Dear Jane,
To start this letter off right, I just wanted to say that it has been my pleasure to be in your class. Although you did not see our faces throughout the semester, I hope you know you were the only class I looked forward to joining out of the other four I was taking. Thank you for your teachings Jane!
In the very first introductory essay, I wrote about my feelings on writing and that it wasn’t my strongest subject. Now that it is the end of the semester, I can say that I don’t hate writing but I still don’t enjoy it as much. Instead I found out that I like to do anything relating to expressing my work through art more, such as the visual essay. Your feedback on my first draft and my final draft for the visual essay actually influenced me to take interest in graphic designing and trying it for fun on Adobe Photoshop. It’s exciting that an English assignment for class led to that because your words of, “What a eye-catching creation! Your visual project illustrates your original argument — and it is thoughtfully and uniquely presented” in the first draft feedback, and “You’ve made noticeable improvements to this version — and connected your original argument to the illustration.” in the final draft feedback cause my confidence to boost as a creator and writer, and that’s a good discovery.
Aside from discovering a new hobby through an assignment, the process of critically thinking and writing occurred all through out the semester. From having to think outside of the box, expanding on our peers ideas, reading articles from writer’s we’ve never heard of, reading NYT articles, and listening to our guest speakers, there was a lot to gain from this. It’s always a learning experience even if we feel like we can’t learn more. These were some of they key resources besides Jane and Josh for our writing’s and our open minded thinking influencing our growth in the class. With class being remote and not being able to actually interact with everyone, it wasn’t terrible to accomplish what could’ve been done in person. We all helped each other when we needed it and built upon each other’s ideas to make our work better, such as peer reviews for our four essays. With the endless amount of resources given to us by Jane and Josh, it was utilized to the best of abilities to make our writing become stronger. With those resources in hand, music and my room played a key role this semester too when doing my work. Although I really like to do my work last minute to get my ideas flowing, listening to any one song from the start to finish of the essay makes me complete the assignment and focus better as well. That was an essential resource last and this semester because being in your room all day, need some sort of comfort to get through work.
As I mentioned before, I don’t particularly enjoy writing; probably because writing in “standard English” is out of my comfort zone and feels complicated to do so. My first language is not English but I was encouraged to read a lot growing up by my immigrant parents. From reading chapter books to now reading New York Times every other morning, it’s big step to doing better in my writing by experiencing how each writer articulates their thoughts to the audience. With Jane stressing to comprehend the use of rhetorical devices, finding a target audience, appealing to the reader’s with the use of tone, and keeping paragraphs short and concise, all throughout the semester, I’d say that I have improved with at least two of those things. Target audience and using rhetorical devices. Personally speaking, I don’t see my growth from the first assignment to the last. I know my weaknesses and my strengths in writing but I believe I made no significant improvement and it isn’t due to my professor’s teachings. It’s a personal challenge to reach that A+ for me in writing. I received and utilized most resources given but I believe not liking writing (unless I enjoy the assignment) and having difficulty due to my mother tongue makes it hard to get in the mindset of writing “appropriate essays” the way the professor wants it. I, however do believe, that I became a better analyzer of readings and grasping the concepts of what writer’s are trying to let out by being in an engaged class of students and an amazing professor who is passionate about what they teach.
I’m not too proud of two out of the four assignments I did this semester but I know I can improve for the future with the feedback I have gotten back and readings I’ve read. This semester wasn’t like last semesters English class because, although we had less work, it was quite stressful. Nonetheless I’ve received an amazing learning experience on the ways I can broaden my way of thinking and putting it into words, how writing can benefit me in life, proper way of writing, having an engaging and creative/open minded class to help me get through the assignments, and a wonderful teacher who cares for their students and their education.
I know I mentioned that I don’t believe I grew as a writer, but I do believe I grew as a person considering the topics we discussed and wrote about. Thank you Jane for making English classes a little more enjoyable than it has been these past school years. I hope to meet you and my other classmates one day, because it was great team work and development in writing.
Sincerely,
Dipti Talukder
