Essay 4 – Reflection

Introduction

As a student in English Composition, you will often be asked to reflect. To reflect means to think thoughtfully about a given topic. Some instructors will ask you to reflect on your writing process for a certain essay; others will ask you to think about your experience of reading a text; still others will ask you to examine some aspect of your life. To reflect isn’t the same as to narrate, which means to tell a story. When you reflect, you explore and analyze a certain situation within your life. You don’t explain every step in chronological order; you choose certain “pieces” or “threads” of an experience or situation and look at only these.Exploration like this often leads to connecting themes or ideas within the situation. You won’t necessarily know the connections when you start to brainstorm: often, they are surprises that only come to light through careful reflection and consideration. Thoughtful reflection can help you in any aspect of your life.

The Assignment

This assignment will be a bit different from our past assignments for the following reasons:

Format:

First, the format will not be an actual essay. Instead, this composition will be in the form of a letter. It will begin with “Dear XXX,” and it should end with some kind of signoff (“Sincerely, XXX” or “Good luck, XXX” etc.).

Audience:

You will be writing this letter to yourself. Not the person you are today, but the person you were when you started to take Developmental English classes. This might be the “you” at the beginning of this quarter if Eng 99 is your first Developmental English class. If you started with Eng 95/96 or Eng 97/98, however, you might want to write to the person you were in January, in September, or last Spring (whenever you started).

Purpose:

The purpose of this letter is to give the “younger” you some good advice as s/he prepares for the first days of Developmental English class. You should think of yourself as a mentor, or coach, who is able to go back in time and, with the advantage of hindsight, help out your younger self as s/he starts on this journey in English.

We will look at some examples of essays that fulfill this assignment. We will also look at some reflective essays (not letters) that might give you ideas.

This letter is an adaptation of what is called a “literacy narrative.” (Some of you might study literacy narratives in Eng 101). The literacy narrative tells the story of your life as a writer who is experiencing college. Rather than addressing your letter to a vague, academic audience, I want you to personalize it and address it to a younger, less experienced, perhaps frightened, perhaps excited, you. Take the role of mentor; the experienced you who is familiar with English 99, and college life at North, can help the inexperienced you of the past enormously. Reflect on what you’ve learned, and share it. Your letter doesn’t have to begin and end with this class, but this class and your experiences in it should play a large part.

Format:

  • As always, your essay/letter must be typed in a standard 12-point font, with one-inch margins, double-spaced, and this time it should be 3 - 4 pages in length.
  • Papers that do not meet the minimum (three FULL pages) will lose one letter grade.
  • MLA format isn’t required for this assignment because of the letter format.

Requirements and Due Dates:

  • In-class peer reviewon Monday, June 7 is worth 10% of your grade on this paper. I will be taking attendance on this day, and that is how you will receive your points. Do not come to peer review without your paper: it’s your ticket in. If you don’t have a paper, you will be asked to leave and you will lose 10% of the points for the final draft.
  • In-class Work Day on Monday, June 14. On this day, you can bring your letter and work on it. I will be here to advise, answer questions, etc. I will not be able to read entire reflections on that day – I need to divide my time amongst all students. If the majority of the class would prefer to work in a computer lab, I can see if that’s possible.
  • Final draft due on Tuesday, June 15. You will ONLY turn in your reflection. Although we will have peer review for this essay, you won’t turn in the peer response form or your first draft. You will not use a folder, either. You will simply turn in your letter, which begins with “Dear XXX” and ends with a signature.
  • The final exam period for this class is 10:30 – 12:30 on Friday, June 18. We will NOT have class/a final exam at this time. During these hours, I will be in my office and available to you. I will have your letters graded, I will know your final grades, and I will have your final placement forms (white, not green) completed. Any students who don’t come to my office during these times will be able to pick up their essays/placement forms in the Humanities office (IB, 2nd floor) after 12:30. I will not be teaching in the summer, so at 12:31 I will probably disappear!

Evaluation Criteria:

  • Content and Thesis (40%): Although this letter does not need an explicit thesis statement, it does need to have an implicit main idea that guides/shapes the whole essay. Additionally, the content of the letter needs to be specific and discussed with concrete and vivid detail. Lastly, thoughtfulness is of supreme importance in this kind of assignment. If you simply skim the surface and list tasks, you’re missing the point.
  • Organization (15%): This is the overall organization (the body paragraphs should have some kind of arc, with the most important information coming just before the concluding paragraph) as well as paragraph-level organization (PIE). Your work on PIE will really help you here.
  • Expression (20%): This category ranges from varied sentence structure to vocabulary that is unique and precise to the correct tone. Because you are writing to yourself, your tone will be slightly different than if you were writing a formal, academic essay. However, please remember that you are writing a college assignment, so no slang or bad language.
  • Mechanics & Usage (25%): This covers basic grammar, word forms, vocabulary choices, punctuation, spelling, etc.

Final Notes:

  • This assignment invites you to be creative as you reflect, and requires that you be thoughtful as you advise. Even though this is a letter, you must organize it in a way that shows an awareness of the structure and progression of the letter. You also need to write body paragraphs that are unified (about one topic). PIE can help you enormously with this. Disconnected, random thoughts are not an acceptable way to write this letter. Outline the letter before you begin, and think about what kind of structure will best serve you. You want to build to your most important point, so think for a while about what that might be.
  • Please remember to proofread your essay.
  • I urge you to take a draft to The Loft before turning in the final draft.