Dear Ms. Langley,
As an English student, these first few weeks have been engaging, informative, as well as progressive for me. The grade that I gave myself during our self-evaluation was 95. I am proud of myself as I believe that I have exemplified achievement as I have put meaningful thought and effort into the work that I have turned in these past few weeks. I feel that I have challenged myself more and am working harder to become a better reader and writer.
As a reader, I feel that I have grown stronger, but I also feel that this is the area that I can improve on in the future. I believe that it is important to recognize my strongest points and my weakest both for you as well as myself, to identify how I can become a more advanced student in general. Before the start of the first six weeks, I was not strong in the area of reading as I only occasionally picked up a book. I found it difficult to find time to incorporate reading into my schedule. I also struggled with picking a book that I enjoyed and would keep my interest. During these six weeks, I chose a book that I found interesting. The book was Something Like Hope by Shawn Goodman, and I made personal connections to it as I read. I deeply thought about the book and analyzed the style of writing that the author used. I found more time to read as I truly tried to spend 15 minutes every day before school started on reading. This is why I gave myself a 95 rather than a 100 because although my goal was to read every day, I did not accomplish that but I did get further than I thought I would. I read in the mornings on the days that I did not have band class, and surprised myself as I found that I was enjoying and becoming more engaged in my book, leading to the formation of positive associations with reading.
As a writer, I felt very confident in this area and feel that my knowledge of writing has expanded. I believe that the pieces that I wrote, such as my assertion, were strong, and well constructed. When writing, I referred back to the rubric to make sure that my piece could be as powerful and supportive as I could possibly make it. I enjoy writing as I find it to be a way to express myself. When combining reading and writing, for example, in the text we were given to read and annotate, I read deeply and put precision into my analysis. My notes and annotations portrayed deep thinking and criticism of the text. In addition to this, I use my notebook to take notes on the in-class notes and discussions that we have. When I see examples of styles of writing that I find interesting, I place them within my notebook to refer back to in case I want to try them in a literary piece. Some challenges that I have faced in terms of writing include time management and learning to plan successfully before writing as well as keeping track of how long some pieces take me to write. I need to address this in order to prepare for timed pieces that we will have in the future.
My learning reflects my growth positively in the areas that I set for myself within my Learning Goals and Behaviors sheet. My learning has allowed me to reach many of the goals I had set for myself on various topics. On the topic of critical thinking, my goal was set to contribute to discussions as well as address and build on the ideas of others. I believe that my learning positively reflected these goals as I reach them both during full class and breakout room discussions. In the area of being an effective student, my goals included being more organized with the scheduling and management of assignments. I improved in this area although it consisted of trial and error. In the beginning, to manage my schedule, I originally downloaded an app to plan and be more persistent with assignments, but I discovered that this did not work for me. In response to this, rather than give up and not have a plan at all, I discovered that physically writing out my schedule was most effective for me. I now write out and organize each of my classes along with the assignments due for them individually, and this contributed to me reaching my goal of becoming a more organized student and turning my assignments in on time.
My learning reflects how I have demonstrated original thinking about complex ideas positively as well, and with a sign of increase. I now take complex ideas and push myself to truly think about them and understand them. If I do not understand something, rather than keep it to myself, I project and announce my opinion by asking questions to either you or my peers in order to gain a better understanding of something that I am struggling with. These six weeks, I have challenged myself to use more elaborate analysis and apply it to complex ideas. I am proud of myself for the fact that my learning reflects that I do not give up when I come across a complex idea, instead, I acknowledge and think through it. This reflection of learning can be seen through my annotations on the mentor text that we are given as well as through the responsive contributions I make in-class to either a peer or to you when we are given a question to respond to or something to reflect and comment on.
As I develop and practice my habits as a student so far, I am gaining more understanding and improving within and outside of each class. I am becoming a more responsible student as not only myself but also my fellow cohort peers hold my accountable and responsible for the work that we must have completed and ready to share and discuss in class. I believe that relationship building has been going well, especially with my cohort. Between us, we each depend on each other and are able to rely on each other for support, no matter if it is on the understanding of a mentor text, or if it is to check over and share our work with each other for feedback. Amongst my class in general, I feel that an open relationship is formed as I do my best to present myself is an outgoing and open person that is willing to help. Through these first six weeks, some of my peers have contacted me for help or asked questions and we mutually help each other as we give and receive feedback to support and make our work stronger. I am glad that these relationships have been formed through this class. The last thing I want to focus on is my reflection. When reflecting, I have become better at more carefully analyzing my work, referring back to the provided rubrics (if applicable), and attempting to produce the best version of my work that there could be. When reflecting mentally wise on things such as discussions and topics, I do my best to listen to others, deeply reflect, and build off of what has been shared. I recognize the importance of reflecting and how it can make a difference in the work produced, as well as during the thought process.
I would like the next six weeks to be even better than these previous ones. I want to be able to become a better reader, writer, and English student in general. I will be sure to achieve this and build on to my previous goals by applying more pressure in finding the time to read and really being sure that I am doing my best to make time for it. I will also continue to find ways to better manage my time by asking peers about their strategies and seeing how I may be able to incorporate them into mine. Lastly, I would like to thank you, Ms. Langley, for teaching us and for working with us to better us as students. These six weeks have allowed me to exemplify and express my identity as what I believe is a strong English student that is an efficient writer and a student that can become an even better reader. I enjoy learning and realize that there are areas that I can definitely improve on and that there will always be room for improvement.
Thank you,
SaNaya White
SaNaya's Poetry Blog 