Devin Perea

Professor Beadle

ESW113A

31 July 2019

My Progression

The difference in writing an essay in high school and college is based on your foundation

and structure. My experience in high school of writing an essay is providing as much

information, evidence, and supporting details but with a weak and broad thesis. Essentially my

high school essays have consisted of rambling sentences with lack of context and unnecessary

information. Writing essays were excruciating because I had no outline or idea on how to write

about my topic, all my essays were turned in on last minute notice and were rushed.

Procrastination is my worst habit especially when I have no idea how to tackle a subject for my

assignments, this bad habit kept with me when I wrote all my essays. Most of my high school

essays were detrimental and crucial to my overall grade in my English class, meaning if I did

well on my essay, my grade will partially go up or if I did poorly my grade will significantly

drop.

However, Early Start Writing 113A has improved my writing skills drastically. This

course has taught me how to use correct supporting evidence, how to interpret text from articles

or books, how to include counter arguments and refutations to strengthen my essays, using

extensive vocabulary, and most importantly how to strengthen my thesis and use it as a roadmap

for my essays. Without this course, my first upcoming semester at CSUN will have me

unprepared and I would fall behind in my writing class. Although my high school writing course
taught me the basic format of writing an essay, ESW113A provided me the missing details and

the key ideas on how to perfect an essay. Beforehand, I would write essays on the top of my head

and typed whatever came into my head first. Now I think critically and write many ideas on my

outlines and proposals to guide me to writing an easier and clearer essay.

Furthermore, writing essays in ESW113A has definitely sharpen my ideas so I could get

my point across. In high school, I used to write lots of useless information in my essays and

never used to get into the details right away. I would stall my useful information because I would

lack supporting detail and evidence. I would sort of ignore the prompt given to me by my teacher

because the topic given to me would be boring and challenging and my thesis would be very

weak and broad. The writing process in general would be excruciating and I made it harder than

it should be. But, a very important lesson and trick I learned in my S.I. class for ESW113A is to

write about an entertaining topic that draws the writers and readers attention. S.I. class brought to

my realization that if I write about something I like, the writing process will become easier for

yourself and your writing would become entertaining to your audience. Another valuable lesson I

learned, is to give yourself a reason to write! If you don’t like what you’re writing, then why

should your audience like what they’re reading.

In conclusion, ESW113A and S.I. class have helped me improved as a writer and most

importantly a student. My improved writing is credited to ESW113A, the course gave me a

broader perspective of writing and reading. It helped me interpret text that I’m reading and to

grasp the full meaning of it, to use evidence effectively, and to make my main ideas clearer. On

the other hand, S.I. class made me a better student and taught me something as an individual, if

you don’t like what you’re writing then write something that you’ll entertain yourself and your
audience that corresponds to your topic. S.I. class reminded me to do what you love and not what

you don’t want to do, essentially do something for a reason and with a purpose.