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Isabel Baggett

Justice 1A

English III

22 May 2019

Writing Portfolio Reflection

Over the course of the past eight months, through both in class and out of class essays

that I have written, I have grown both as a writer and a person. At first, I was thrown off by the

amount of writing we had to do, the short amount of time and the concepts we were writing

about-- I had never done any of it in my other English classes. But looking back now, honestly,

writing as much as we had to has helped me immensely. And although I didn’t come as far as I

had hoped, I know what I need to do next year in order to reach my goals.

First, the timed writings. To be honest, I absolutely despised these at the beginning of the

year and while they still aren’t my favorite, I would not have been as confident on the AP exam

without them. I had never written an essay in such a short amount of time and although I rarely

got the score I was aiming for, I did improve over the year. For example, starting out at the

beginning of the year, I wasn’t even sure what a rhetorical device was, but reflecting upon my

rhetorical analysis for my AP exam, I feel like I was able to construct an essay that (hopefully)

accurately analyzed the rhetorical devices used in the passage.

I chose two timed essays written six months a part. I chose these two specifically because

they were one of my first and last rhetorical essays that I wrote in class. Rhetorical analysis was

a very new topic to me coming in and that is very much reflected in my timed essay on Hazlitt’s

“On the Want of Money”. While typing this, the amount of times I wanted to change what I had
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written was plentiful, but then comparing it to my essay on Albright’s commencement speech,

that number went down significantly. I then rewrote my Albright speech to show how far I had

come since the end of second quarter until now. I chose that instead of the Hazlitt essay because

I wanted to correct the mistakes that I had made.

Reflecting specifically on the scores I received, I did not end as strong as I had hoped. I

started off rocky, improved and then sort of sat on a 6 for a while until the last essay where I got

a 5. I was surprised because I had written so many essays like the synthesis one in AP Seminar.

However, as I look back at it I am coming to understand that I typically pick a side, insert a quote

every once in a while and call it a day. Because it felt so much easier than others, I didn’t have to

memorize any words or read any books, I didn’t try as hard and I regret that now. Especially on

the AP exam, I rushed through what I wanted to say and didn’t go very deep into the claims that

I made. I think because of the time constraint, I try to go as fast as I can. I know that I can write

an essay now in 40 minutes so I need to slow down and take time to fully respond to the prompt.

With my out of class essays, I am both proud and disappointed in myself. I loved every

essay that I wrote. I had so much fun finding my voice and writing about things that are

important to me. For example, my first essay was written about me and my sexuality. Then for

my last, I was able to use my experience to relate to an argument much broader than that. The

freedom of the prompts gave me the space I needed to write about things that I cared about over

the course of this year. However, I stayed on the same topic the whole year and so I hope that

next year I will broaden my horizons and write about things that I am uncomfortable with. Yes, I

think someone needs to write about queer issues, but I know that in order to be a good,

well-rounded writer, I have to be able to write and research and analyze other topics. I need to
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get out of my comfort zone. I think this year was a good year to focus on myself and my voice as

a writer, and I think this class has prepared me to take on bigger challenges next year.

I learned a lot about myself as a writer. I tend to write a certain way. I tend to use short

sentences to sound more dramatic. More insightful. While I don’t think my habits of writing

(such as the one mentioned before) have changed much, hopefully, the way I respond and

analyze prompts has. And even if I didn’t, I am equipped with the knowledge and tools for next

year. This class was incredibly challenging, more challenging than any of my other English

classes before. But I think I got out of it what I put in, and as difficult as it was, I needed that

push in an English class. I learned so much this year and I am excited to see what next year has

in store for me.