Gerardo Garcia.
English 101.
- How does the author feel about her writing abilities?
Shannon Nichols: a student at Wright State University, describing her experience when she was in High school taking the standardized writing proficiency test that every student need to take in order to graduate in Ohio.
At the beginning, Shannon told us how she had great strength at writing, and math. But, after her first time taking the proficiency test of Ohio, and failed, she started to Doubt about herself. Nevertheless, she didn’t give up. She got over it and decide to work more to pass the test in the next time. She didn’t pass again. By this time, she has felt very disappointed with herself, and a feeling of failure. She also felt she has disappointed her family. All she needed in those two trials, was half of a point to pass. After all of that, she started to quit trying hard and stopped taking English class seriously. In the third trial, she did pass the test but, the excitement and the love of writing was not the same. After all, she started to hate writing and doubt of any new ideas she has it they were worthy to write about or not. Even though she was strong in other areas like math, one mistake can lead us to think we are not that good at all as we think we are, and as a result, it led us to quit trying.
2.Has there been a time in your life when you doubted your abilities as a writer or in general? Explain.
There have been a few times were I had doubt about my abilities in acting. For example, I used to have classes on Saturdays and that class was movement. I started to doubt about my abilities when at like in the middle of the semester, the professor started to put for like 20 minutes music without voice (I am not sure how to describe them). What I have or supposed to do was let my body be guided with the music. It was my first time doing that, so at the beginning was hard but not impossible. I started to doubt when I saw everyone and they were doing big movement (even the teacher), and I didn’t move like that because in my mind (for me) was not like a “natural movement”. I remember asking myself if I have the abilities to be an “actor”. and if so, what were they? I passed that class, but it made me doubt a few times. Till this day, (I learned at least some good stuff) I ask if I get back to that class, will I understand it better than before or I’ll be as the first time I was there.
3. How do you feel about your writing abilities?
I feel like I have good writing abilities but I still making mistakes. I guess creating kind of long stories, checking and questioning where I should need to put a coma, or a point make me have a good writing ability. I consider myself as an average writing person for now.
4. How does the author feel about standardized tests?
After reading her essay, I would infer that she must feel like standardized essay should at least (in the state of Ohio) tell the students where they have done / made their mistake so for the next time they could be more aware of that, and not making the same mistake again. In the essay, at the beginning of the last paragraph she wrote: “after failing the test for the first time, I began to hate writing, and I started to doubt myself. I doubted my ability and the ideas I wrote about.” I can relate that evidence to a few experiences that I have seen, and are that when made a mistake (or a few of them) in the class, or in a job; we start to convince ourself that we cannot make it. We start to give more important to the mistake we had made than how we can prevent that to happen again. Little by little, we start to give up even if we don’t want to. When I used to procrastinate in high school, I always used to tell myself, “Next semester I’ll get a 90, so my name could be called and gain a medal.” And the next semester came, and I end up with an 80 or less as an average. Why? Because at the beginning I start motivated, but as time pass by; I started to loss that motivation and as a result, I convince myself that it is a lot of work to do to get a 90, and without noticing, I was demotivating myself.
