Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Ferra Kochanek
Professor Ditch
English 115
4 December 2017
Reflection of Improvements
When I entered my English 115 class, my knowledge of writing essays was very limited.
I have often viewed myself as lacking fundamental skills. During my time in the course,
however, I became more confident in my ability to write a meaningful, well-written essay. Part of
the reason I believe the improvement occured is because of the mandatory Learning Resource
Center visits I attended. The tutor was very helpful and I learned a lot about the stages of writing
an essay, as well as how to intertwine quotes. Regardless of the reason for improvement, the fact
Gender Roles and Videogames was my first essay in which a space needed to be
described in relation to gender. The space I chose was the gaming world and how females were
being suppressed and discouraged from the fraternity of gaming. My second essay, named
Radical Woman, was about the book The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, by
Annie Barrows and Mary Ann Shaffer. Once again, gender performances were analyzed in this
piece. However, the purpose of this essay was to show how two characters of the book either
conform or break free from the normal gender performances of the society, instead of my own
experience.
Kochanek 2
One of the ways I know I have improved as a writer is by the increase in quality of
transitions used. For example, in paragraph four of Gender Roles and Videogames, one of my
quotes had no introduction and was just pasted in. I wrote In the article, Becoming a Member
of Society, Aaron Devor describes attributes that correlate with men and women. These two
clusters of attributes are most commonly seen as a mirror images of one another with masculinity
usually characterized by dominance and aggression, and the femininity by passivity and
submission (39). These two sentences did not flow together as there was no intro for the quote.
However, in Radical Woman, every quote has an introduction which fits it best, instead of every
quote having the standard introduction of author, follow by article name, then the quote itself. On
page one of Radical Woman I use the sentence Our most beloved radicals are often the greatest
communicators, says Jason Del Gandio in his book Rhetoric for Radicals, which introduces
the quotes in a new way instead of the boring, standard way I said above. Moreover, some quotes
were weaved in without the need of an introduction as shown on the third page of Radical
Woman, also during this time, education for woman wasnt very common, due to the scientist
that claimed women could not be educated because their brains are too small (Hubbard).
These small changes created significant results, improving the quality and flow of the essay
tremendously.
One of the greatest improvements that happened for me was the use of correct syntax, or
the arrangement of words and phrases to create well-formed sentences. For example, my first
essay uses repeated words for starting sentences. On page three I say this was to start
consecutive sentences, which both sounds, and looks terrible. However the syntax of Radical
Woman is levels above the last one. Even when I repeat the same phrase, it works out and flows
Kochanek 3
well. For example, on page one I write, Elizabeth McKenna, a strong-willed woman, fought for
what she believed in during the WWII period and died for what she believed in, staying
composed and defiant till her last breath. This sentence is not only entertaining but is also
informative.
Last, but not least, my diction, or vocabulary, is definitely the largest improvement I have
had. Going into the second essay I felt an extraordinary amount of pressure, given the low score I
received from the previous essay. Knowing that I needed to improve the quality of my work, I
decided to up my game and aim for a higher score. The biggest correction that needed to be
made was my diction. Since high school, my english teachers have told me to stay away from
basic words like good or bad so as to give my writing a little more color. Despite their
critiques, in the first essay I used phrases like gaming is bad (2) and girls arent good enough
(3). These phrases do capture the essence of what my essay was saying, however, they leave the
reader feeling underwhelmed with the lack of substance in these words. In my second essay, I
used much more descriptive language in an attempt to draw attention to certain statements. Some
of these include using debunking this claim (3) instead of countering this claim and path of
Although I have came a long way, my journey through the English language does not end
here though. I know that there are many improvements that can still be made, but I know my
work has improved from Gender Roles in Video Games to Radical Woman because I improved
on my introductions, diction, and syntax. Gender Roles in Video Games to Radical Woman, albeit
my first college paper, received a C letter grade. Because of the amount of work I put in and
Radical Woman there were less correction marks since I a clear vision of what I wanted to write
and better evidence to support my thesis. Therefore, I can say my work has definitely improved