Drafting a Personal Essay

     During class this week, we were given time to write up our personal essays. It took me a while to organize my thoughts and somehow create a way to make all of my stories tie in together. We got to take the day off on Wednesday to continue to write our essays from the comfort of our homes, which helped me focus on writing the essay more comfortably. 

    Although I have not completed the draft yet, I think I should be fine. I have a good idea as to which stories from my life I should use and in which order I should use them. My stories range from one experience I had as a young kid all the way to today as I am in college. Hopefully, that will make my essay more involving because it gives a sense of time passing, and the readers will get to know about three different stages in my life. 

    As the deadline for the draft is rapidly approaching, I am not too worried. I have faith that I will be able to complete the assignment on time, and I can hopefully revise it at a later date. 

Making an Essay Personal

     This week in class, we were introduced to our next project: the personal essay. We were given time to start the project in our last class of the week. However, the majority of my time was spent trying to think of what I wanted to write about. I have always struggled to decide what I want to write about in any essay I write since high school, and it is honestly irritating. Whenever I get an idea started, I feel like I find something better to write about. 

    I now have an idea of what I want to write about after having some extra days to think about it. It was hard to think of something personal to write stories about. Luckily, I have plenty of stories to tell that can relate to the theme I chose to write about. I will not directly say what my topic is because I want to save it for the writing, but hopefully I can make it work to fit the requirements of the personal essay. 

The Importance of Revision

    During class this week, we were given time to revise our rough drafts for our projects. It has been a while since I have written a rough draft, but making one made me remember that writing out our initial thoughts is important. We also participated in peer review, which is always nice because it's better to have another person's perspective on out work.

    Having multiple methods for revision helps everyone improve their work. The more people who look at your work the better. Every person is able to read your rough draft differently and suggest different things. At the end of it all, the rough draft will be much better than when it was originally made.

    Even though rough drafts are made to be revised, having people other than yourself proofread and make suggestions helps more than just simple revision. It makes it much easier to find the smaller mistakes in the rough draft, and all the time spent on revising will make the final draft all the better. 

The Theme of a Microtheme

     During class this week, we were asked to find something to write about for a project called a microtheme. I have never heard of a microtheme before, so I was interested in hearing the details about it. It was actually a lot harder then I thought it was going to be. 

    Apparently, a microtheme requires an issue, social trend, or topic that the writer is actively interested in. I am not very interested in any social trend, and I am not involved in any global issue so I had to think for a long time about what I wanted to do. The most important aspect of a microtheme is that the writer has to leave the issue open-ended, without showing noticeable bias in one way or another. This made it even harder to find a topic because I could not write about anything I already have a solidified opinion on. 

    After careful deliberation and talking to my family about what I should do, I still had no definite answer. I had to think of something, so I thought about problems like pollution. This led me to the topic of littering. I work at a park district, so I see litter all the time. It annoys me when I see garbage on the ground when there is a garbage can within a twenty foot area. This gave me enough of a reason to try and do the project on littering. I do not know how this project will turn out, but I should be able to get a nice product after having time to revise during future classes.