Third Quarter Self Evaluation
Before entering ninth grade, I thought of reading as only a one-dimensional story that had little meaning, and now close to the fourth quarter of the school year I see the text as a passageway to literary elements and deeper meaning that I would never have noticed before. When first hearing about annotating our text, I nearly wanted to hide in a corner. Yet, when the second quiz came around I noticed how much more I could recall from the story. As I studied for the quiz, the ability to look up the plot summaries at the beginning of each chapter made it extremely easier to uncover some of the plot I had forgotten about. As a result my grades on reading tests and quizzes improved greatly in comparison to the first quiz, where I had not annotated the text. I remember studying for one of the first quizzes and the helpfulness of the annotations, specifically with characters names, made all the difference. Especially in concern with books such as Genesis, where new names are announced in almost every sentence, the process of note taking truly helped. However, beside the comprehension aspect, learning literary elements contributed to my growth in finding the deeper meaning and the different hints that the author portrays through these different terms. In Haroun and The Sea of Stories, the work of fiction consisted of irony, characterization, allegories, and motifs that I most certainly wouldn’t have been aware of previous to ninth grade. I even notice them when reading outside of class! With all of this visible improvement I now approach the reading assignments with excitement to all the different elements I can uncover. This marks a complete change from the beginning of the year. Currently while reading The Odyssey, even without text marking as a requirement, I annotate passages, summarize chapters, and list characters names so that by writing down the info and establishing it in my mind I will keep up my progression. Now with only a little more than a quarter left, the only goal I would set myself for the rest of the year would consist of becoming quicker at doing all of these things by practicing with a timer and limiting my self to the amount of time I can take up.
When it comes time to writing, the ability to organize and structure my essay has improved ten fold in comparison to the beginning of the year, yet in respect to content and style, I seem to fall short of my goal. Considering the time our class has focused on structure and preparation, the knowledge and capability to start the essay stays prominent in my mind. I remember the first time we used the webspiration charts to organize our essay on the hero journey. At first I saw no point and the idea of this type of outline confused me. However, now I use this resource for other topics like theatre history. The time where I felt I learned the most on structure came during reviewing for the mid-term. Having that outline constantly drilled into our heads, made it impossible to forget and led to an A on the assignment. If I were to write that essay in the beginning of the year, the outcome would most certainly have turned out differently. On the contrary, in regards to content and style I start the assignment with zeal towards what I want to write about and the message I want to portray. Yet when I receive the paper most of the comments relate to my lack of analysis and wordiness. Throughout the year, when writing essays I focus on this aspect of style and analysis and try to improve by narrowing down my point and message. However I seem to always receive the average grade of a B and can never reach what I want to say. To improve on this in these lasts months, I intend on starting my compositions with preparation focusing on specific and concise theme statements and then refer back to these ideas when writing.
Late nights of worry and tears that appeared frequently during the beginning of the year have now progressed into school nights of proper studying and accomplishing the homework assignments efficiently, yet without all the anxiety. The overwhelming load of homework now seems less and less overwhelming. When I see that the syllabus says IRJ on day two, instead of beads of sweet forming on my forehead, I think of what I will write about with excitement. The time it took to write these short pieces use to take hours and now the assignments occupy twenty minutes of stress free writing. Another assignment, reading and annotating, use to drive me even more insane. Hours and hours of reading and finding literary elements seemed the killer of my nights. However, these hours have turned into half hours and don’t seem as painful. Of course this skill came about from constantly practicing, but my determination and constant checking of the clock contributes most to my progression. Either way English homework, although still challenging, does not end up with me walking over to my sister’s room crying. With this in mind, I would like to end my year by improving on the amount of pleasure I receive during these assignments. Instead of looking at them as things I need to get done, by putting some more personal touches I feel this goal can get accomplished.
