first hand, or just get excited talking about. Being able to pick topics based off the type of essay that we are assigned to create allows me to write with passion. The essay I enjoyed doing was the causal essay. I picked a topic that not only I knew I have experienced a lot about, stress, but also many other people my age. Looking up information became easier because not only was it something I could relate to, it was also something I wanted to learn more about. The more educated you are on a specific topic, the more you become comfortable about it and are willing to share it with others. I learned new ways to handle stress or even how to not have so much while looking up information to help with the causal essay. For me it is a little harder to polish said essay. I just get so many ideas flowing through my head that I cannot get them all written cohesively down into a complete sentence. I struggle with going back through and reading what I have written because I feel like I will just want to change all of it or I might think of think of something completely different to talk about. I second guess myself. However this year, becoming passionate while writing and going back through and editing my essays have become easier. I enjoy it more now going through and reading what I have written to see if there is a new or better way of wording a sentence or using a grammatical term I just learned to enhance my essays. I am worried that when I come back from break I will have forgotten everything that I worked hard on so far this semester. Not so much the big topics but the little details in grammar and sentence structures. Some of the Final Exam terms are similar and I think I will not be able to keep them all separate. However, with a week before test, hopefully we will have time to go back and look and study what we may have forgotten.
Jacob Meyer Pd. 1
My essays have the most passion when I have interest or truly have a passion for the topic in the essay. I can throw some words onto a page, but it is clear when I do that compared to my works where I have interest. Like in my narrative essay, I had a passion to tell the story and wrote an extra page then required to narrate my experience. Most of my essays this year have been about a topic that I care about. Or if I was not as interested in the topic, I made myself interested. In the argumentation essay, my interest was not at its peak. I decided if I was not that interest, I would write about I thought was interesting in the topic. I enjoyed contradicting the opponents points so that is what I tried to write more about.
When it comes to refining my essays, I think I could use some improvement. I am still learning and becoming better at grammatical part of essay writing. Once I reach grammatical excellence, my essays will appear more professional. In my essays, I feel that I am good at rewording some of the content. I sometimes reword sentences a couple time until I think it is at its highest quality.
I am nervous about the final exam for this class. I will be studying and reviewing material that we learned, but the long break filled with traveling and family get-together will hamper the study process. I would like to say I will be study a lot over break but realistically I will not have as much time as I would like. It will be interesting to see how the final exam after Christmas break will affect the results of the test. Even though I am nervous, I know from the different studying we had done in class and the studying I plan to do, I will be fine for the test.
Schwint 1
I have the most passion in my essay’s when I am writing an essay about a topic that I am very knowledgeable on or when I want to persuade people to see my point of view. For instance, I was very passionate about my classification essay because I was able to talk about something that I knew a lot about-- Softball. I also have a lot of passion in essays where I get to share my point of view with the readers in hopes that they will see things from a different perspective. I am mediocre when it comes to polishing essays. When I polish my essays I will reread my essays to make sure that everything flows together well and make sure that everything that I am trying to portray is getting through to the reader. I also go back through my essay and try to give variety to my sentences so that it keeps the reader intrigues throughout my essay, yet I do need to work on adding more hyphens and dashes in my sentences to make my essay’s even more interesting. I am very good at researching for essays in order to provide proof for my essays. I like to research proof especially when I am writing an argumentative essay because it is easier to persuade people to be on your side if you are able to bring up credible proof to back you up. Going into this winter break I am most nervous about some of the final exam terms especially the term that are very similar to each other but they have one small difference that distinguishes them. For example, I am nervous about antithesis, inversion of a whole sentence, and the difference between empty words and disagreeable pompous language.
1 Klumpp
I believe my essays have the most passion when I write about a topic that I am interested in. The words seem to flow easier and the transitions are smoother from paragraph to paragraph. I am also the most comfortable when I am writing about something I am familiar with. I also believe that I can self-correct and critique my essays well. I can point out when something does not sound write or is just flat out dull.I also feel strongly about my essays when I am trying to argue a point. When I want to get my point across, I will back it up with strong opinions and facts. I am not one to rush just to finish an essay, I would rather rewrite and correct to make sure it is almost perfect. I also enjoy researching and offering those who wrote it credit. I believe researching makes the essays more credible and believable to the reader. I enjoy using internet sources as well as book sources from the library. Easybib.com helps me cite all my sources correctly, I would recommend it to any student who has not been using it and needs help citing.
I am most worried about classifying sentences, especially complex and compound sentences. A few more google documents on classifying sentences would be extremely helpful. I also occasionally have a hard time picking out independent clauses out of sentences. The final exam also stresses me out because this grade affects my college GPA, not just my high school GPA. This also motivates me to study and write my essays to the best of my ability. I believe if I have sufficient resources and the drive to study, I will do well on the final exam. I have learned a lot about grammar and writing in this class and can not wait to learn more.
There are many things that I am passionate about. Like sports, family, and many other topics. I believe I am most passionate when it comes to sports. I have been playing sports since I was able to walk and I know a lot about them. Which is why I believe I am able to type passionately and with a purpose. The hardest part about composing an essay is turning a thought into words. Since my knowledge of sports is so high and since sports have been a part of my life for so long, it is something in care deeply about and I am able to write with ease about it.
If there was one thing I could change about my composition skills, it would be able to edit and polish my essay. When I read my own writing I believe it sounds good and that it is perfect because I typed it. The reality is I do make many mistakes and I have to go back through it very slow and read through it. The way this class works allows many other people to review my work and help with my corrections in my essays.
I also believe one of my strong points is being able to research a topic and get facts to back up what I am saying. When composing about sports, I already know many facts, I in return can research what I was talking about to make my essay very strong and accurate. I believe researching, and getting facts can make your essay very strong. I do have problems with citing my sources and if there is any tips, I would be will to hear so I can improve my writing.
Finally, I am most worried about the term Tuesday words we have to remember. Most of the words we have been reviewing I have never heard before, and there are plenty of them to remember. Memorization is not my strong topic in school and this test is a huge part of our grade. Studying now will help me in the long run.
Bender, Grace Pd 6
I find that my essays have the most passion when I am writing about personal experiences or something that interests me. I love talking about topics that are extremely controversial and will get many people either to strongly oppose or strongly support my hypothesis. If it is a bland topic, I do not care for it much and my writing shows. Or if I can speak for a large group of people. For example, I know that many people share what I am feeling or share a common experience, then I feel inclined to write more efficient essays to represent not only myself but other’s opinions also. I find that it is easiest to write in first person because then my thought flow quickly from brain to my fingers without translating it into 3rd person.
I sometimes over polish essays. I know that that sounds strange but I read, and reread many times. There is always something to change. Truly great writing is concise. Shorter is actually better and more correct with out a ton of extra fluff. I always over write sentences and sometimes give information or details that is not relevant. When I reread my essays I find this is the case more often and I continue to edit and reedit.
I am also great at finding credible sources. I know that a .org is better and more reliable than a .com or just any old wiki. I know when I find a blog--that may have my opinion or how I want to portray information-- they are less reliable because it could just be the blogger's opinion.
I am extremely worried about forgetting everything that I have been working so hard to remember. I think I understand the grammatical classification we have been quizzing over, but I do not think I will be good at the earlier term tuesday's information because it was so far away.
Although I am not usually an avid writer, there are times when my essays are saturated with passion. I am most passionate when writing about a topic that I thoroughly enjoy. This could be a wide variety of items, ranging from hockey and working out to babysitting and family. Not only that, but I am also a passionate writer when taking a stance on a particular issue that I find important. In those cases, I become passionate to persuade the reader to take my stance on the issue, and not the stance of my opponent.
I do not believe I can say that I am a proficient polisher of essays. Each day when I come to class, I do my best to compose and polish my essays as instructed, but I don’t feel that I am great at it. Some ways I try to polish my essays are by adding even more, descriptive words making the essay not quite as bland. I also try to change my sentence structure, using a combination of simple, compound, complex, and compound-complex sentences with the occasional fragments. I often refer to the enormous list of Term Tuesday terms to find new ways to make my essay more interesting. Also by using more of the Term Tuesday terms, it helps me to prepare for the final exam coming up. I find that I am able to research to find credible proof well. I would much rather research all class period, than sit and write. Therefore, I am able to find a variety of sources that can substantiate my point and topic given.
I am beyond ready and excited for winter break, but the thought of the final exam shortly afterwards worries me. I think that I would be completely fine if the test was simple, like matching, in which all I had to know was the term and definition. Applying the terms appears to be much harder than simply having the general knowledge of the definition. I need to find a way to study that makes me apply each term - which will help me understand them better.
I would say my essays have the most passion when I am arguing a point that I am truly passionate about. If I am writing about a topic that does not spark my interest, than my passion suffers considerably, but when I am writing about a topic I admire and find fascinating, I will have much more passion in my writing. This passion usually shows up most in the body paragraphs of my essay because this is the point in which I am arguing or using persuasion on my topic. I find it more facile to find facts to back up my opinion when I am writing about a topic I am passionate for; these credible sources along with my heartfelt opinion creates a lot of passion in my essays.
Once I have completed my essays, I go through all of it, checking each sentence for grammar mistakes or faulty meaning. I try my best to be a proficient polisher of my essays, but, of course, I will usually miss some errors that I have made even as I go through it a second or third time.
When researching to find a credible source for my essay, I try to find the most plausible and appropriate source for my topic. Sometimes I end up finding highly pertinent proof, however, sometimes my proof may not be as tenable as I had intended it to be. I do research quite a lot to make sure I find what I think is the best source for my essay, though.
As winter break approaches before the final exam, I am most worried that I will forget the terms that, before break, were fresh in my mind. Also, I am worried that over break I will forget to study or not have the motivation to study (I think we all get that sometimes) and I will have to cram for the test the days leading up to it. I know this will stress me out and I do not study well when under stress, so I hope I do not procrastinate studying too much.
6 Mullet
My essays have the most passion when I am persuading or arguing because that is when I find the most to say. If I am only analyzing a book I can not find much to talk about because it is all facts and some thought. This kind of essay does not allow you to provide why you believe a certain way; it only allows you to think about a book. Most topics I argue or persuade are topics that I know a lot about or that I feel strongly for. I enjoy standing up for a viewpoint that I agree with and normally can write more because there are multiple angles to consider. I believe that if I care enough about an essay and have enough time, I polish my essays proficiently. If I am rushed with little time, I do not worry about polishing my essay. Along with no time is no knowledge. If I can not think of anything to add to my essay to meet requirements then I know my essay is messy. If I am rambling or do not have a concise plan, whether in my head or on paper, then my essay is very sloppy and I do not bother polishing it. I can research to offer credible proof, because I check multiple sources and read through most of them before deciding to cite one in my paper. The final exam worries me only because of the break in between. I know I will not want to study, but instead take a break and relax. I will need to study hard the week we get back to school so that I do not forget things, such as the final exam terms and what they mean. I need to go back over the notes and re-learn everything that has not stayed with me through the semester.
7 Mixell
My essays have the most passion when I am writing about a topic that really interests me. There hasn't really been an essay that I could go crazy on this semester, but I was able to put a good amount of passion into the essays we did have this semester. I like writing about my interests, which I have tried to incorporate into my essays, however it really didn't turn out the way I wanted it to. When it comes to polishing essays, I feel like whenever I read over my essays, I always want to change or edit the things that I have written before. It seems to be an endless changing of certain words or completely rewriting different sentences. I feel like the original version of my essay has the most passion and emotion to it. When I start writing, the words I write usually come out exactly how I want them to come out. If I go back and edit these sentences later, I feel it loses some of the authenticity that I had intended it to have when I wrote it. I think researching topics can offer a plethora of credible proof, as well as adding exciting new information into an essay. I am most worried about keeping my math grade where it is at or improving it to the best of my ability. I was never great at math and this year Calculus is really giving me a challenge. As long as I can keep my grade where it is at (which I am fairly confident in), I should be just fine. Other than that, most of the things that I would be worried about have already passed, and we are extremely close to winter break. I am more than ready for this relaxing vacation.
Simons 7
My essays have the most passion when they are about something I believe in, or something I can form an opinion about. I don't do too well with fictional stories--they usually fall flat. I am also not as good at normal "what did you learn" essays. For those, it would be easier if they did not have a length requirement, as I usually get everything in without meeting quota. This will be difficult for me during the next semester, as forums for each book are required. Argumentation essays are my strong suit, as they are easy to research. Research is great for an argumentation essay because it helps to persuade your reader that your opinion is the correct one with facts about your topic. I try to do this in most of my essays if I can. Research is extremely helpful.
Ever since middle school, I have been pretty good at polishing essays. My friends used to give me their essays to proofread (especially punctuation, grammar, and spelling issues.) I have always been proficient at spelling and punctuation. Grammar was sometimes difficult for me, but I have gotten past that barrier and now I am skilled at all three topics.
As the winter break approaches, the only thing I feel that I am worried about is getting bored while home alone. Actually, I am a bit fearful that I will forget to do any homework while away from school as well. I am not the best at managing my time and therefore, often homework assignments do not get done or turned in. Hopefully I will not forget to prepare for the final exam, I will read Lord of the Flies, and maybe even get a head start on the forum that is due sometime in the future over the book.
7 Nador
Personally, I can become particularly passionate about what I am writing when it is either a narrative essay--meaning that I talk about myself and what happened to me--or argumentation, because I like to think about interesting moot topics and form an opinion, then prove my point. I like to exchange ideas and accept the challenge of changing someone’s mind about a certain idea or challenge someone to do the same with me. For a narrative essay, if I have a semi-decent base story, I can go great distances by challenging myself to embellish and polish the details until I think it is perfect. Also, I have recently acquired useful grammatical and literary knowledge that help my writings a great deal in being more enjoyable to read. My most recent (and most knowledgeable) narrative essay is the one I am most proud of: “To Be or Not to Be: The Short and Flat Story of My Hamster’s Life.” I remember the feverish excitement I composed that one with. In the most recent argumentative essay I partnered up with the brilliant Renae Kribell, and to my utter astonishment, we came up with countless great ideas and legitimate evidence to the arguments of a topic I, at first, was not very fond of.
To be honest, I have not been capable of giving much thought to the final exam yet, I am glad I have the date stored somewhere in the back of my head. Thinking about it though, I have come to the conclusion that since we deliberately use and apply the knowledge we obtained during the Term Tuesdays, most of the terms we have already learned in the process. My only concern is that knowing myself and my attitude during breaks and holidays, there is a pretty good chance I will procrastinate, or, should I say, “slack” and put off the schoolwork I should really do.
My essays have the most passion when it is something I deeply care for or am educated about. I don't like writing about something I have no idea about, but once I research the criteria I can become interested and involved. I have most passion on free writing, or creative writing. I have always wanted to be a writer since I was little, the idea of creating an entire plot, lives, and story intrigues me. I can get lost in my writing. But writing on material things where you have to have this and that, I cannot get into. I like more free writing and just going off a spurt.
I love polishing essays, if I have the time to do it. I always make sure to reread my essays at least three times to correct spelling errors, grammar, and overall if it even makes sense. Polishing essays is very important, I don't understand how someone can write their essay and not even take a second look at it.
Research essays can be the best, or worst essays. Some topics have a ton of information that can fill the pages and mind. While others lack information and are mostly opinionated and dull. I love researching about something I have never heard of, or am not familiar with.
I am worried about the entire test honestly. English is by far my greatest strength, but grammar is rough for me. When I practice the slides you made at home, I feel confident and know what I'm doing. But when the actual test is in my hands I feel faint and my confidence collapses as my grade does after the test. It just overwhelms me. I second guess myself and think way too hardly about something so simple. I have printed out the practice tests and have been practicing. I hope I manage through it. It will be a rough exam, but looking on the bright side it prepares me as I am thinking of becoming an English teacher. This exam will further prepare for my education and I am thankful for that.
When it comes to writing essays, they are the most passionate when it is a topic that I could not only verbosely babble on about, but something that has either affected me, or affected someone I know. If I care deeply about a topic my essay is sure to show it. I will work hard on it and take pride in it because in it I am giving you a peek of my soul! I express myself best through words-on paper and verbally. Whether it is reading between the lines, looking more into what the words would mean to me, or just plainly what I am saying, I will show you how I feel through each phrase. Once I have turbulently composed my essay, polishing it is not my strong suit. I am either too exhausted by the end to go back and polish it, or I pridefully think it is adept. It is not often the latter. Cleaning up my essays to perfection is something I hope to master after this year and in college. I usually prefer to have an outsider’s view and expertise on correcting the essay versus me going through it. I do however re read my essays many times over and over to make sure I have all the content I want in it. But correcting things like grammar and sentence structure and maybe certain requirements is not something I do well. Getting resources for a paper is not something I am poor at. This is not a hard task. I have gotten better at citing in the proper format as well. Finding articles and websites with reliable information is almost fun. It is like finding the proper puzzle pieces that fit in with my essay properly. I am most worried about having all the terms memorized for the final exam. There are so many. Tons of them are quite similar and this makes it tougher to differentiate them and label them correctly. Memorization is one of my strong suits though so with enough repetition and study, I hope to get them pounded into my head enough that when the final roles around, it is second nature.
When it comes to me and writing, I normally get the horrid "writers block". I have never been much for a writer. Truly, I only wanted to take this class as a chance to have Mr. C. as a teacher. The more that I have been required to write, that "writers block" has faded away. When writing is involved, the topics that I am more interested definitely have a stronger presence of passion in my writing. At this time in my life, Military is one of the few things that will truly get me excited to write down what I think of it, what I have experienced, and what I am dreading to come, but that is anyways.
I would definitely have to say no, I am not a proficient polisher of essays. I do not understand how to quite end my point and not have it come off as though whoever was writing was slamming on their breaks just to be done. Yes, I probably could, just depends on the topic and if I want to take the time to read the entirety of multiple columns and such just to get the exact info that I want.
When it comes to the final exam, if I was required to take it, I would have to say a lot of the terms that are generally expanding on simple terms. Yes, all the term Tuesdays were good, but, a lot of time they were rushing and unless it was just me, I couldn't seem to get a full understanding of a lot that they were trying to get across.
I think my essays contain the most passion when I am writing the introduction and the conclusion. I enjoy tying the whole essay together and highlight the main details and points of my works at the beginning and end. The topic also always has a major affect on my passion for the work I am doing. I could tell my narrative did not have as much passion as my others essays which seemed odd since the narrative was written about a personal experience I thought it would contain the most passion. I have found throughout writing many essays this semester that I like to defend points and persuade people to my ideals and beliefs rather than tell a story that I do not find as important as factual information. However, I like to read narratives more than nonfiction works so I also thought that was interesting. I also find it more difficult to polish and essay once it is completed rather than while it is in the process of being created. I think it has to do something with the fact that it was good enough once so why it is not good enough now. However, with my liking for writing factual, more argumentation style essays I have found that I am very good at finding credible sources and citing them in my essay and a works cited page. I have also found that I like doing annotated bibliography pages because I think they are a simple way to supplement your knowledge on the topic you are writing about with is highly valuable. I am worried most about something being on the final that I am unaware of. I know we have the final exam study list, but I worry other things will be on the final that I will not remember about and therefore not prepare accordingly.
If you were to read some of my essays, you may have noticed that I add aspects of nature to my writing. That is because I become the most passionate when I describe what I have a deep respect for. I become the most passionate while writing about nature, because not only do I partake in multiple outdoor activities, but I also know that society can learn from the living world around us. It baffles me when I see people in my community take the resources we harvest from the earth for granted. Another reason why I write about nature so often is because I know that the pen is mightier than the sword. I know that if I were to protest against the crimes society commits against nature by say, beating people who litter, my actions would be in vain and I would surely be incarcerated. On the other hand, if I were to write a multitude of formal complaints and warn people of wrong-doings with the use of ethos, logos, and pathos, concerned citizens and politicians would unite to hopefully strengthen regulations and teach the importance of conservation with greater emphasis.
I personally believe that I am a proficient polisher of essays, for my attention to detail can usually find minor flaws in rough drafts and I know how to use the resources given to me in the Term Tuesday folder to further strengthen my essay. I also believe this because I will usually ask for help from my peers to review my work and the majority of the time, their comments are positive.
What I am most worried about as winter break approaches before the final exam is that there is always the chance that I would forget to review the final exam terms and potentially bomb the test. I can assure you that I will try not to get into that situation, but anything is possible.
After taking this Composition class and writing all of the essays we were assigned throughout the year, I would like to say that my essays have the most passion in many circumstances. One of which would be, for example when we were assigned the narrative essay, when I can relate to the topic we are given or write about the certain topic with ease. Although I may say I can write about it with ease, I am not inquiring that I will just write it lackadaisically and quickly to get it done with, I simply mean that the words can just flow right out of me as if I am living what I am writing about. When it came to the narrative essay, I felt as though I was reliving what had happened that day and the image I was creating in my head was exactly how I remembered it when it had happened. Another way that I know I can passionately write about a certain essay is when I am alone and in peace where I can clearly think to myself what I am trying to type and have no interruptions or distractions that can ruin my flow of words. While incorporating both of these at the same time into an essay, I know I can--and have-- produced essays that have noticeable passion inside of them.
I believe that I am a “proficient polisher” of essays in my opinion. I know this to be true because normally what I will do is write out my essay trying to use as little dead words or undescriptive words as possible, and when I have reached the end of my essay, I read through the entire thing once or twice and sometimes three times again, adding miniscule and huge improvements to my writing. I also read through it to delete any words I feel as though do not give the reader a better understanding of what I am trying to put into their minds to allow them to understand the certain situation. With reading through it so many times, it allows me to pick up any small mistakes that maybe one read through may not have caught the first time.
Unless I am taking this question the wrong way, I would say yes I can research to offer credible proof. For example with the argumentation essay, I did a lot of the research and the citations and the annotated bibliographies. By doing most of these it opens my eyes to understand what sources could be credible with information that could help the statements I have made in the essay believable (because they were true).
What I am most worried about when it comes to the final exam after winter break is that I doubt I will find much time or any time at all during the break to sit down and look over those final exam terms to better prepare myself for that exam after the break is finished. I highly appreciate the fact that we do get an entire week after the break before any tests are taken to hopefully get the students back into the “mojo” of school and bring back the information they were taught before the break. I understand that this exam is very important so I will try my best to find at least (on average) a half an hour a day to just look over the material. When it comes to Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, I do not plan on studying, neither does anyone else I am guessing, but after all of that is done, I am determined to put some quality time into studying not only for this class, but for others.
Finch 1
Without question, my essays are at their most passionate when, oddly enough, I'm writing about something that I'm passionate about. For example, if I were to be given the objective to compose an essay about the politics regarding solutions to our national debt, it would likely--no, undoubtedly--be extremely bland and lacking in any sort of emotion. Considering the dull subject as well as my overwhelming disinterest in politics and anything surrounding them, the essay would appear as flat and appear forced (both of which would be entirely valid observations). However, if I were to be appointed the mission of compiling an essay about a wild story that had never happened, I would gladly sit down and work on the essay for hours, allowing my wild imagination to run free. To write about something you emotionally desire to write about will almost guarantee that the essay will likely materialize itself in a manner that demonstrates excitement and knowledge on the subject.
Of course, to write a passionate essay, or any kind of essay for that matter, is significantly trivialized if you are unable to polish your essays upon completion. When I finish an essay, I religiously return to the beginning and scrutinize every detail to ensure every word is spelled correctly, every sentence was formulated grammatically, and to double check whether I wish to add specific aspects or features to my work. The skill of polishing essays proves invaluable; if I were to immediately turn in essays the minute I've finished typing them, they would not appear nearly as refined or, well, passionate, as they would be had I gone over them several times in order to safeguard their legitimacy.
What I am most worried about regarding winter break approaching is the carelessness that I will undeniably be overcome with when faced with an extended break off from school. I fear greatly that this negligence will arrive in the form of procrastination, denial of importance, refusal to study, and the inescapable loss of knowledge gained over the months prior to the break. To combat this I will have to remain disciplined in studying, and I must remind myself of what could happen should I grow lazy.
I believe my essays have the most passion and heart to them if I am writing and researching a topic of my choosing and trying to get my ideals across in a way to make people relate to them. I research to show people that I have all my facts and am a credible source of knowledge that they are receiving while reading my essay.The info i look for is usually something that is not too smart to make fellow students distraught after reading it trying their best to make sense of what they just learned in their own words, so I feel it easier if I explain what is is by using simple quotes or lines from the passage that are more understandable while still helping my fellow students become more knowledgeable. What I am most worried about for the final exam is how much new knowledge from the past couple of months that I retained do I remember. Also having my mind and heart set on Christmas day and what treasures that holds and spending time with my friends hopefully will not leave my mind a blank for the test. What I am most worried about for the final exam coming up is how to even start to study for such an intricate test about a subject that is not my strong suit in school. Also the fact that I am a novice when it comes to college finals and tests, because hey I am not in college yet(technically). What I do refuse to do in these coming weeks is become the typical college student and cram all of what we learned over the months into studying one night and trying to remember all of what I just studied and try to apply that to the test the best I can. Cramming for finals has got to be the dumbest thing ever, it is simple to study for a college final if you have the proper time and educate without distractions. For studying my plan is to start the week before and go over what I already know just as a refresher and then drill the hard to learn more complicated parts of the essay in and make it something I would know if asked.
My essays have the most passion when it is an essay I know a lot of information about and if I am interested in the topic. For example, if I wrote an essay about Game of Thrones I would be able to go on for pages and pages because I love watching the show and I am almost all through it. I find it very intriguing because it has an amazing story line. Some of the extra fluff within Game of Thrones is..well, interesting to say the least but because of the plot twists and surprises it keeps the watcher interested. I believe I am a proficient polisher of essays because that is how I produce essays. I will first write the “backbone” bare basis of the essay and then I will go through and detail or polish. So, I do believe I am good at polishing because that is how I write. I do also believe that I am decent at research. Sometimes information can get repetitive no matter how differently you word your search but once you find the information you are looking for it is just that more rewarding. It just takes a matter of knowing what to search for and where to find it. As you research more and more you find that there are trusty sites that seem to always have the information you are looking for and then there are those that you know you could never rely on.
Over winter break, I am most nervous for the weather and driving in the snow. Also, that I will forget I have some tests to study for before coming back and once I am back I may have forgotten a lot of information. I am also worried that I will not be able to retain the information, therefore not passing the two college and only exams I must take after returning from break.
I have learned to enjoy writing writing essays after taking this Composition class. With all of the essays that I have written the ones that I have really dived into with a passion would be the ones that I enjoy. For example, the narrative essay was interesting to me because I could relate to it and I thought it was fun to write. I got to tell the story that I wanted and that really gave me joy. I got to tell about a great learning experience in my life and that is when I write with the most passion. Of course, on the other side were the essays I did not enjoy writing as much. They would be more research and more formal, this is when I am not passionate about my writing. I often do it just to be done with it and it often times is not well written.
As a polisher of essays, I am decent at best. I do often times go back and read my essay and change grammatical errors and once in a while I will find a wording to make absolutely no sense. However, I have improved on my polishing skill because everything gets better with practice. Another thing that has helped me is the use of vocab word in the essay. I will always wait until the end to add them in and when I add them in the sentence needs restructuring. I then rearrange the sentence to sound sophisticated and it improves my writing overall.
One thing that worries me over break is my ability to avoid homework outside of school. I need to find time to study for this big test otherwise I will fail and that is not what I want. Hopefully this is not what happens and I pass the test with a good grade.
My essays have the most passion when I am able to state my individual opinion and expand on said opinion. Unless I feel strongly about an issue or elect to write in an almost unconscious manner, I struggle to pursue my writing requirements; coaxing my fingers to write and write and write is a struggle I always face. Creative writing has always held the most appeal to me as a composer, because it indulges my creativity whilst spitting out developed scenarios and spectacular imagery. I would consider myself a semi-proficient polisher in the realm of essays; initial planning is simple, and I am adept at analyzing and tweaking grammatical structure and flow when the essay is mostly finished, though, again, finishing is a difficult endeavor in itself. I can edit others’ essay extremely well, and feel confident in my writing ability, but sometimes I feel cursed with an inability to complete my work. I can research and provide credible proof of my claims, and tie in this research with a brisk hand, but expanding ideas relevant to research can be tiring and boring to me, and often appear as short-winded summaries--as if the words of another simplify an idea so that my elaboration becomes an unnecessary feature. I am not certain what to consider sufficient explanation or necessary development of a thought or connection (this is a skill I will work to master). Sometimes I feel that I fail to capture the idea I had initially aimed to include in my writing, as though a haze has covered my vocabulary and cut off it’s connection to communicative fluency, like writer’s fog rather than writer’s block. Still, I see that this class has aided me greatly in my compository endeavors, and for that I am grateful. I am worried that I may neglect to prepare myself well enough for the final exam; I also worry that I may not complete every project that I have been assigned over these next three weeks, and that worry may cost me sleep and good health. I may become quite literally “worried sick.” But, such is life, I suppose.
Beck 1
My essays seem to have the most passion either when it is something that I am very interested in or it is something about me. Usually when I am writing about myself I am quite self conscious, I never usually like talking about myself because I feel that people will think that I am self centered. But when I am writing about me and things that have happened in my life I can give the most detail and be the most free in things, I do not have to look at what others think about it. I am writing about me and what my life is, and nobody else is an expert on that topic but myself. When I have passion about something I put in a lot of time, I want it to be perfect, make it the best I can. Such as writing my Causal essay, over the time of writing it I got more interested in the topic and put more research into it. I found it to be very intriguing, and it helps when I can show my liking of it in the essay.
What worries me with the winter break fast approaching is the dreaded final exam that will either help my future or hurt my future. It will be the if I get the 3 cheap college credits I am wanting or not. One of my main worries is the grammatical classification of sentences. Trying to figure out what each sentence is is not my strong suit. I feel that this will be one of the hardest parts of the test. Another thing that worries me with winter break is that I will not spend much of that time preparing for the two large tests I will have a week after I come back. I will be so consumed in the relaxing and having fun that I will forget that I need to study for two college exams I will be taking when I get back. But as long as I make good timing during the break I should be able to do good on the final test.
Throughout this semester we have written many difficult essays, all of which I seemed to procrastinate and dread. I have never been a huge fan at the mere thought of an essay, but I am much better once I get into the flow of composing. Once I begin to write, I am much more proficient at doing the essay rather than thinking of how much work it will be. All of my essays have seemed to be a struggle to me, but also is helping me to become a much more ready, proficient composer. My personal favorite essay was the narrative. I enjoy talking about things the way I feel. It helps me to write down my opinions and therefore completely expanding my essay in the process. When I am able to only use my opinions, I am much more cooperative when it comes to writing. I know this class is meant to challenge us, and that it has. I have went out of my comfort zone by typing essays in a foreign, new way.
I also have learned many new tools/tactics when it comes to ‘polishing’ or bettering an essay. I learned to grammatically classify sentences, which helps with putting in commas or semicolons, in which I have always struggled with. The term tuesdays also continue to give me new ways to make my essay more enjoyable/readable.
As for the final exam, I have never taken many big tests. I am most worried I will forget the simple things, or mix terms up. There are so many different sentence types that it is almost impossible to me, it seems. It would help tremendously if you, Mr. Christensen, would go over them all in depth in class and help us find ways to learn or remember these terms.
I would have to say that I had the most passion in my Comparison essay because I know the most about the two things that I wrote about. I know so much about disc golf and powerlifting because those two activities take up the vast majority of my free time. When I find something that I enjoy doing, I want to do well at it. I will find all kinds of information about it on all kinds of places on the internet. I feel that I can do fine research like most people. I am no stranger to the internet so I know immediately what will be useful and what will not be for my essays. Throughout this semester the research required for the essays has helped me a lot with finding a balance between thorough and concise research and citations. I am most worried about the two exams I have to take after christmas break. They are for my two hardest classes, this one and calculus. I have never had a harder english or math class in my life so that is concerning. I have also never taken a final after such a long break. I do not know how much I can retain during the christmas break. I always forget a bunch of stuff over the summer but this break is much more short. These terms are also very complex and hard to remember. I do fine on the vocab test but the final exam terms are so much harder to memorize than the vocab words. We also do not get tested on smaller groups of words like in vocab tests. I feel like that makes it a lot easier and far less stressful because is makes the total amount of work seem a lot smaller. To me, at least.
Writing is a fascinating ability. If you ponder it creatively, you could say that writing is a form of transferring thoughts to tangible words on paper, which is then transferred to reader’s thoughts. It is like telepathy in a way. If one wants to induce powerful thoughts, one must have the ability to transfer their thoughts with articulate accuracy. Some writers are gifted in a sense that they can accurately depict powerful memories that never existed. I however do not have this ability. I have the ability to write passionately when I feel passionately about something. I could only write something powerful if it interest me, and I feel like I can impact readers that read what I write. This is only an assumption. I have never given it much thought to be completely honest. The best thing I have ever written was a speech about my grandfather my freshman year. If I may correct myself, the most powerful thing I can write is something that others must feel for. I wrote about my great grandfather very passionately and angrily, and people cried when I told him how I could never forgive him. It is funny because I wrote so passionately about something I knew nothing about. People cried for memories that I embellished. My grandfather killed himself before I can walk. I shed no tears for him until many years after. Yet I can force others to cry with half-truths. He did kill himself, but he was never a fatherly figure as I depicted him to be, and I never remember what it felt like to be held in his arm like I depicted him to. I don’t even remember what he looked like when I write this.
I can now say conclusively, I can write passionately when I pick the subject I write about, and when I want to rip the tears out of my reader’s sockets. Otherwise I can get by just fine writing informatively instead of passionately.
If I may add, I am scared for the final exam because I do not like the system of Term Tuesday. Although I do not doubt my fellow classmates are extremely intelligent, I would rather have my teacher with a Master’s Degree in English educating on terms that are on my final exam. I do not know if my thoughts are reasonable, but they are my thoughts.
Passion. It is a word that some people may relate to intercourse. It is a word that some may say needs to be in one’s career. Some may say it only applies to artists. To others, it comes naturally therefore they do not think about it much. To me, I would say that my passion stems from the friendships I have made throughout the years. Every once in awhile, I am able to express that passion in a variety of mediums. One medium is video games. I will sometimes play video games for hours on end because of my deep passion for them. Other, more practical, mediums for my passion include homework which commonly refers to essays. Last year, I could never even think about taking a class just to write for every single assignment. I struggled so fiercely with writing papers, that I nearly began to lose hair over the stress caused by it. Now I look back to that time, and I realize that it was either a lack of passion, or due to the fact that my former english teacher was less exciting than watching paint dry (I think it was both). Throughout this past semester, I have accomplished feats I could never have imagined myself accomplishing. I have written nine-page papers when only a year ago I often failed to complete a single-page paper.
Over the course of a semester, my skills of writing have exponentially improved. Thanks in part to my amazing new english teacher (who actually knows what he is doing), I have been able to comprise essays of sufficient lengths in order to obtain a sufficient grade. I have learned valuable skills needed to create, polish, and submit beautiful essays. If I were to ask myself whether or not I was a proficient polisher of essays, I would answer without the tiniest shred of doubt, “yes.”
Other valuable traits I have learned about composing essays will most certainly provide assistance in later parts of my life. I have learned exactly how to do research properly and to cite my sources accurately and precisely. The skills I have learned in this class will definitely help me in my days to come. If I were to worry about anything in the future, then it would be remembering all 100 of the literary devices on my final exam next month.
Passion in our lives drive us to reach success. It is a phenomenal feeling when you feel passionate about a person, activity, or thing. One may go as far to say the feeling is indescribable. I am passionate about many thing in life and strive for success. If the effort and passion is there, then you will never loose, such as a match for wrestling. Your record may change, but it is more about learning and having fun doing something you love. In my essays, I love the option to choose something that interests me, because I may not get perfect scores on my essays, but the effort and passion is there to always learn from these mistakes. School work is a passion of mine. I strive for knowledge and doing my best; therefore, I am passionate about all essays. As the year has gone on, my essay knowledge has expanded exponentially. A few things I have learned have been increasing my word choice, increasing my different sentence structures, and finding faults while reading through it. Saying I am a perfect polisher would be wrong, but I would say that I am a proficient polisher. Many things go into polishing an essay and there are more leaps and bounds for me to take in becoming a phenomenal polisher. A few that I can improve on would be different sentence structures and better flow. I would also like to decrease the amount of time it takes to do the essays. This can be done through knowing more intelligent words and being able to add things into my essay as I go and not try to vary sentence structure at the end. I am most worried over Christmas break that I will not be ready for the semester exam. What worries me is that I will not know all of what is exactly on the test or that I will not exactly know what to study.
I tend to invest a lot of passion into my essays when the topic is something that appeals to my interests, is over important matters, or allows me to voice my opinion. For example, if I received an essay topic over tennis, I could write for hours. I enjoy tennis and I know a lot about it. On the other hand, if I received a topic over farming, I would not be able to write a whole lot about it because I am not educated on farming. A topic than I do not know much about would require me to do research on it, and that would cause me to lose interest and passion. I love opinion essays because I have strong opinions, but I also like to see other people’s viewpoints. Important topics like political matters, if I was educated on them, would also increase the passion I put into my essay. When it comes to refining my essays, I always find myself changing words here and there or rereading sentences to make sure they sound correct and flow. Proofreading my essays is something that has become a habit, but it is a good habit to have. Occasionally, I will catch a misspelling or a sentence that does not sound as well as it could so I change it to make my essay sound better. I am proficient in polishing words to make them sound more exciting.
I have heard from many previous College Bound English students that the final exam is difficult. I am planning to study as much as I can. I am most nervous about memorizing what each term means. To be completely honest, I am a bit nervous for the terms I presented on as well. I think creating a quizlet or doing kahoot reviews would benefit me as I continue to study.
1 Gloege
This semester in Composition 1, we have written many essays so far. With each essay that I write, I believe that I have improved greatly in my writing style. Sometimes, however, I think I struggle with involving passion in my essays without making it overly personal. An essay I used a great amount of on this semester was the Narrative essay. I wrote the essay about a trip my family took to the Dominican Republic, and our exotic parasailing adventure. Because I was able to personally experience this, it allowed me to use personal opinions and views in my writing. I became very passionate in this essay because I was able to talk about an experience I enjoyed very much. I would think writing about personal experiences or events would help almost anyone make their essay more relatable.
I believe that I am a proficient polisher of all my essays. I have reviewed my essays many times, and have noticed how well my sentences flow together, and how easily my point is made. I believe my essays are easy to read, while being enjoyable at the same time.
Christmas break is always a time every student looks forward to. This year, due to the date we started school, we will be having semester tests, and other exams, after the long break. Our school has never done this before, and it seems that the students are nervous that they will forget many things they have learned throughout the first semester. I am not one of these students. I plan on studying my Composition 1 final exam terms throughout the break, and during the week when we return to class.
Peterson 6
I would say my essays are filled with the most passion when I am trying to explain how I feel about a certain topic. My opinion is what gives my writing passion, not when I am using someone else’s opinion. If you are looking for passion my narrative essay is filled with it. Polishing essays is certainly not a task I am talented at. I often over read my writing because I know what I am trying to say, but I do not catch the grammar errors, or even missing a word, which makes polishing others essays easier for me. I will admit that my skill of polishing my writing has definitely improved over this composition course. I think that I am good at researching. The reason might be because I enjoy learning new stuff… of course that is if I am interesting in what I am researching. Also I have learned that looking at more than one cite to make sure the information I am refuting is credible.
Having my composition final exam after Christmas break can either be a positive or negative experience, it all depends on the way I go about with it. I am planning on studying every day for this exam (I have heard it is an arduous test), but I will also have the distractions of my family, friends, and I selfish desires to just relax over break. Christmas break has always been a time for me to just relax and forget about school for that two weeks, so it is going to be quite the readjustment for me to force myself to study. My ambition to get a high grade in this exam is overflowing, I just hope that I am able to push through my laziness that I am used to. I think that I will study the amount that I need. But if it was my choice I would have had semesters before Christmas break, so students could actually enjoy the break they deserve.
Essays can be a sore topic for many people. They are not particularly enjoyable to write sometimes especially ones that forced upon you in which you have little interest in. Over this semester, I have written more essays than I probably have in most my time in high school. Some have been extremely fun and adventurous to write and others have been not so much. What I do enjoy is Mr. C gives a wide variety of topics we can write about within the certain essay type instructed, making it more of a possibility to use passion to what I am writing about. I find myself enjoying essays that I have a decent amount of previous knowledge to or an essay that requires me to research about a topic I wish to seek more information and insight on. Because Mr. C gives us such freedom, there have been few essays I have not been passionate about besides maybe one or two. The only reason I did not feel a sense of passion towards them is because I was not able to put as much time and effort into because of extra curricular activities..
I feel I am and average to above average student when it comes to polishing my essay. Finishing essays I feel are much easier than starting them. I think this is because I sometimes like to procrastinate starting them because an essay is almost like a starting a new adventure. Once I start the essay, I usually enjoy spending the time researching about it. The only difficult thing about research essays are finding credible sources and choosing which would have the most impact on my essay.
As Christmas break approaches, I am somewhat nervous for the final exam. The Term Tuesdays helped immensely with an introduction to the different final exam terms. I appreciated the time people put into them to teach us more knowledge. Although we have been reviewing in the past couple weeks, I am nervous that over break I will forget some of the terms and concepts we have learned. I do have confidence though that when we come back we will be focused right away and utilize the reviews that have been generously made for us.
Creating passion for writing is a difficult task for me. I find difficulty with the subject of English and all of its entities as well. I am most passionate when I pick a topic to write about. Being able to pick a subject matter that is relevant in my life is extremely important for when I am writing an essay. If I am passionate about it I find difficulty to stop myself from writing. You can see this in my causual essay where I went overboard with the length requirement. That particular topic was seen in my family life, so I was able to put my feelings into writing. I score higher with topics that I am passionate about. I put more time with researching and getting my points across, so those who are reading it, specifically my audience, can understand my feelings and where I am coming from. I write to get my purpose across and for those to see my point. This is why I go the extra mile to put the little details in my essay. I am excellent at meeting every single requirement, and I have never missed any but towards the end of my essay I can tell that it becomes weaker. I do not go look back over my essay for minor details except I do check my works cited and annotated bibliography. I need to break this nasty habit. I occasionally have my mother proof read it for minor grammatical errors. Towards the end I feel exhausted and I do not feel the energy nor the strength to go back over it. With over two weeks worth of work I feel absolutely drained. I feel research as effortless. I like to spend my days in the library with books. It is easy to go online and find academic articles that support my side of my essay. I can put parenthetical quotes into my essay with ease. As a writer I am nervous about the final exam terms. I have included them in my essay but they seem to get jumbled in my head. Chiasm, antithesis, and hyporpha, I can not distinguish between them and I am unable to apply them. It makes me extremely nervous.
My essays have the most passion when I am writing on a topic that I have interest in before I start writing. For example, when I wrote my essays on illegal sports gambling I had prior interest in researching it. I wanted to learn more. That is what motivated me to do the research and put more passion into the final piece of work. I also use a lot more passion when writing about an event that I lived through. More of a narrative form, this is because I know the facts. I can sit down and start writing the story of what happened. I believe my narrative essay was my best for this reason. I wrote about going to Las Vegas to watch my father qualify for the Boston Marathon. It was already a good story but I was able to compose it into words, using passion because it meant a lot to me before I started writing. I think I am decent about looking up information to put in my essays. I usually like to research a broad range of sources before I start writing in order to get a good idea of the facts. I then take the most credible as the ones I will use in my essays and cite them in my work. Checking sources I am not well versed however, this is simply because I can see the MLA citation and have no idea how to get to the page or the book that was cited. Finally, I am horrified for the final exam. I have started to look at the study guide and I know a lot of the terms. I am nervous just because of the number of terms and so many are thing I had not heard of three months ago. I hope with studying over the winter break along with a little instruction in class a good grade can be earned.
My Essays have the most passion when I am speaking from personal experiences such as depression, death, love, and narrative stories. Or perhaps I am great at arguing about a topic that I am avid about. When I really put my mind and energy into an essay I believe that I can be a proficient polisher. When it is a topic that I really want to get across to readers as to how important the details and facts are, I could spend hours upon hours looking for new sources to place the truth in my essays. Anything, to help prove that I am right—since women are always right
What I am worried about when it comes to having winter break before the final exam is completely forgetting everything that I had learned. Considering that I have to take a final exam for college algebra as well, it is really nerve racking. School can already be a stressful concept at times, especially when it comes to massive tests such as final exams. It is such a huge part of your grade. I am doing very well in my Comp and Lit class. I have had an A for the entire duration of the semester, and I am a very poor test taker. It will just be very disheartening if I were to get a grade on the final exam that would affect the grade I have worked so hard for all semester. That goes for my College Algebra exam as well. However, it is much easier for me to forget how to complete some math problems and memorize formulas if I had not done such work over a period of time. Christmas break feels more like a month rather than two weeks. Hopefully I will stick to my promise that I will practice English and mathematics over the break to help keep my mind focused on the exams in my near future.
Throughout my life, I have pretty much always enjoyed writing. There have been times, though, where I have struggled excessively on a few topics to compose enough thoughts to write about. I would have to contend with the basic idea that my essays are more proficient when I am writing about something that I am passionate about. In most cases, then, argumentation essays tend to bring ease to my writing and I have a better time delivering my message across to a reader. Writing was always more carefree for me when I was younger because there weren’t as many restrictions. I have had to teach myself to thread my style into my essays despite the essay topic or what was needed in it. I have always struggled with the thoughts about whether or not what I have written will make any sense at all. On top of that, I question myself if I have everything where it should be or if something is out of order. My way of overcoming this is to either reread it a few times or simply ask a peer if my writing is understandable. I also would have to say that my essays are most proficient when I allot myself enough time to add the fine details that will polish it off.
For the final exam, I am mostly concerned about the quantity of terms we need to know. I am pretty confident in knowing about one-third of the terms but I am worried that I won’t be able to detect them in context. I’m not as anxious for it since it is a little ways out still, and I can read through my term notes over Christmas break. I hope that I can achieve a basic knowledge of all the terms by the time we return from Christmas break so I won’t have as much studying to do right before the test.
My essays have the most passion when I am writing about people. I know I am very perceptive of all of the people around me, and have always been able to read someones character, even though I am not the most social person. Being an introvert also comes with the benefit of being able to know yourself at a deeper level. It is always a breeze for me to write about myself, and I like to, because I do not think many people really understand who I am. Through my writing I can tell my story to those who care to read.
When I am finished writing an essay, it is important for me to make the essay readable. By readable, I mean that I want the essay to be fluent and coherent, while keeping it somewhat formal. Polishing up an essay is never a step to overlook. It is common for me to find typos and grammar errors even after reading over an essay a couple times. Once I was careless and decided to turn in my essay without rereading it. Later on I went back to it and found out I had turned in a casual mess for a formal essay.
Only after taking Composition have I noticed that my writing style is naturally very casual. This is only sometimes acceptable, especially since the most important things you will write, will probably be formal. One way I brighten up my essays is by researching. Credible proof can gain a readers trust when you are writing. When the reader trusts what you are writing, they are more intrigued and understand better what you are trying to emit.
As the final exam approaches, I am most worried about sentences. I am just getting the hang of classifying a sentence, and I know that there is a special structure to each. Not all sentences can coincide in a paragraph, tenses can not change, and punctuation has to be perfect. In composition we write creatively, so I am worried that the sentences I study will be too simple, and the ones on the test will be elaborate and completely throw me off.
Kribell 6
Passion tends to enter into my essays when the subject itself is something that I love or gets me motivated or aggravated. I find that I’m rather opinionated and I want to educate people on subjects that are important to me. I get upset when people are even the slightest bit wrong and they do not realize that they are wrong because the urge to correct them becomes extremely strong. Polishing essays is not my favorite thing in the world to do, but I believe that I am decent at it. I like to make things clear and as understandable as possible for the people who are reading my essays. Researching has always been almost what you might call a hobby of mine. I used to spend literally hours a day on my mom’s computer researching animals and dog breeds. I’d learn about geographical places and how many Marwaris are in the United States. Researching is rather fun for me, because you learn something new or discover that you already knew something. My dad will always ask me to research things for him. This summer I aided him in finding a detailed step by step process on how to disassemble a lawn mower and put it all back together again. I found it within 5 minutes and he was absolutely amazed. Therefore, researching has never been much of a problem for me, and finding credible sources for essays is not only fun but easy.
I am honestly not that worried about the final exam approaching, and the fact that I am not worried is what actually worries me. I am afraid that I will be overconfident and end up not knowing anything that is on the test. But as of right now I feel secure in my knowledge of this class so far.
I have the most passion for essays when there is the most information to write about. I have a passion for learning new thoughts and opinions, so when there is more information to absorb and transfer into an essay, I feel like the most passion. An example of this is my Causal Essay. There was a plethora of reasons and ways of thinking that cause humans to own dogs. I like to see the progress of an essay, and when the essay is easy to write, the progress motivates me to work harder. This essay flowed very well, and I think it was one of the best essays that I wrote this semester. Researching my causal essay led me to a learning about Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs; Learning about Maslow’s theory was incredibly interesting to me, and I wrote passionately about this.
Polishing essays is a skill that I think I am particularly adept at, and I enjoy doing it. My friends sometimes have me read their essays in hopes of strengthening their work. I find it easier to read and help others write essays than write my own sometimes. Brian Hoffman, a close friend of mine, asked me to review his comparison-contrast essay, and together we worked together to brainstorm some topics and we made a better essay together.
I am worried about forgetting about the things that I have learned over christmas break, then needing to relearn the content for the semester tests for Composition and Calculus. I do not like how they split the semester over winter break because it puts stress on students to study over the break instead of relaxing with family and friends. I am just glad that I am exempt from most of my tests. I am also slightly nervous about working over the semester break. I have to work a 12 hour shift on Wednesday at Midwest Tropicals, a pet fish distribution center in Sioux Falls. This summer a shift half as long would tire me out, so I am unsure what a long shift will be like. Also, due to being understaffed, I am going to work in the morning, which I have never done before. I like my job though so I am sure it will not be too bad.
Passion is one of the biggest driving forces behind essays. It separates good essays from world view changing essays. A good writer knows how to invoke passion not only in themselves but in their readers. As a reader I love reading passion filled essays, when I read an essay written about a topic that the author has no passion of I find the essay is easily forgettable and boring. To write good essays with passion you have to pick the right topics to write on. I try to have all of my essays contain as much passion as possible. It is a very difficult task to fill your essays with passion. To get passion into my essays I do research on my topic. I try to immerse myself in the topic that I am writing about as much as possible. It takes time and patience to become a writer that can fill any essay with passion. It can take years to develop the skill of writing with passion, but when you can figure it out it makes your writing exponentially better to read. Along with passion, when you get finished with an essay one of the final steps is to polish the essay. I believe that this is one of my strongest qualities as a writer. I thoroughly enjoy taking a finished essay and trying to make it better by going back through and finding more interesting ways to phrase things. Being good at polishing an essay can separate an average writer from a professional writer. An average writer will finish an essay and be done with it. Doing research for an essay is an important task with any essay. It can be difficult to do but if you know everything there is to know about the topic you are writing on the essay that you write will be very cohesive and sound as if it was written by an expert on the topic. I find that this is one of the areas that I struggle in. I find it difficult to search out information and interject it into my essays.
Schroeder Pd. 6
Throughout my writing days, I have noticed that I am most passionate when writing about a subject I have a personal connection to. If I was asked to write about a personal experience I know that I would put more time and effort into writing that essay rather than writing an essay about research on bacteria, for example. I would classify myself as a proficient writer, but there is always room to improve. Compared to the first essay that was written about my womanhood, the last essay that involved another past essay was very much improved. I never thought that I could have written seven pages of a paper. The true test will be at the end of second semester when our college English class will have to write a 12 page paper. Finding that much information, along with allowing it to make sense will be a true test to my knowledge and ability for qualifying as proficient as a writer. I can research to find credible proof although I sometimes find information that opinion based rather than research. I should look on Google scholar rather than normal Google search. I am most worried about not remembering everything that we have learned all of the term Tuesdays. I will log onto Google docs and study the material that is provided but I am worried that when I come to the test I will forgot some of the rules and processes on how to answer the questions correctly. Everything will work out, but I know I will have to study hard.
All of my essays are filled with some form of passion. In every single essay that I have written I have talked about something that I have cared about and know about in some aspect. Usually my essays have to do with the fine arts, which is my passion in high school. Whether it’s band, choir, or theatre, my essays are filled to the brim with passion. Generally these essays are fairly polished, since I often read through them before calling them good, but some of the smaller details sometimes are left unpolished, a prime example of which is my causal essay, which wasn’t polished as well as it could’ve been. An example of an extremely polished essay however would be my compare and contrast essay written with Mr Hegland, which we put a lot of effort and attention into. Along with the polishing, I researched extensively for the causal essay, and any other essay that requires information that is not my own.
As winter break approaches, my focus switches from essays to my worries. My greatest worries are definitely forgetting everything or not having enough time to prepare for the Composition and Calculus semester tests. These two tests are quite terrifying as they are such a large percentage of the grade for these classes. The fact that these are such high percentages are one thing, but also the fact that these classes can carry through to college help reinforce the worry that I feel. It is a scary idea that my grades in these classes can be absolutely destroyed in just two tests. Because of this, things like terrifying winter storms and bus crashes and scary Tennessee inhabitants are nothing compared to these tests. But because of this worry, I will be studying throughout most of the band trip, so at least it has gotten me motivated to work.
As a growing writer, my essays have the most passion when I really care about the topic I am writing about. If I have a topic I am just given I often do not care at all. Most of the time I just write the essay to be done with it, and I do not research and polish my essay properly. However, when I do care about my topic. If I find something I really care about, my essay is Improved not only by the amount of time I put into it, but I also apply that time in a more reasonable manner, procrastinating less. When I do decide to polish my essays I believe that I am proficient at this task. I can easily see times when the wording does not flow well, or I use a bad word choice. I have read so much that awkward uses of words are obvious in an otherwise proficient sentence. Research is most likely the most difficult thing for me to do when writing essays. It is very difficult for me to find multiple sources that have different angles on the same topic. I can find many sources, but I do not know what to search to find these different ways to look at it. As winter break approaches, I am worried about a few things. When I look forward to the semester test, I get worried about a several main things. I worry about the uses of many of the terms we studied during Term Tuesdays. I know what nearly all of the terms are, but the uses of them escape me sometimes. I believe if I study all of these terms and their uses over winter break I will be fine whe it comes to the test, but for now I am worried.
Oren 2
I have been the most passionate about the causal essay. Homelessness is a topic that I am very passionate about, and I can get behind. In my opinion, my best writing is personal writing. With homelessness on the rise, I am very avid about informing others about what they could do to help. I also get fired up about current social issues. In my womanhood essay, which I just finished expanding, I was quite passionate about the injustice revolving around women in society. It has not even been 100 years since women were able to vote, facts like that blow my mind. However, I am quite the feminist, so I find it easy to discuss inequality and women's rights. Another issue I was revved up about was the argumentation essay in which my group discussed gun rights versus gun control. Believe that guns are a necessity in today's dangerous society. My main goal when writing topics I am passionate is not to get the readers to agree with me. Should they change their views due to my writing, that would be amazing. My goal is to better inform the readers about important topics in society, it is when I am teaching that my writings receive the most passion. As for polishing my essays, I would rate myself as a sub-par polisher. When I believe that I am done with my essay I will give it a quick scan, add something if I need to, and then be done with it. I am, in my opinion, the bomb at finding credible sources. I always read the first few links when searching something just to make sure that they all say basically the same thing to ensure I am telling the truth. I am worried that I am going to forget everything over the break because that is what usually happens when we have a long break.
My essays have the most passion when I am writing about something that has great meaning to me or that I have a personal view on. One of my favorite essays I have written this semester was the causal essay, which I found to be very interesting. Through this I was able to do a lot of research and write about a topic I feel strongly about. I asked the question, “Why do women feel the need to be thin?” Something I believe has overtaken the society we live in. I felt like I was a proficient polisher of my essay when I had to expand. I found that I had used a lot of quote error within it which is something I can change and make better. It was all my own writing so I do not have a lot of ways to credit it. I am able to cite throughout my essays with quotes and statistics. Then make sure it has credibility on my works cited page. The other essay I liked writing was the narrative because you could base it off realistic events but make up certain parts. I find fictional writings to also be very interesting and I enjoy writing in that way. I am worried about a the semester test more than usual because of the long break. Most likely will not look at one piece of homework or anything that has to deal with school. I hope that I do not forget things we have learned over the semester. I am still shaky with labeling sentences so I think that is something I should review over this break if I were to do any type of studying. I also am worried about MLA citations when you have to source and can not use online sources. There are a lot of terms to study before we take the semester test final.
2 Laycock
Before taking this composition 101 class, I was poor at taking an topic and turning it into a well written essay. Now that I am almost finished with the class, I have become quite efficient and am starting to excel at sitting down and writing an essay with passion. I am most passionate about my essays when they have a topic that I enjoy writing about or have live it personally. Take my narrative essay for example. I enjoy telling the story about my knee injury because it is something I lived first hand. I know every detail about what happened that day and I am capable of making a passionate essay that expresses those details. Thanks to this class, I have become a much more proficient polisher of my essays. I can sit down and reread my essay a few times to perfect it by adding various sentences, correcting grammatical and spelling errors, and perfecting my works cited page. I have always been able to find credible proof on the essays I write, the problem has always been that I find it hard to cite those sources. Most of the extremely credible sources are documents from a website that has no specific author, so those sources are difficult to cite.
There is nothing specifically that I am worried about for the final exam. I am worried about the entire test. I am usually pretty good with final exam tests; however, I am fairly worried about this composition test because in many other tests, we practice and have tests and quizzes on the various terms throughout the semester. In this class, we do not. We learn it once on a Tuesday for a class period and move on to our essays. I am fairly worried I have forgotten a few of the terms that we learned early on in the year.
I believe my essays have the most passion when I write about something I enjoy or when it is interesting and I can research it. When I am able to research a topic my essays tend to flow more easily and make a little bit more sense. Plus when I research I can add valid points and sound more intellectual. I would say I am not a proficient polisher, I sometimes struggle with making what I am trying to say sound decent. I have thoughts in my head about what needs to be fixed but it is more difficult to fix them. I really enjoy researching for my essays because it gives me more ideas then I had before I started the project. I feel I am a good researcher and also give credit well to the writer. Final exams are coming up and it makes me very uneasy. I have definitely have gotten more confident in labeling sentences, I went from getting about 5 out of 25 to getting 20 out of 24 and that makes me feel more confident about that part of the test. The other parts I am still very uneasy about, and I will need to focus more on those now that I am getting better at knowing sentences. I feel as though I will forget things during break and forget to look over terms. Personally I was hoping the final exam would be before break so I would not have to worry about anything and just relax. I will have to try super hard to review the terms we have learned over the past semester.
Finding a passion for something can be very easy for some but also very hard for others. My passion in life would have to baseball. I was introduced to this sport when I was just a young lad. Immediately upon being introduced to this game, I fell fell in love with it. It was something that I had never experienced before. Being with a team and contributing towards a common goal was incredibly satisfying for me. Having this passion has allowed me to relate many of my essays back to baseball. As well as, allowing me to compare and contrast ideas along with baseball. I have greatly enjoyed being able to participate in the sport I love and being able to use all that I have learned from this great sport to write essays.
I am greatly able to research topics for essays to gain knowledge. No matter the topic I am able to find information it. I could write an essay on anything and be able to make it above average at the least. If the topic was interesting at the least I could find some passion in writing it and be able to crank out a incredible fascinating essay, no matter the topic.
The winter break is coming up very quickly and has no signs of slowing down. I am only worried about a few things though. One being the final exam terms that we are suppose to know. There are quite a few of these and I will have to spend a great deal of time focusing purely on these to be able to get a decent grade on the final exam. The other thing will be examining sentence types. I did a okay job on the quiz we recently took, but with more time and preparation, I believe I will be able to get a B or higher on the exam.
I feel that i am the most passionate in my essays when i am writing a paper on a topic that i was able to choose. This way i can usually have a pre formed opinion on a topic which just helps me to better organize an essay as well as form a complete thought without putting in too much effort in a certain area. Polishing essays is a skill that i posses, the area in which i am most proficient is the replacement of bland words with far more descriptive words. As far as reconstruction of sentences, i lack quite a lot in that area. As far as researching is concerned i am more than capable of researching a topic and using information that may contradict my opinion. Using credible information in an essay is very valuable to better form my argument as well as providing a counterargument. My main concern over break is that i may forget many of the final exam terms. Memorizing terms is not my strong suit, and neither is studying. Winter break is seen as a time to relax and forget about all of the stress of school. During this break i may move school too far off my mind and forget about studying for any of my finals that come the following two weeks. These tests are crucial in order to maintain my gpa and failing to study for them would be very foolish. Over break I feel as though I may forget the structure of sentences and how to label them properly. I also do not want to forget to read any of the text assigned to us before break. If i do, there will be an overwhelming amount of homework on my plate right after break. However i will relish in the fact that we have a break from school.
I believe that my essays have the most passion when I have a vast amount of background knowledge or if the topic has to do with something that I am passionate about. Passion is something that cannot be replaced by even the most perfect knowledge and understanding of knowing how to compose essays. Passion brings liveliness that draws the reader in and hooks them and if missing, will make the essay bland and almost impossible to read.
Editing and polishing essays is extremely essential in composing. For me, it is very difficult to polish my own essays because I was a part of every step of writing so far. Rereading my own writing becomes monotonous task and it is almost impossible to separate myself from my own writing to be critical enough to find mistakes. However, if I am polishing an essay that was written by one of my peers, I find it very easy to find minute mistakes and small grammatical errors. Then again, it is almost always easier to find mistakes in others rather than yourself.
Researching to find credible proof is not only a great way to make improvements on your essays, but also an incredible way to expand the writer’s knowledge and to invoke a passion in the essay with the knowledge gained. Without knowledge, writing is almost held at a standstill. Research can give writers a new understanding and expand their way of thinking in order to argue each point of their thesis and convey their message clearly and thoroughly.
Over winter break, I am worried about keeping to task in making sure that I stay disciplined in keeping up with studying for the final exam along with beginning to read the novels assigned for next semester. The final exam is a very large task to take on in such a relatively short amount of time. I hope to be able to find the perfect balance of relaxation and continued learning.
When my essays have the most passion is when the subject of the essay is over a topic that I prefer a lot. Naturally. What I mean when I say this is when I can think of multiple points that could be included in my essay rather than when an essay is about a topic I could care less about. Another example of when I write with a lot of passion is if the subject would be about antiques. At home, I have a small collection of different types of antiques and with each one I did extensive research to make sure that I bought a good working antique. In doing extensive research, I usually find out a great deal about the item I am going to buy. Whenever a friend asks me to help peer edit an essay of theirs or when I have to help edit an essay as part of a class. Therefore, I would not say that I am very good at polishing up essays. The reason I say this is because when I usually take a look at another essay, I will read it but I usually have no idea on what advice to give back. I usually feel bad afterwards because other people will offer me all kinds of tips but I have none to offer back. Whenever I write my essays, I do a fairly well job of researching my facts. One thing I hate is when I am reading something online and the facts are misleading, and it makes people think a different way that is not correct. Usually, researching is not very difficult, but it can be a bit time consuming. Lastly, the thing that I am most worried about are the few semester tests that I do have to take in order to boost my semester grade and a physics project that will involve building a bridge made entirely out of .4 cm thick balsa sticks.
When you are passionate about the subject at hand, you write with a more feverish fervor for the For example, if anybody brings up the subject Futurama (a TV series which I adore) I will become instantly adorned to the conversation, and augment it with several references and allusions to the show, along with even more of my favorite moments, quips, and quotes from the series, and also along with a list of my favorite episodes (season number and episode number, of course). Bring up the topic of dinosaurs, and you shall reignite my primordial passion for them, and without consent we shall discuss dinosaurs, regardless of outsider’s opinions or prejudice towards the topic we are discussing, continuing as a whim towards my youthfulness. I still remember many names of many dinosaurs, and also of quite a few plesiosaurs and pterodactyls. By taking conversations about topics we adore with people, and replacing them with conversations we love, alone with our thoughts and some paper, it becomes a composition, a masterpiece, maybe even a classic.
I like to believe that I am a proficient polisher of essays, but I also understand that it is human nature to make mistakes. Therefore, when I compose essays (and music as well) I like to assist myself and enlist others to peer review my work, to ensure that my essay/music is polished enough to make me proud to claim it as my own.
My essays can easily be augmented by research. The hard part (or at least, the tedious part,) is correctly citing my research, though with time I believe I shall become more proficient.
The thing I am most worried about for the looming winter break is that I get as much scholarship forms and essays and applications figured out, before school hits again. That, along with a band trip, the thought of all the semester tests I may have to take, and because of the fact that I’m looking for a job, shows that I may have a semi-stressful Christmas vacation… but alas, all shall be well, and it will be worth a few weeks of stress in the long run.
Ullom 7
Writing with a passion is difficult, if you don’t have passion for the topic or discussion to begin with. Most of the topics that I have written on this year mean a great deal to me. They were something I felt I was knowledgeable about, so they were easier for me to write. The difficulty comes when I am putting my essay together, wanting it to sound good, and yet have to have a certain amount of pages. I, unfortunately, can say most of what I want to say in a very short essay. With that said, I have gotten much better at polishing my essays, using the instructions given and making changes. It hasn’t been easy, but it has been worth the effort I have put into it. As far as works cited, I found that this was easier than I had originally thought. I think I was overthinking what I needed to do instead of just focusing on the actual task of citing a work. I have a pretty clear indication now what needs to be done and how to actually do this. Research is interesting, yet not always fun or enjoyable, but necessary. I feel I have gotten much more proficient at finding topics and resources related to the topics I have written on.
What worries me over break is really just one thing - the final. I am fine with looking at my worksheets and resources and figuring out what and how to write. However, I find the memorization of some of the homework very, very difficult. I know that I will need to focus all my efforts on the final and do the absolute best I can. But before that, I am going to go have some fun in New Orleans and Memphis with my “bando” friends. It should be a trip to remember. Then, the studying, in earnest, to fully integrate everything I’ve learned this semester in composition, will begin.
The most passionate essays I have ever written are usually argumentation essays. Argumentation essays seem to be a sort of competition. Being a highly competitive person, I enjoy trying to win the argument. These types of essays are often written about topics that provoke strong emotions within the author and the reader.
My patience is tested during the polishing of essays. The start of an essay begins with a fountain of ideas, but I find it hard to continue that same enthusiasm throughout the end of the essay. After awhile, the words in my essays seem to become boring and I begin to lose interest. I found the photo essay especially enjoyable because it included pictures and photos. The different color schemes of each slide were fun to tweak and perfect. Kirstyn and I had a great time taking hundreds of pictures of different coffees. Research is one of my favorite parts in writing an essay. The topics that I research always show me details that I had not previously considered. Research can revive a stale essay. I love when I come across research that backs up the points in my essay.
The amount of terms worry me the most. I am not sure that I will be able to remember what every term means and how to apply it. The grammatical classification of sentences can be tricky, but I think I have gotten much better at classifying after learning more about the different types of sentences. Luckily, I have Christmas break and a twenty-one hour bus ride to study! College is a source of worry for me. The deadlines for college applications are quickly approaching. I also have All-State Band auditions in one month and auditions for scholarships at a few of the colleges I applied to. I hope you have a wonderful Christmas Mr. Christensen!
I think that my essays show more passion when I have interest in what I am talking about. It proves to be very difficult to have passion about something that does not interest you. I really enjoy being given a goal in my essay but being able to really pick my own subject of my essay. I think that it makes it much easier when I can write about topics that interest me. It makes me want to make the essay longer, detail it more, and really polish to whole essay over. I consider myself fairly proficient as polishing my essays. Sometimes I think that I could spend a little more time to really make sure that all the grammar (commas especially!) is correct, but that also proves to be where I struggle the most. I usually have some of my friends look over my essay to see if they see any major grammar problems. I actually prefer to have research in my essay. Researching what you are writing about actually makes it easier to write longer and more detailed. I think that adding in that research that you do not only makes your essay longer, but give it more of a purpose. Everybody has an opinion on something, but when you have stats and figures to back your opinion up, it can be much more persuasive. The thing that I fear the most on the final exam is not knowing what is going to be on it. I feel like I always seem to study so much and yet I forgot to study something or something on the test was not mentioned in class. I am also scared for the sentence labeling because on both of our practice quizzes I have really spent time studying and the top grade I got was a 75, which is the lowest grade I have on anything in any of my classes, I really do not get low grades like that. So, having those grades on those quizzes makes me very nervous.
My essays consume the most passion when I write about something that interests me and something that has a lot of information to write about. It is very hard to write about something that does not interest you, you will lack the passion that essays need in order for other people to be interested in it. If you do not have passion and entertainment in your essays the reader will not gain the passion while reading it. Also controversial topics spark your interest and passion in writing. It is easy to write about something that has a lot of points to and you can spend a lot of your time convincing people that you point is correct. Maybe that is why I like it so much because I like the argue and prove myself right to people. That is why the argumentive essay was one of my favorites to write because I was able to pick a side on a topic that I was really interested in and write a ton of information to try to prove to the readers that my point was right. I really enjoy writing about controversial topics that interest me. I believe I am some what a proficient polisher of essays because I really care about making my essays the best they can be. Honestly I could do better, but I do believe I do all I can to make my essays the best they could be. I believe doing that really gets you prepared for essay writing in college. Over the winter break I am most worried about losing the information I have learned throughout this first semester of school. This would seem hard to do but going from working on something everyday to not doing it all would make it very easy to lose your skill at that. I am also worried that I will get in a habit of not doing homework over the winter break and not test myself as much as I should. That I will get lazy and not study as much as I would if we were in the school habit. The good thing is that this is all up to myself and I can control this.
Writing has always been a favorite of mine because it is a place where I can put my thought onto a physical level, a thing that allows others to understand me better. Writing is one of my solaces, and therefore I put passion into each work that I create. It is when it gets on an emotional level that this passion shines through the most, because I care most about how my deepest thoughts are reflected. Scientific papers do not often offer this opportunity, and so I cannot be as passionate about my writing. After all, there is only so much emotion you can put out into a report about the anatomy of a cell. When I found the rare assignment in which I can relay my feelings through written word, I look over the work relentlessly, searching for ways to make it better so that I can feel most at peace with what I have accomplished. There are always improvements to be made, I know, but my goal is to have those improvements be as minuscule as possible. However, I will not lie and say that I never give up on scouring for mistakes; there have been many times where I simply decide that something is good enough the way it is and go on to a more pressing task. This is brutal honesty, and I hope that teachers can relate to me. I am quite certain that a large percentage of today’s working force do their job well, but not perfectly. There comes a point where other activities take presence over perhaps rereading a paper for the third time or perfecting a hamburger at a drive-thru. Researching has never been a strong pint of mine. I find it bring to credit my words, especially when I would rather be expanding on my essay instead if citing it. I will do it when I have to, but I feel less passionate about my writing because I feel less credible and creative. As winter break approaches, I find myself worrying over the mounting task of memorizing the massive amount of final exam terms and wonder exactly how to study; it has never been a strong point of mine--memorization does not come easily to me. I am sure that I will survive the final exam and gone on to live a normal life, but a small part of me wonders whether I will perish from exhaustion and stress. Oh well.
Essays can be good, but can’t be great without passion. The best authors, writers, and publishers have a way of producing passion beyond belief by enhancing the detail and interest to the readers. I feel that I produce the most amount of passion when I am interested in the topic at hand. If I am interested about what I am writing about, passion becomes easy. I have noticed that my best grades and essays were the ones I felt the most passionate about. When you are interested in what you are writing about, coming up with ideas and perfecting your essay becomes easy, as does polishing your essay. At times, I find it quite easy to perfect my essay by reading it over and over again, but other times I can’t come up with a single thing to adjust and add to make my essay better. I believe this has to do with the passion I put into my essay as well. If I am passionate about the essay I am writing about, I will try my best to perfect it. If I am not happy with the essay topic, or my writing, I lack the drive to enhance my essay. As a writer, I typically can find faults in my essays fairly easily, although finding faults in my classmates can be quite difficult for me. Not only can proficient polishing perfect my essay, but research can as well. I find myself researching ideas for my essays quite often. By researching to find credible proof, you become more intelligent as a writer. Researching can help perfect my essay when I am stuck by giving me further ideas to add.
As Christmas break becomes closer, I become more nervous. The start of Christmas break symbolizes my need to study for the Composition semester test. Tests have always seemed to produce nervousness for me as a student. I am incredibly nervous for the Composition 101 test, especially because it is one of the first college classes I will have on my college transcript. I usually am quite excited for Christmas break because it is a time or relaxation and family time, but I feel I will be spending most of my free time studying for semester exams.
My essays have the most passion when the subject matter is important to me. I think this can be said for most people that write. But when you write about something that you know well it seems that the words flow onto paper a lot smoother. One thing that I can passionately type about would be in depth stories or life experiences. This is fun to recall and get down on paper. Also through sharing these stories you find people with like experiences. Leading to great friendships or stories with people that you may never had talked to before.
I do not believe that my essay polishing skills are very good at the moment. The major thing to me is time. Everybody seems to have no time in their day so this does not seem like a viable excuse. What it comes down to is effort and this is one thing that I need to find more of when polishing masterpiece essays. I do indeed think I have gotten better at proofreading essays and reforming the sentence structure to make a few elegant sentences. This is a fun thing to do because this is where putting in the time pays off with a uniform essay.
Researching to offer credible proof can be a good time actually. Sometimes you find new information that can lead into a couple of sentences or even a whole paragraph. But the main thing that is important about finding proof is that people know information is not just being made up but it is proved through others too.
I worry about studying up for the sentence structure part of the exam. This is so hard for me to break apart a sentence and figure out the tiny differences. The hardest part for me would be finding the dependent clause because it doesn't stand out in my eyes as well as the Independent’s. I have however improved from the start of this semester so that is a plus.
I believe the essays that I write that have the most passion are the essays in which I am writing about a topic that I care about. For example when I wrote essays this year I wrote about topics in which I knew a lot about not only because I would be able to write the most about that topic but because I actually had a passion for the topic. The more often my essays have passion the more I am able to write the best about that topic. I believe one of my worst qualities as a writer is when i am putting the final touches on my essays. After writing about everything I want to talk about I hit a block and no longer want to work on the certain essay. I no longer want to spend time and polish the essay to make it superb, however I still manage to push on and complete it. I believe I have learned a lot about researching essays over the years and I have become very good at doing so. I especially like using google scholar for research as the articles found on there are research articles written by well esteemed professionals.
My main concern for the winter break would be trying to restart my brain after shutting down for winter break. I will have a band trip which will not be beneficial for me as I will not be able to do much studying to prepare for the test. Coming back the day before school starts will be hard to get back into school mode to try to prepare for my tests. In years past teachers have typically eased us back into school mode and this year there will not be that opportunity to do so. Hopefully I will be able to study just as much as years past and be successful with my tests.
Essays that I am most passionate about are the essays with content I feel are important to me or I have done personal research for. Whenever I have to write about a topic I do not care about, then I would rather not waste my time trying to write to the best of my skill, because I know that I will never be satisfied with what I wrote. Also, I would enjoy to write fictional tales, or other forms of literature that requires creativity instead of factual essays. I have loved to indulge myself in mystery style plots in books or shows since I was a tiny child; having to guess what will happen next always makes their stories thrilling and exciting to me. When the essay has to use facts to persuade and promote an idea, my writing suffers, since I find it difficult to express my thoughts with facts in a logical manner. My difficulty to do express my thoughts carries over to polishing my essays, which I hate doing. Once I reread a part of my essays, I have to rewrite my sentences over and over before feeling happy enough to leave it alone. Researching for essays is the best way for me to lengthen my essays. Some topics have a ton of information that will fill pages. Other topics lack information, thus the essay is shorter. I do enjoy learning new information about something I thought I knew I everything about or something I had not heard of before.
I am not worried about the test to tell the truth. English is easily my worst subject; instead, I understand math and science far better than English. When looking over the study guides that have been provided, I feel confident that I know what I am doing, but I am sure that the test will be more challenging than those study guide. Sometimes all the information can seem overwhelming.
7 Nick Rise
My essays always without any exception have the most passion when I am able to write about things I am passionate about or things that interest me a great deal. Things like soccer, human emotion, and certain current events are prime examples. I love to learn about these things so of course I love to teach others what I know of these subjects. Writing is one of the main forms of spreading ideas so it is a very important skill to have. I actually enjoy writing in my free time. Even though I have not had much free time in the past few months I still do try to make time. I actually have two short stories that I am currently working on at my own recreational speed. This makes the story even more entertaining to write. I am not rushed by deadlines, and I have nobody to impress with it. It is for my eyes and only my eyes unless I later decide to share it with others. This decision lies with me and gives me more choice in my life than I would have otherwise.
When it comes to polishing my essays, I struggle a great deal. I write my first draft and have a very difficult time fixing/cleansing my work. The things I wrote right away, I tend to think are better than anything I could change. Usually I read over my sentences and add coherency, but this is usually all I am able to do to add to my essays. This past expansion essay was actually really good practice for this skill, and I do feel that I need to work on it on my own in order to actually show quality improvement.
My ability to research is good or at least better than some, in my humble opinion at least. Comparing my ability to others is not what I aim to do by any means, but sometimes it is necessary to rank yourself among your peers to see where you are at. I honestly am unsure of my classmates abilities to research in order to offer proof of their argument, but I do know I am able to do this well. I understand sites that carry more weight than others and actually just sound better in comparison to others, and I also know when a website is worthless and is just using click-baits to lure people on. This skill is a vital one to have especially for the future. While I do think I do this well, there is always room for improvement. I am not the best, nor am I near perfect, but I do think I am capable.
I am most worried about studying for the exam specifically. I am not sure exactly how to go about studying for this. It seems very long and there seems to be quite a bit of terms to understand. I do not know for sure how much I do know at this point, but I am somewhat worried to find out.
Ellie K. Pd 2
My essay tend to have the most passion when I am writing about something I strongly believe in or a topic I am well educated on. Once I get started on a topic I thoroughly enjoy I can write about for hours, just perfecting it and adding new parts. I do not enjoy writing about a topic I do not understand or believe in, I also do not favor essay topics that are very strict and hold down my creative style. I have learned through this class that I do not like writing about myself, I am not one to be in the spotlight so talking about myself can be a little awkward and hard for me to do.
I tend to struggle at plashing my essays, my essays can tend to be jumpy at first because I have a hard time organizing my thoughts and getting them to make sense and in the right order. This class has taught me how to fix that and now if I have enough time I thoroughly enjoy reworking and polishing my essays. Sometimes I find that I missed a whole point or maybe this paragraph would make more sense here. I also feel more confident in my essay if I have gone through it and made it the best it can be.
I personally love research essays because there are endless amounts of research on many topics, which unlike essays that tell a story can be limited. I also like the idea of hard evidence that research essays use; they tend to be more persuasive than other essays.
As the semester test looms closer I get more and more nervous I am not confident in many of the grammar or sentence types. Sometimes I feel like I do not know any of the material at all and that worried me a lot. I am starting to realize that this test will take much more studying time than past semester tests I have taken, but I am up for the challenge.
When I am writing, I try to add an exceptional amount of thought and passion into my works. I have noticed that I am the most passionate when I am able to take my time and write about something that thoroughly interests me. I can write the longest and the most proficient when I compose essays and papers in my own time and in a style that relates to me. When there is added humor and added insights through the author, it can change the essay completely and make it that much more relatable to the readers. But there is still a long road of essays ahead of me and other soon-to-be college students. We have come a long way from where we were in August and we should all continue to grow. Finding out your writing style is crucial and can change your perspective entirely… maybe even to the point of enjoyment.
I have always felt confident with the polishing of essays because there really isn’t anything to it besides knowing your stuff. The arduous part of writing is the thinking, structuring, and then the composing. I would have to think that it is common for students to enjoy the final touches of the essay compared to the commencement. Going on with the commencement… If you are required to do an abundance of research that usually means you are going to have a works cited page along with, depending on your instructor, an annotated bibliography. I am still a long way from being 100% confident with citing my sources, mainly because I feel like I am missing some crucial parts whenever I cite something. It is hard for me to find the author, publisher, date published, etc. Maybe it is just because I am using websites that are not completely certified. But researching in general is not too difficult and if the subject is interesting to you, there should be no problem whatsoever.
As the winter break approaches I can honestly say that I will not be doing much, if at all, studying for the reason of it being a break. I am stoked to be able to get school out of my head for a couple weeks but that does not mean I will not be ready for the final exam. I expect I will do just fine as will everybody else with all that we have absorbed this first semester alone.
I would have to say that my essays having passion fuel them is a rarity. I mean almost no offense, but the broad topics that lead us to pick our specific topic to write essays on are not that interesting in my own opinion. The only essay I feel that I put passion into was the causal essay. I had chosen to write about the perception and use of words that are considered bad or inappropriate. I was passionate about the essay because I was passionate about the subject. It is one of the many topics in which my belief contradicts that which is the normal standard or behavior. Otherwise, I do not believe I was passionate about any of the other essays, excluding the narrative because it was a true life story.
If my procrastination was not such a nuisance to my writing ability, I would say my papers would be more polished. The fact that I do not pace my writing is the reason it may not be perfected. But I do believe that I polish my writing while I write it the first time. I often times do not need to go back because I am satisfied with my work. My research ability is probably more crippling than that of my procrastination to my writing, matched only by my ability, or lack thereof, to cite those sources. I have never been decent at doing research. I just am never sure what exactly I am to include or what not to include.
I would say that I am most worried about reading/ finishing the Lord of the Flies book and also learning some of the final exam terms. I tell myself that I am going to read the book during the break, but I am most likely lying to myself.
I am not very passionate for writing, because I lack creative thinking when it comes to essays. The topics I have not been very interested in but have found a few of them to be somewhat entertaining. I would say I am most passionate in my writing when I am writing about something that I care about or can relate to at least. When I had to write about wrestling I found it very easy to write about because I could relate to it. When I had to write in my argumentative, I found it very difficult to keep a flow going when writing, and it was very boring to write about. I could not relate to it as much as other topics. When I can talk about something I can relate to, I can write about it in tremendous detail and that is why I think I am most passionate when writing about things I care about or topics I can relate too. I am very afraid of this final exam because It is going to be very difficult to memorize the 100 terms. Not only am I worried about not understanding the terms, but I am also worried about trying to spot them in a sentence and be able to identify them correctly. There are so many different types of sentences, and sentence structures that it seems to get overwhelming, and very frustrating. I started off very bad identifying these sentence structures at the beginning of the year and am scared for the test. Although I am getting better at identifying them correctly, I do not feel I can identify them during the test because there is so much information. I will have to go back over term tuesdays, and my term tuesday notes to fully prepare myself for the final exam, and I hope the studying does not get too overwhelming and that I will be able to handle it.
It is not to my knowledge if this is common sense, but the quality of my work improves as the interest to the topic increases. Due to this, I have written a lot about multiculturalism, cosmopolitanism, tolerance, and other similar themes. As the relations of my writings to the topics lessens, effort declines; that is inevitable. I find that a major flaw of myself: that I can be compassionate only towards limited stories. I am equally concerned about my own attitude towards revising and polishing my words. Effort for this is more dependent on the amount of energy I hold at the times necessary. As for effort towards research, I lack it. I have an abhorring habit of writing what (I think) I know first, then searching for truth from the start. This is where I know my laziness will someday come to haunt me.
Many people compliment me that I am smart. Some also praise how I can be always cool and calm. I try not to be too narcissistic. I attempt to focus on my room for improvement when receiving those words, actually. One room of improvement I have always had is testing. Call it fortunate or unfortunate, even since the first grade, I was always able to get at least a C on any test, even when my preparation was far from the minimal requirement. I never felt true suffering from studying that I heard others constantly complain about. There is a hubris that piles up inside me every time I hear other struggle with problems I never even thought of as a problem. So there it is, my worst fear in school: not preparing anywhere near enough because of the pretense that lies in my mind for eternity. Believe it or not, I have learned that I need to know what is coming before me before I confront it. Then, perhaps, it may not be a confrontation but a skip on the meadow instead. Cliche it may sound, but essential to note.
I hope that did not sound too dark.
Rasmussen 7
I find that my essays are the most passionate when I am telling a personal story about what has happened to myself. Most of the stories that I tell when I write are about hunting memories or my grandpas. I think this comes up to be the most passionate time since those memories are the most important ones to me and can give a relate to people the most when I add the details and make the setting I was in very colorful. This also drags to the reader into wanting more, it gives them a mental picture that they can connect to with a memory or a dream they wish they had. With the stories come the feeling to write faster being the words just flow through your mind, which causes you to make spelling errors and grammatical errors, but while you are writing it seems correct. When I write with things from a personal experience I become more confident in what I am writing and do not check what I am writing. That also comes with when I just want to get done with an essay and still write about the topic thoroughly, but just want to get the essay done with causing me not to refine the essay. The best part of a good factual essay is the hard evidence. The evidence adds up to bring whomever is reading your essay to believe what you believe and know more about what you are talking about without having to do the research themselves. When it comes to the part of me getting information from a credible source I find that as one of my strength being most of the time I already have some knowledge about what I am writing about. This makes it easy for me to see if the facts that I receive on the internet or in a book are actually correct.
My essays that contain the most passion are the ones that relate to something that I already have a large sum of knowledge in. If I received a topic that related to the type of knowledge I have and the knowledge that I want other people to know, then I could type on that topic for hours, I could type page after page and keep going because if I already know what I'm talking about, then I can connect it to other topics that are related and just continue typing and putting down my thoughts and ideas. I am not very good at checking if my essay grammar is perfect, or if the essay flows perfectly, because that is not my strong suit. I place commas where I think they go, although I am not always one hundred percent positive, because commas are used extremely often and a person cannot possibly get their commas right every time. Writing essays is not the simplest type of homework for me to complete because I usually get topics that I have to research about and then the essay just turns into a homework assignment, rather than something I have passion about and can write by starting with pre-existing knowledge and learning from there. I am very talented at researching and finding out facts, but only if I care about the subject that I am researching. If I have the motivation to want to learn about something, then I will find out fact after fact and I would be able to prove many facts in my essay, but that essay will come a different day, maybe when it is not a homework assignment. I am also bad at trying to be passionate on essays if they are assigned to me as an assignment, because then I try to get the requirements and I do not worry about trying to make it something I care about. Homework has been assigned to me almost every day of the last twelve years, and I am at the point to where I will usually finish an assignment (if I do not forget and complete it a couple days late) and turn it in, hoping for a decent grade. I have lost my passion in school and if I write a truly passionate essay in my life, it will not be something that is assigned to me.
I am worried that all the knowledge I retained in your classroom will vanish from my mind and I will do completely horrible on the final exam because my worst school topic has always been English. My mother and brother also tell me that the final exam is extremely difficult (my mom only knows because my brother is super smart and he got like a D or something), therefore I am highly worried that I will not be able to live up to his D, but I have done better on semester tests that we have both taken, he just took them two years before me.
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