Personal Reflection

Reminiscing About A Great Class !!!! 

This semester English 102 has brought me a tremendous amount of knowledge in a variety of areas. These include knowledge about literature, writing and critical thinking. Taking this class played a major role in broadening my horizon. Reading novels is something that I absolutely find entertaining. I appreciate reading and analyzing characters in different novels, because each of them have a different story to tell and their experiences vary. Reading books has not only been my hobby, but it has also helped me grow as a thinker, writer and speaker. I am able to examine characters and form my own analysis and talk about them in-depth. I think my ability to do this efficiently helped me immensely when I took English 102.

As a writer I believe that I have improved drastically. I feel my confidence level increasing every time I submit my writing assignments. Even though it caused me stress, I used to look forward to every time we had a published writing or one of the two important papers because that meant a lot to me. One, I had to deeply think about what I wanted to express in my work. Two, I got to go over the literary piece and analyze the characters and pick interesting quotes to personify my point of view. Though it looked and felt complicated, it was not complex because once I started to type away my thoughts, the writing flowed and before I knew it I was finished writing. The one thing that was frustrating at times was that when I was writing, I felt that I wanted to talk about so many different ideas in different angles that I could not find places where those details would be appropriate. But sometimes I would submit my work and then I would have ideas that I could have mentioned, but it was too late to do so. I would feel excited to get my rubric back for my assignments, because I love the feedback and comments I received from Professor Brady. It helped me develop faith in the work I handed in, and it gave me reassurance that I was doing well. Overall, I realized that my writing became stronger, stylish and developed and it also proved I was more comfortable. Even though there were many things I learned in this class, something that stood out to me was a quote from the great Greek writer, Sophocles. He stated, “The greatest griefs are those we cause ourselves.” This was a very impactful statement that I learned, because I believe that this is true in our everyday life situations. As humans we find ways to blame others for problems that arise so that we can feel better, but we never think of it as our difficulties being caused by the actions that we make. Another lesson that I enjoyed was talking about the characters in one of my favorite plays, A Streetcar Named Desire. Reading this play for the second time has given me a newer analysis of the characters and I was able to gain a more in-depth understanding.  

Currently, as a writer and thinker I believe I am doing swell, but there is always room for development. But in five years I hope to make immense progress as a writer, thinker and reader. In addition to this, I also want to read most of the books that are in my book list. This semester, English has been a great class and I am a bit upset that it is over, but I gained knowledge that I hope to implement in the outside world. I am a very hard-working student and English has taught me that I should be more brave, positive and have self-confidence in my work.