This English course has taught me many essential skills to utilize throughout life, including an important knowledge to bring to the workforce including peer-review. Now, peer review has not been something I ever practiced throughout my four years of high school so it was a new challenging curve for me. I was so used to having the teacher grade the rough and final drafts that when presented with peer-review, I was shocked that I would have to look over and give feedback on a peer’s paper. At the beginning of my peer review process, I wasn’t quite sure what I should comment on besides grammatical and punctuation errors. I sat there reading through my peer’s papers trying to think of what I should say, but wasn’t versed enough in the subject to know what to comment on. Sure enough, our first peer-review class had come along and we were expected to spend fifteen minutes reviewing each peer’s paper which was a struggle because no one really knew what to say. Now, I struggle with having only fifteen minutes per each peer’s paper to try and cram everything I want to say into the allotted time. As the course went on, and we were continually taught what to look for and comment on in a good paper, it became easier to find areas to elaborate on. I was no longer looking for surface-level errors, I was reading essays critically and with intent to help my peer’s grow and strengthen their areas that needed improvement which eventually led to seeing room for growth in my own writing.
Specifically, in comment ay on the marked peer draft, I was able to look at his conclusion paragraph and realize that it wasn’t fully relating to his topic, and wasn’t adding any further reflection on their topic of choice. This is a valuable skill I learned as I read through peer’s drafts and was able to see where it needed work. I remember getting a comment on one of my drafts stating that a conclusion should add further reflection, so I always looked for that in peer’s drafts. Another comment, aq, showcases my improvement on knowing the format of quote sandwiches. I first learned how to properly frame a quote in this English course, and now I feel like an expert at it. This skill also helped me to comment on peer’s papers because that is a major aspect to quality writing and without the quote sandwich, the quote means nothing. My peer had just thrown a quote into their paragraph and did not add context to it, so I let him know how he should be properly framing his quotes. Learning the peer review process was so important for me, and I am glad I know have the knowledge and experience to utilize in other courses. These skills I acquired through English composition helped improve my writing vastly, and helped me to become a better critical reader.
