For the past two years, English class has been a great learning experience. I’ve learned new things and have become a better writer than I was before. This blog post will demonstrate how I’ve grown as a student over these two years. In 7th grade I did the Performance Task Essay that I will be using as my first artifact. This assignment shows the type of writer I was in 7th grade. I was messy and unclear at times. In 8th grade I did a blog post called, “The Lesson of the Moth.” This blog post shows how I’ve developed as a writer since 7th grade. The Performance Task Essay compared to the blog post is a major improvement as a student writer.

To start off, for my 7th grade Performance Task Essay, I was supposed to give my opinion on whether tap water is better than bottled water or vice versa. It was a six paragraph essay. I annotated the essay I wrote one year ago to show how I’ve grown from 7th to 8th grade. In the first paragraph, my introduction, I was supposed to state my claim with whether tap water or bottled water is better. The reader wasn’t able to figure what side I was on until probably the second or third paragraph. Your claim should be stated in the introduction to let the reader know what you’ll be talking about. This made my introduction incomplete and unclear. In the third paragraph, I was supposed to state evidence from the texts to support my claim. I wasn’t able to correctly site my sources. I had forgotten to state the name of the source and forgot the quotation marks. I’ve learned if you forget quotation marks, that could count as plagiarism. The transitions I used also didn’t connect with my ideas. It didn’t seem to flow. In my fifth paragraph I was able to write two counterarguments and rebuttals. Out of my entire essay I was able to make zero to three grammar, punctuation, and capitalization mistakes.
This assignment shows me being a critical and creative thinker because I was able to make connections and think at a high level to write this persuasive essay.

In 8th grade I did a blog post called, “Lesson of the Moth”. I read a poem about a moth and a cockroach seeking to different things out of life. The moth wanted to have an exciting life and didn’t care if that meant cutting his life short. The cockroach was cautious in life and did the same thing everyday because he wanted to live forever. So he had a boring life. I was required to write about what I thought about the two differences in the way these two insects thought about their life. In the first paragraph, I was able to state the theme and cite evidence from the poem correctly. I also had a piece of evidence cited correctly in the second paragraph. In my 7th grade essay I had trouble doing either of those correctly. In the third paragraph, I was able to write a complete conclusion during this year. in my 7th grade essays, i would seem to forget to include all three points in my conclusions. By completing this assignment, it shows me how to be a critical and creative thinker because I was able to make connections about how I felt with both the moth and the cockroach’s point of view.

To conclude, from 7th to 8th grade I have really grown as a writer. I am able to write a complete conclusion, correctly site evidence, make zero to three grammar, punctuation, and capitalization mistakes, and state my claim in the introduction. I still make a couple mistakes that I need to improve such as, including transitions and not having run on sentences. I can avoid those errors by reminding myself when I’m writing to fix those things and reviewing my writing before I turn it in. Plus, the more you write the better you get at being a writer. If I continue to do this I will be more prepared for high school english.