English class has been quite rough these past two school years, but nonetheless a challenge I have seemingly overcame. I am writing this blog post because in the FLAGS program there is an event we do each year called, Portfolio Night. During this event we are to present to a small group of people what we have learned and what we have improved on in our classes. We are supposed to choose two different assignments and explain the differences in our ability then to our ability now.

The assignment I chose from 7th grade year was an argumentative essay titled ” tap water vs. bottled water.” We were prompted to write an essay about if tap water is better than bottled water and vice versa. Although I received a fairly good grade on this assignment, there were many errors made that I wish I could take back. The first error I made was my choice of words, the words I chose to use for this assignment were atrocious and unprofessional. There was also some subjects I had not clarified. For example, the NRDC was an abbreviation that I did not clarify; I don’t even know what it stands for anymore. The next error I made was a spelling mistake. Although I only did this once, it still effects the writer’s score. The last and most prominent mistake made throughout this essay was my incorrect use of citations. I would not capitalize them, nor place them correctly within a sentence. I am glad these mistakes have been improved since then, and are continuing to improve. One FLAGS outcome that was associated with this essay was Effective communicator because we had to organize a way to present our argument and have significant evidence to prove our statement.

The assignment I chose for my 8th grade year was the “Issues addressed in the SOTU.” In this assignment the class was to watch the president’s State of The Union speech and answer questions about it explaining how what the president did effected our community or the people around us. As you can see by the annotations I did, this assignment involved less writing than the assignment from 7th grade. This doesn’t mean I did not improve though; in this assignment I explained my views in a clear and understandable manner. Compared to the essay I did before, my skills of correct punctuation, capitalization, and most importantly clarification have improved. Another important improvement was my choice of words, before my writing seemed very unprofessional but has gotten better overtime. One FLAGS learning outcome I connected to this assignment was Global and Civic minded. This is because I gained knowledge of what has changed within my country, good and bad.

Overall, between 7th and 8th grade my writing has actually improved. I know this because of my grades improving and the amount of time and effort put into my writing. As a writer, I know there are many weaknesses in my writing, for example, organization, grammar, and punctuation. The only way for me to improve these things is to continue writing to my best ability. Even if it may seem difficult it will get easier the more I try.