Reflective Essay

When I hear the word writing, I think of words flowing to make illustrations. Writing helps
me write my feelings through thoughts yet the inability to express my thoughts and feelings the
way my mind would creates frustration. I aspired to write the way I thought; obsessively, with a
maddening hunger for creativity. When reading my own essay it would make sense in my head
but in reality an audience would not understand my main concept and would often be puzzled.
In high school, my thesis would always be a closed ended sentence which is not considered
bad but inadequate in college; it would always follow the “because x and y”. Following this
method gaped my writing capabilities as a student. I knew that my writing could be better but I
wasn’t sure where to start.
Before starting this class, I would write whatever came to mind without looking back. My
professor’s thesis outline activities and conclusions helped write with a purpose and have a
clear understanding about what I want the audience to conclude with. In my conclusion, I would
often restate my thesis and the main idea from my paraphrase. With my learned knowledge of
level three conclusions, it has helped me stop writing “in conclusion”, “in summary”, and focus
on greater implications or different aspects that have closure for the reader. In essay 3, When
the Emperor was Divine, by Julie Otsuka, I used level 3 conclusion to discuss how families who
experience war never fully come back as who they were before and even become worse such
as having PTSD. As someone who learns better with a guideline, the levels for the thesis
building and conclusion structure have truly improved my capability to have control and flow
over the direction of my paper.
Another strategy has helped me immensely with organization and thought process is the
storyboard. This strategy has aided me immensely in the way I think. In essay 2, which was a
synthesis of three different sources, there was so much connection to make with all three
sources. Without the storyboard, I wouldn’t have been able to make connections between them.
The storyboard really outlines my themes and sets flow arrangement of each evidence. As a
student who gets overdriven by an abundance of information, this technique assisted me with
clearing my head and making my theme and points link fittingly. In addition, starting my essay
with the body paragraphs instead of the introduction helped ease my frustration on ways to
start. With body paragraphs complete, I can use my themes and points to contextualize my
writing and create a clear thesis that is answered in my body paragraph.
I can say I really appreciated the one on one zoom calls with my professor. These
individual meetings gave me a professional insight on parts of my essay that need fixing. With
my first essay, The Undocumented Americans by Cornejo Villavicencio my professor viewed
that some parts of the essay should be in the front so that my analysis for my second evidence
would align better with my point. Certain aspects of my writing changed with the advice given by
a professional writer. My professor made me think of the why’s and how’s in my analysis which I
have never thought to write before. Before this class, I would only restate my quote to give the
readers a better understanding. I learned through the meeting anbd great advice to think deeply
what the author means and not alter their opinion with yours.
When I first got the news that I didn’t pass, I felt defeated by my failed writing abilities.
With that said, I can now say that I have attained a greater grasp on how to become a writer of
higher quality. I do not feel as a failed writer anymore as I now understand that this class was of
importance for my writing skills. I won’t have trouble thinking of ways to start my essay anymore
as I have learned of ways to use my body paragraph to create my introduction and conclusion. I
have become a better writer and I am proud of the techniques and strategies that will follow me
throughout my writing experiences.

Draft Essay 1 to revised Essay 1

When rereading my paired essay for the portfolio, Undocumented Americans, I realized
as my first essay it needed more work than my other essay that had more learned strategies.
My introduction structure lacked coherence with my body paragraph points. There was no
organization in the intro as there were excessive points being brought up that were irrelevant. I
don’t even think my thesis statement would be considered a thesis statement with no
connections with hedges. My thesis did not specify in relation to my thesis analysis. With
revisions, I made my introduction concise which in turn helped my point stronger. I used my
professor's guide to first contextualize the sources, providing examples that can set a ground for
my argument, and adding the authors ideas that lead to a need for a thesis.
There were various parts in the essay where it was too overgeneralized and not enough
ideas of the author himself. I started off my first body paragraph with “In the tangled tapestry of
social connection, the exclusion of undocumented individuals entwines a sinister repetitive
pattern of back-handed discrimination and subjugation of low paid undocumented workers”
which was to generalized of my own idea that would’ve been good for my introduction but it’s felt
too uncomfortable as a body introduction. It didn’t align with my point of the paragraph and was
quite misleading. I would think the overgeneralization was due to my ideas of the book itself not
aligning with the author’s ideas. Thereby altering the author's ideas. To fix the problem, I added
more of the author's ideas and tweaked my own ideas to align with the authors. Additionally,
adding more evidence to support my ideas that were too overgeneralized and focus on major
points. My overall issue with my essays would be the overgeneralization and abstract ideas that
I generate from my analysis instead of the author's ideas. To fix this I added more of the authors'
claims and used their claim with my analysis.