Letter

To all of my fellow block 4 classmates,

I have not had this much fun in an English class in a long time. This year was filled with a lot of fun that we shared throughout the days and actually made this year bearable. With all of the songs, arguments, and laughter that we shared, we shared a combined group that bonded as the year has come to an end. I have honestly never felt more happy being in an English class and it was all thanks to you guys.
 This year, in the beginning, I did not know what to expect. As I glanced around the room, I took a mental survey on what to expect from all of the new kids, and I must say I was quite surprised. The kids this year were so smart and boosted our classes intellect level a lot. I will miss this class and hope that everyone does well in the future and strives to work their hardest. Thank you Block 4 English!

 This quarter, it seems like my performance started to taper down as we got further into the quarter. I feel like this has to do with my laziness and excitement for the summer to start. So far this quarter, I feel as though I really could have done better had I put in a lot more effort. I really dislike poetry and plays, which is what the quarter was more geared toward, therefore, I feel that that also had a direct impact on my performance in class.

 With general procedures, I really didn't do as well as I probably should have, now let's be fair, I wasn't terrible, but I should've done better. I was good at bringing in materials (most kids should be) but my downfall was not always turning in homework on time.I also checked email daily, and followed up with the teacher when it was needed.Usually I was cooperative, but some days I just had bad days and didn't treat Dr.D right. I think I contributed a lot to the classes discussions in a good way. I came prepared daily with relevant comments or questions that may have arose overnight. I didn't take notes as I am more of a visual or auditory learner. I was also good at listening to my peers and taking things from a perspective other than my own. I'l be honest, I did engage in side conversations a few times, but I was mostly on task.With my individual and group work I think i did excellent. I was very helpful to my groupmates and I worked honestly for myself. I think this was an overall good quarter.

Outside reading recap

This year I have been more welcome to reading anything that comes my way. I have been a lot more interested in Non- Fiction and post-colonial novels. This year I have enjoyed reading recommended books from my peers as many of them know what books are very interesting to read. I especially like the suggestions that I received from Jerry Dunbar and Justin Rogstad. I have progressed a lot as a reader this year and hope that it continues this way. This year I have also enjoyed stepping out of my comfort zone in reading, and Nervous Conditions was an immense help with that

Next year I want to start reading the books that I didn't have time for this year. I wanted to start reading the Hunger Games series this year, however I didn't have enough time for it. My friends Andrew and James McGaugh really enjoy the books and they said I will too, so I will read it. Next year I also hope that my teacher picks difficult books to read. I know we read The Great Gatsby, which is an awesome book. I don't like poetry though, so I want less of that. 

Macbeth

Due to the three witches telling me that fate will make me king, I must either allow fate to do it, or take matters into my own hands. My wife thinks that in order to reach this position I will have to go in a blood bath to the top. My wife and I have now both agreed that the only way for me to reach royalty is for me to kill Duncan to give up his position, however, for me it is not that simple. I am loyal to Duncan and I must not do this. Or maybe I can do it without looking, as if allowing my hands to act on their own. We have finally done the deed, and have been covering up pretty well, I even had to kill the guards in "rage" to cover up for my murder. Finally I have been crowned king.

9th grade writing assesment

 So far, 2011 and 2012 has been one of best years in writing. I have come to learn different techniques and styles of writing that have saved my papers throughout the year. In all of my papers I had some mistakes, but in general they were good. This year we wrote the literacy narrative, literacy analysis, global issues, profile narrative, and WrAP. As far as things go, I think I did fair on them, however it was the simple mistakes I made in every one that led me down.

First, let’s start with the first two that I wrote, the Literacy narrative and the profile narrative, to show how I progressed in just one paper. First off, the minor mistakes I had from my literacy narrative were things such as word duplication, comma splicing, and missing commas. These mistakes could have been easily avoided, so I paid them no mind. When I began to look at things such as ideas and organization, it allowed me to compensate these mistakes with the next paper. Problems that occurred with ideas and organization were paragraphing and easing into foreshadowing entirely too quickly.  I believe that the grade I got on the paper was relatively fair, but more than a good grade, I was able to put my newfound adjustments in the next paper which was the profile narrative. I did a lot better on this paper, besides a few minor mistakes in conventions and those. I had no mistakes as far as Ideas, voice, and organization go. Also, my reflection turned out to be quite accurate as I thought I had done well in those areas.

My next two papers were actually the hardest to write because of the content they expressed and because of the issue of formality in them. Both papers were supposed to be formal and were analytically-based. With my literacy analysis, I had a few major flaws that tore down my paper. My paper overall was average, but a lot of the problems that were prevalent were repeated mistakes that I had made before. I completely agree with Dr.D looking back at the paper that I had, my thesis was good, but I didn’t have much supporting evidence. My other flaw in this paper was citation, which had followed me to my Global issues paper. My main problems with both of these papers were to use citations and sources properly. I felt as though I needed to focus on those main points for the next research or analytical paper I had coming next.

Finally, I had to write the WrAp. I have never liked this paper since I started doing these in 6^th grade. My main reason for the distaste towards this paper was because you only have 2 days to do all of the pre-writing, drafting, and writing the final draft. I function better in writing when I have weeks before an assignment is due because I pre-plan a lot. Overall, I was not enthusiastic with my score for the paper, and I think that I would have done better had I had more time. Overall, I got the average score for most kids my age. I got a 23.5, and a 24 is actually pretty good, so I was close. Because I had only two days to work on it, my score had dropped dramatically. For all of the sections, I got 4’s (except for a 3.5 in support) because I didn’t have enough information to make a good enough essay. I was missing quite a bit of support and backing evidence to help my cause. And like I said, if I had more time, I would probably do a lot better.

Based on the feedback I have received throughout this year, I need to really focus on the simple mistakes that I have consistently been making in writing. Small things are the things that seem to be tearing me down. Also, I seem to have the grasp of the concept of the task at hand; however, the final product sometimes lacks all of these parts working in tandem.

From what I can gather, next year, I need to focus more on paying attention to the assignment as a whole and not picking out details that need to be done. I feel like if I can do that, my papers will sound better and I can finally start the individual pieces of word choice, voice, organization, sentence fluency, and ideas to work in harmony. So doing more prewriting and things of the sort should cover that bit. I also want to get the chance to be graded and checked by my peers. This year, I spent over an hour per person checking their papers to make sure they did a great job, whereas every time we had peer reviewing, my paper got read for maybe 5 minutes maximum. To me this is just messed up, and if I could get more help from peers, I would do better. Next year I also just need to simply try harder to write better. I know if I just try hard, I can make better papers.

English essay list of common mistakes

Comma splicing

Lack of detail in some areas, but a lot in others

Awkward spreading of paragraphs and sentences

Adding in extra and unnecessary sentences

Ambiguous pronouns

Word Choice

Song Analysis: Built to Fall by Trivium

http://www.metrolyrics.com/built-to-fall-lyrics-trivium.html

   The song I chose to analyze is called Built to Fall by Trivium. Trivium is a Metalcore band that had just recently released an album called In Waves. The reason why I chose this song is because the album In Waves was made to give listeners the opportune to interpret songs in their own way. The whole album adds a mix of lyrical and artistic poetic devices throughout every song, which is why I decided to analyze one song from the album called Built to Fall.

  The first line says "you are a cancer spreading it's wings" this line is actually a metaphor in that the person is being described as a cancer growing (hence"spreading it's wings). This next line reads "so selfishly unaware to the things", which contains rhyme with wings and things. Let me also say this before we continue, this poem has a story that it tells, so in this sense it is considered a ballad. The next stanza is also filled with very descriptive metaphorical writhing. " you start as a fissure, a crack in the skin, you become an ulcer permeating" This is once again a metaphor expressing the person "spreading". Actually, I'll just name off all of the parts that contain similes and metaphors in the song. The whole fourth stanza( the chorus) is a metaphor. And the sixth stanza is also a metaphor. I will state this, sometimes the things repeat (chorus) so I will not repeat them. Repetition joins in where the singer says "your built to fall several times and when he says "you've got you war against my head, push that button make it end". This song is an ode to someone that the writers are talking about, and in my interpretation, someone in their life that has passed. This song is filled with enjambment in most of the stanzas. In a nutshell, that is the song.

Free Post: Europe

This week, I have been packing and packing to spend my spring break with the band in Europe. I am going with a lot of my friends and fellow band mates, which I hope allows us to get closer and bond. I heard that's what happened to the kids that went to Rome. I have actually never been this stressed in my life, because packing for nine days is actually quite hard, putting everything you need and nothing you don't.

In going to Europe, I hope to learn a lot about European culture and see things that I would never see in the US. I think traveling might be hard with all of the instruments and all of the large checked luggage we have, but if it was too hard, they wouldn't trust us to go on the trip. The only problem that I have is that this is the last break and I would love to spend it with my family. Hopefully we all have a fun and safe trip together.