The first card marking was a wake up call for me. I realized my assignments and work were no longer going to cut it. If I don’t work harder, I will not succeed. It was almost like I was pushed into a pool and I could either work to stay afloat and adjust to the cold water or I could do the opposite and let myself sink. The latter was not an option, and I knew it. The first card marking for me was all about adjusting.
One thing about adjusting is you need strategy. After my revelation, I was eager to find out ways to help me succeed. A strategy I was taught much earlier in life is chunking and analyzing sections of the text. It is a basic strategy everyone is taught. But within the first 6 weeks of high school my take on chunking and analyzing text got a complete makeover. I was looking critically into text and zooming in on ideas and concepts like never before. It’s almost crazy looking back and thinking, “How was I not doing this before?”
With my adjusted and improved strategy, I was ready to take on close and critical reading. I was feeling
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During the first card marking I became conscious of the fact I am no longer being forced to think a certain way. One of my biggest adjustments has been the freedom to express ideas in ways I haven’t had the ability to before. It has always been do it this way or don’t do it at all, but not anymore. This came to me with one of our first assignments, the “I am From” poem. I was encouraged to develop imagery and descriptive language in unconventional ways. This assignment required me to unlock a level of thoughtfulness I have never had to before. The “I am From” poem is the first literary assignment I’ve been proud of in a while. I knew what I wanted to say and was given the tools to do so. That assignment has not only improved my writing skills but also helped me get in touch with a part of me I haven’t talked to in a minute. It has been my favorite assignment in the first card