What I Learned In English Class

Prior to my development of routine introspection and, consequently, maturation, I wrote not to encapsulate my ever-growing discomfort towards life, but rather to gain praise and acknowledgement for my efforts in writing. Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, I sat on the floor of my kindergarten classroom criss-cross applesauce-style as my teacher, Mrs. Glickman, asked the class to write a short story and to provide an illustration to accompany it. With smudged and disorderly speckles of graphite sprawled across my paper, I managed to write a story in my signature chicken-scratch handwriting. The story was relatively simple, about a girl who had thought she was a hideous monster until she looked into a river reflection and realized she was beautiful. I even drew (or attempted to draw) a beautiful girl for the second part of the assignment. At the next school assembly, Mrs. Glickman granted me a sky-colored paper, reading “Award of Recognition: Kiana Lucin, for her creative writing and exemplary drawing skills.” From this point on, I prided myself in writing, and excelled

It is Connor’s last semester in medical school. In order to earn an internship at a top-rank hospital, Connor must write a ten page reflective essay on which part of medicine impacted him the most. Connor has no idea what to write about as multiple ideas come to mind but none of them are his own. Like all writers, Connor must make sure he avoids obvious content and instead give his genuine and original idea to allow the reader to understand how he truly feels about the specific topic. To be able to provide a clear visual of what impacted him the most, Connor, like all writers, must slip out of abstraction when writing and provide enough detail to not just help the reader visualize but to also embody the experience, leaving a lasting impression. While providing enough detail to help the reader visualize their vision, the writer must make sure they avoid padding and be as direct as possible. Being direct will help Connor reflect and share his experience while keeping the reader engaged and demonstrating a better understanding of how he feels. Consequently, all writers can write well by projecting their own voice while keeping the material fresh, providing detail for a more vivid experience, using strong evidence, and establishing their own voice amongst other writers.

In the first paragraph I was attempting to illustrate the moment and gather the memories from that day into a few short sentences. The words I chose and the way I organized my paragraph was in hopes of reflecting the nostalgia that I was feeling while looking at the picture. There is also a strange feeling that I felt while looking at the picture, because it defines a moment that now feels as if I had imagined it. Therefore, while writing my personal essay I felt the need to recover this and other misplaced moments. The entire concept that a previous self may be a stranger to me is something that I feel needs exploring, although I also felt, while writing, that there are certain fundamental aspects of a person that never change. After rereading my essay multiple times, I am pleased with how I was able to achieve my goal. Although I feel as if I could have used more detail to describe myself then, in that particular moment, I believe that by describing what has changed over the course of the years proved to be just as effective. From the beginning of the essay through to the end, it is easy for readers to track the progress I have made from an elementary school student to a high school student. Each paragraph I began to develop a little more as a person and student which then lead me to succeed in my first few weeks as a

When writing the narrative essay, I stumbled across many difficulties trying to meet the requirements. The prompt required us to reflect on memories of a past experience related to literate practices. This was nice because we could tell something more personal, but I had a lot of trouble trying to remember a time where I’ve done literate practices. After several days of trying to brainstorm some kind of ideas, I almost gave up. Then, as I was just sitting in my room, thinking, I looked over and saw my guitar. Music, my biggest passion was a literate practice. After that entire thinking process, I had finally made the decision to write about my passion for music (Music is my

As the semester comes to an end this assignment gives me a great opportunity to look back on my experiences in English 111. Through my experience in English 111 recognizing several ideas that have greatly impacted me, my point of view on learning, and my actual learning. My experience in college has been beneficial because my professor approached teaching with a more aware effort and taught me how to approach learning and my role as a learner in a way. It is tough to put into words how much I have grown as a writer.

The experience of writing a personal narrative essay was engrossing. I learned a lot about my thought process, my manner of analysis and my writing procedure for this genre. Furthermore, I understood the difference between a literature review and the

In literature, descriptive writing is a useful technique, especially since it allows an author to describe how he or she truly feels about a particular subject matter. Descriptive writings bring literary works to life; it is vivid, especially since the readers are able to visualize specific information in their

When I start to write a story, I try to reach into a particular topic, scene, or emotion and delve deeper to expand my understanding and its meaning in the human experience. I write not only to make sense of the world, but also to make sense of how others interpret what is written to their reality. I was drawn to creating stories when I was placed in an unfamiliar environment in the Solomon Islands. I made sense of and learned about my surroundings through crafting sentences; going from stressed and racy to calm and in control. Upon my return to America, I searched for ways to learn more about the craft, which I found through fiction workshops at Columbia University during my post-bac program and in my hometown of Austin, Texas. My interest

There was a point in my life where the thought of having to read something sent me into a panic and there was nothing I despised more. I was six and could only utter a few things in English, my first tongue being Portuguese; my peers would tell me I spoke “funny” and I soon resented anything to do reading or writing, especially out loud. Tired of being teased, I pushed myself to learn the language and to go beyond what a six year old was expected to know. From that moment on, I rekindled my love for literature and dominated the rest of my class in the subject, earning various trophies. Thus, the courses, Fiction Workshop: Writing Short Stories and Heroes, Lovers, Villains, Fools: Archetypes and Modern Culture, appeal to me the most because I feel that they provide me with the best opportunity to further develop my skills as a writer.

Writing can mean many things to different people, but for me, it is a creative outlet and hobby as well as a valued professional skill. In my writing, I attempt to use my most descriptive language—without going over the top—throughout a work in order to create the most vivid images possible for the reader. This has been one of my main goals, and in this aspect, I’m sure my best paper is the first essay I wrote this semester titled “My 7 and 1/2 Acres.” I believe this is the most effectively descriptive work I have written. I do not have a favorite out of my essays and papers but if I did this one might be it.

As I was writing this essay, I had a lot of fun reminiscing on the most amazing parts about my life. That includes moving from place to place, experiencing new cultures and living overseas. My style of my essay was a first person narration. I was not trying to persuade anyone in my essay, but I was trying to develop a “hook” so that could reel people in using entertainment and to inform someone on my life and what I have personally went through.

During the past year my art has taken a significant turn towards the multimedia realm of collage. I have learned to combing my early artistic training in painting and drawing with my more personal and experimental art that is often involves sustainable or found objects and reclaimed textiles. Because I am also pursuing a degree in English literature, storytelling and narrative, personal, socio political, or otherwise has become intertwined with and essential to my creative process. In the four pieces that I am submitting I had a very clear narrative in mind when starting each piece. For example, the piece Ontario began when I was given an old map of Ontario. The song “Ontario” by Neil Young and the story he tells through the lyrics immediately came to mind and inspired not only the portrait but the brushstrokes and mood of the entire piece.

Some skills that I learned in PD #1 was to speak out loud more and to step out my comfort zone. I hate public speaking because im super insecure about my voice and im afraid that people will misunderstand what I say and take it the wrong way. It happens to me often. But I learned that no one really cares as long as you voice your opinion right and say the things you want to say. You do what you have to do to take care of your responsibilities. Another skill I learned in PD#1 was to ask questions without having to be questioned about your question. In the drawing activity, I was able to clearly describe my drawing to my partner without having her messing up. It shows that I was able to talk out loud and that I should talk more slowly without

I had some great memories in which had to narrow them down because not all of them had an unfavorable part that I could describe from. After I choice my scene it was good because it had a balance of both point of view and the way I was going to organize it. As I was writing this assignment sometimes I had to stop and think about how I want my audience to image the scene from my point of view. In which it was hard to choice what words would best fit in the paragraph and to choice the same image but in my unfavorable view.

There are many helpful things I learned in English 125, but there are a few things that I strongly learned that have helped me a lot throughout the school semester. One of the things I have learned is MLA format which not only makes your papers look professional but it also makes people want to read it. Also, I learned that transitions are another important part in English because you need them throughout an essay in order for it to flow from paragraph to paragraph. The third thing I learned in class is that essays don’t always have to be five big paragraphs; they can be up to nine small paragraphs telling and explaining the same things. I learned quite a lot of helpful things that helped me succeed in my English class.