Ravago, Joseph

HL English Y2

Casady

2019 May 23

Reflection Essay

Most Proud Of?

Although I’m proud of most of the work I have produced throughout my four years

at Great Oak, this year’s sticks out the most as the work that I believe I have both done

the best on and have been the most confident about. Particularly within this year, it has

been my “Written Commentary Poetry” piece that I’m the proudest of because I was

able to utilize all of the tools that I have learned throughout my 4 years and craft an

essay that received a score that I believe accurately reflects my abilities as a writer. My

scores haven’t been particularly bad by any means; however, I was always slightly

disappointed as I had felt like I could do more; do better on my work if I had thought a

little more critically or been able to craft my essay much better with a few added

minutes. This essay was by far my best throughout both years of IB English and I think

that this was the case because of the care that I put into the “how?” aspect of my essay.

I often have struggled with adding that additional “how?” aspect into my pieces, so I

focused on this majorly throughout my entire essay. That’s why I think I was especially

successful with this piece because the added focus created an easier pathway to a

deeper analysis of the piece. So, in the end, my entire piece was enhanced with a

simple focus on an aspect that I was weaker at throughout my other earlier essays.

Growth Over Four Years?

 Over the four years I have grown significantly upon a closer look at my grade

book from freshman year. My knowledge score has improved greatly because of the

new strategies that were introduced this year. Particularly within knowledge, I think that

the “how?” and “why?” aspects of my essays improved greatly because of my focus on

doing so increased with my added sophistication in education. My freshman year, I was

very surface level with my analysis and I wasn’t able to go beyond very basic analysis.

For example, I would just talk about what the author was presenting to the audience

rather than thinking about it for myself. This led to the improvement of knowledge score

overall due to the fact that my analysis was simply much more in-depth as I began to

think beyond simple text and now expand into something that I can distinguish the

purpose for both the reader and the text.

Literary response has also improved; however, it hasn’t improved as drastically

as I would’ve liked. That being said, I have still improved within my literary response as

well. This can be attributed to my expanded knowledge on devices that are present

within pieces. I no longer have to simply be focused on the base ideas such as simile or

metaphor, but I am able to go beyond and use more stylistic features to help shape my

knowledge. Furthermore, my freshman year papers were always focused around one to

three devices; however, I began to use the devices I found with one another rather than

exclusively. My literary response became focused around how the devices worked with

one another throughout the whole piece; how one enhances the other throughout the

entire work rather than just in a given situation.

My presentation has been something that I have only slightly improved with it

over time. Despite only these minor improvements, I’m proud of what I have been able
to do with my increased skills. The scores have remained relatively the same; however,

I feel as though my structure has improved overall. I had more of a direction with each

essay that I wrote and there wasn’t as much random rambling that had no connection to

my overall claim. I believe this is why I still had the minor improvement that I did as it

overall added to my ability to focus on the prompt given to me. Also, ditching the “two-

chunk” paragraph structure I previously followed in favor for a more cohesive multi-

paragraph essay allowed me to improve my structure as well.

Language is another aspect of my essays that has only minorly improved in

relation to the increased level of academia I’ve enrolled in. In relation to my earlier

works, my language is much more sophisticated and allows for a much more eloquent

flow of my dialect. The increased language has allowed for my score in the category to

increase; however, what has prevented my score from substantially increasing is the

lack of flow in relation to my syntax. I haven’t increased my syntax to the same level as

my knowledge has increased, so my score has only increased slightly. That being said,

my syntax is still improved to fit much more smoothly and along the lines of what I would

consider to be at least proficient with the IB standards set before me.

Opportunity for Growth?

I believe that both my presentation and language can improve greatly as they are

my two weakest categories within English. To begin, my presentation is something that

has struggled greatly due to my natural tendency to begin writing without the use of an

outline beforehand. This has led to my essays to be much less organized that I would’ve

liked them to be as I had to think on the spot in order to make my essays be much more
coherent and appear to have a proper flow. I believe that the IB assessment was the

most organized I have been for an essay due to the outline I made, so by continuing this

practice I believe my presentation will also be able to improve. My language will also be

able to improve as well because the flow will feel much more natural. The need to use

choppy, unneeded language will now be gone and the ability for my work to feel natural

will now be present. Furthermore, I think as the rigor of what I read increases, my

vocabulary increases as well due to the familiarity with it. Given that, I think that I need

to continue to look at higher level academic pieces while also reading some more books

during my free time (as I have been lacking with that) would aid my vocabulary and

syntax to be crafted to be impactful for my pieces rather than something that restricts or

hinders it.

“The Next Step”

I believe Great Oak, but specifically the IB program has helped me the most out

in terms of the future. Going onto a college such as Georgetown with such a rigorous

academic system, I feel like the tools for writing essays within the IB program will serve

me well when writing an essay for my college classes as well. Furthermore, the time

that it takes me to craft these essays will allow me to not feel as swamped with the work

from all my classes I have to manage in comparison to others within my classes. More

importantly, I think that the collaborative nature of the IB program will help me in college

as well because I learn best with combining ideas with others. Being in DC, I will run

into people with polar opposite ideals in comparison to me, so the ability to still work

effectively with them will be essential. Without the lessons that I’ve been taught through
my low points during my time at Great Oak, I don’t think I would be able to deal with the

stress without breaking down and giving up as Great Oak has made me more strong-

minded and willed.