Alvarez 1

Briana Alvarez
Professor Ditch
English 113A
08 December 2015
Kaizen
In my senior of high school, my English class didnt prepare me for college level writing.
In my class, I was just assigned to write summaries on the books we read together as a class. I
have always had poor writing skills which made me nervous when I started college. I feared that
I would not be able to write a college-level essay when the time came around. Thus, I didnt
know what to expect on the first day of my English 113A class. I took early start during the
summer and thought maybe it was a glimpse of how college work would be. However, I was
completely wrong because the work was far more intense than I have encountered in my life.
Unlike last year where I wrote summaries all the time; in this course I worked on different types
of writing. First I worked on a rhetorical essay and from there I worked on argumentative essays.
As, I continued the course in the semester, I have practiced Kaizen. Kaizen is a Japanese word
that means continuous improvement. My progression one and two essays are examples on how I
practiced Kaizen and grew as a writer from my first essay to the second.
In my progression one essay, I had a few of smaller assignments that helped me develop
my final essay. One of the assignments for progression one is analyzing articles from Composing
Gender. Since I was use to writing summaries, it was a little difficult transition for me analyze
the articles and not summarize them. However, with the help of an outline, I realized the thesis of
the of articles and know what they were trying persuade the audience and the tone. In

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progression one essay I didnt really have a clear thesis because the organization of my essay
was bad. My thesis was too wordy and since it wasnt the last sentence of my introduction it
made it confusing. My thesis statement was In relation to gender and sterotypes; Claire Renzetti
and Daniel Curran in From Women, Men and Society and Aaron Devors, Becoming Members of
Society: The Social Meanings of Gender, discuss these topics together and sync them into one
topic to educate the world on how stereotyping on gender roles affects natural rights and the
infrastructure of ones freedom. When I was comparing the two articles from Composing
Gender, I was constantly reminded to explain the common idea of the two articles, which was
parenting. However, in my second essay my thesis statement was Women objectified in the
media which creates a harmful idealization of beauty. In my progression two essay my thesis
statement was straight to the point and clear.
One thing that Ive seen more improvement is my organization and the page length to my
essays. Before, I didnt think I would be able to write a five-page paper because I wouldnt what
to talk about and I would get writers block. The help with of doing the prospectus really helped
me improve my write and organization. It helped me transition my paragraphs into having a nice
flow and not drifting away from my topic. In my progression one essay, when I make the
connect to my personal experience, I dont create a nice flow between the paragraphs. I started
the paragraph by saying, Growing up with a house full of boys, it wasnt hard for me to along
with them. I make a mistake by not adding a transition word after talking about how clothing
and toys play a significant role in putting kids in gender role. I improved it in my progression
two essay by adding transitions words, explaining how it relates to my argument and adding
evidence from Composing Gender to support my statements.

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As this course has helped improve my essay, it also has showed me what mistakes I was
doing in the past. Since being a poor writer, I was always self-conscious about my writing and
wouldnt let people read my paper. When I went to the LRC meetings I realized that it was good
idea to have people read my paper. After the meeting I would see mistakes that I didnt see and I
received good feedback. Also with the peer-views, that also helped me with my papers, because
with the more people giving me people feedback, I got a chance to fix more errors in my essay.
Looking back to my first progression essay where I got a C minus, I only had three people to
look over my paper. Therefore, I still had many mistakes that I could still have corrected.
However, with progression two, my Supplementary Instructor, an LRC tutor, and four colleagues
look over my essay and when I got my essay, I got a B.
Overall this class, has truly improve my writing skills. Even though this class did assign a
lot of work, it was resourceful. The assignments were like little steps in order to purposely to
help you on the final essay. I enjoyed learning about gender because when I started this class, I
didnt know anything about gender. I thought gender and sex were the same thing. This class has
not only showed me how to improve my writing skills but it also changed my perspective on
gender. I would like to say thank you to Professor Ditch for guiding me and encouraging me to
continue writing. I wouldnt be able to make improvement without her help. I will also like to
say thank you to my Supplementary Instructor teacher for advising me and helping me with my
first fall semester. This class was very beneficial and all the classwork was worth it.