TOW #27: TOW Reflection

AP English Language and Composition has without a doubt improved my writing skills. This is most obvious in my weekly TOWs which I have been adding to all year. At the beginning of the year, I thought that these blog posts needed to have a specific formulaic structure. I had never had a blog before, which was part of the problem, but I also did not realize how much transitions and good flow affected a piece. It was not something I was fully aware of at that point in time. My first TOW post was about the war that was then occurring in Syria. I didn't know much about it, so it was interesting to learn, but over time I realized I could be so much more creative and branch out with my posts. They did not all have to be responding to the headlining political news story of the week. I believe that the introduction in this first post was fairly strong, but my conclusions were still weak and ineffective. Rather than ending with a creative statement, I formed a bland sentence depicting how the article related to me. It is obvious, to me at least, that my conclusions among other things improved dramatically in the second marking period. For my TOW from December 15, I responded to an article on a selfie that Obama had recently taken. This article had traces of politics, like the my first TOW, but it was more entertaining to right, and more based in America's cultural changes than government decisions. By this point in my writing, I had started to focus a lot more on my flow and style. This post was definitely a lot stronger than the previous one in that respect. Also, rather than concluding with my straightforward opinion on the article, I incorporated a societal view into my writing and connected my personal thoughts to the situation. So rather than saying that I liked the article, I instead brought it around to honoring the deceased, Nelson Mandela. In the third and most recent marking period, I believe that I wrote one of my best TOWs yet. It was my 20th TOW and I was writing it in response to my IRB: Eat, Pray, Love. This book was amazing, which probably helped me to write a stronger response, but it also included a lot of rhetoric on the narrator's part. I believe that that post displayed the improvement that took place throughout my junior year journey. I had a well- thought out thesis, which outlined my essay, allowing an organization that did not exist previously. This change drastically benefited the flow of my piece. My conclusion was also stronger and less forced than it had ever been. In all of my responses, I could definitely still improve the transitions between ideas, but that skill has come a long way since September. While tedious at times, I do think this regular writing exercise has forced me to address issues with my writing that I otherwise would not have. It has made my writing more effortless and I am grateful for that improvement.