Reflection

Part 1- Thinking and writing

The two pieces I chose to put in my blog were my memoir and the Scarlet Letter essay. The point of my memoir was to take a personal experience we had and put a twist to it. We had to write in detail about this experience as well as to use brushstrokes. The brushstrokes really made our writing more interesting. They helped to make the memoir more of a formal essay than just one that is told informally.
The point of the Scarlett Letter essay was to write about a main topic in the book and discuss it thoroughly. We had to use specific examples from the text and cite them in the essay to connect it to the novel.
Writing all four of these essays conducted a lot of thinking! I don't think I have ever thought this much about writing an essay ever! When writing my memoir, I really had to look deep inside of me and bring out almost every thought and detail I could remember from that experience. I had to go back and think of what I saw, did, thought, heard, and even smelled! Then putting that all together to make it sound decent was an even tougher challenge. Thank goodness Mrs. Turner provided us with the brushstrokes instructions to help form and make the memoir sound more better.
When writing the Scarlett Letter essay, I felt a bit more comfortable. I picked a topic that I knew and wanted to write about. I had also done essay's like this before, so I was more comfortable writing about this topic.
While writing these essay's I learned many new things. One thing that helped improve my writing were the brushstrokes. It added a lot more voice and depth into the writing. While re-reading my essay with the brushstrokes in it, I couldn't believe how much more interesting my writing became! It was just great learning a new technique that would improve my writing. Another really big thing that I learned was to really sit down and think about writing the essay topic I had been given. In earlier years, I had just written and essay for the sake of a grade. I never even thought about it. This time, I thought about what I was going to write as soon as I got the topic. I would brainstorm the ideas in my head as well as on paper. This really helped me gather all of my thoughts together. Then I would just type up the paper using my thoughts and opinions as well. That is another thing that I believe helped me in my essay's. Earlier, I would just solely write about the topic and nothing else. This time, I also learned how to incorporate my own opinions into my writing. I believe this helped my essay as well as my liking for the topic. One more thing that helped was to eliminate being verbs. They just all clog up your writing and make it less interesting.

Part 2- Process of Revision
Writing these essay's also included revising-and a lot of it! After I wrote my essay I would re-read it to see how I could make it better. Then Mrs. Turner would also comment on them, so I would take those comments and also use them to revise my essay's. I also had to learn not to be so vague when writing. I just usually say something and then never explain it. I also tend to not use details. So this time I went above and beyond and tried to include as many details and thoughts.
Examples of revision:
Before: We talked about everything and anything imaginable.
After: We talked about everything and anything imaginable. Such as what we did over the summer, what we were looking forward to, boys, what we were going to do in the morning, boys, Katelyn, boys, movies, boys, random things, and most importantly BOYS! (more details)
Before: Hawthorne mainly uses Pearl to symbolize the "A" through his use of mysticism and romanticism.
After: Hawthorne mainly uses Pearl to symbolize the "A" through his use of mysticism and romanticism, which is a style of writing.He uses one object to refer to another.(vague)
We should not follow this example in our lives today. If someone did something wrong but also confesses their wrongdoing, we should look upon them as brave and honest. We should be willing to help them through their problems and struggles.(my opinion)

Step 3- Learning from your classmates
Having my classmates help me in writing my pieces was so great! They all contributed so much. Their opinions really shaped my essay. Rachel, Erika V., and Kayla all contributed toward my essay's. They each told me that it is good to let your own voice out in your pieces and have an opinion on the topic. They taught me that you shouldn't think of what the teacher wants you to write, but what you want to write. They all told me that I needed to add more detail! They couldn't understand what I was talking about in some places. So I really took that into account.

Rachel's blog: http://www.rachelwhitmire.blogspot.com/
I really liked her Scarlett letter essay. It was really in-depth and it really explained everything really well. Our topics were similar, so we both contributed to each others. Hers also helped me with referring back to the book with excerpts and quotes.
Erika V.'s blog: http://erikaverbeck.blogspot.com/
Erika had a great voice in her writing! She included many details and adjectives. I liked how she explained everything really well and had her own opinion as well. It reminded me that I need to explain everything in depth.
Kayla's blog: http://kayladyarsblog.blogspot.com/
I loved Kayla's memoir. She always has beautiful writing. From her I learned how to make my writing's flow and make them sound really nice.