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Nicholas Brooke

Professor Beadle

English 114A

30 September 2021

The Essential English Class

Every great writer is a tremendous reader. Being a great reader is as simple as looking for

various methods used to spread a deeper message. If you become a great reader, you will be able

to incorporate techniques used to portray a message. To be a good writer, you have to be able to

captivate the reader. I never really understood writing or how to analyze books until my junior

year. My teacher had taught us how to read in depth through various types of quizzes. The

quizzes helped us focus on reading and the deeper messages which we applied to our essays that

we wrote. We were taught many different lessons and to most importantly think for ourselves to

improve our writing. If everybody is coming up with the same message, then every essay will

seem the same. We were encouraged to analyze it through our own view even if he disagreed

with us. To master writing you must first master reading. My junior year English class helped

mold my writing skills through struggle.

Reading is taught before writing because the two go together. If reading is not taught,

then the student will not be able to write at a high level. I have known how to read for a while,

but it was just the basic understanding of reading. It wasn’t until my junior year of high school

that I truly learned the key elements of reading. What I mean by truly learning how to read is

learning how to dig deeper. Digging deeper can be looking for important phrases and important

wording that gives the reader context clues. My junior year teacher made us read over 15 books

to install this way of reading in our heads. He first started by making us read the classics and not
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really telling us what to look for in a book. He gave us weekly quizzes and the quizzes included

questions that asked about very unique details to make sure we weren’t skimming through the

book. The quizzes brought a great struggle for me, and I didn’t understand how to succeed on the

quizzes. I was facing struggles that I wasn’t expecting, similar to meneshma from “The Best

Year of Your Life”. She struggled breaking down the language barrier. Through that struggle she

was able to gain confidence and want to try being a foreign exchange student again. I gained the

same confidence after going through struggle. I was reading the novels and looking for basic plot

points. This was the biggest mistake I have ever made. The questions on his quizzes allowed me

to figure out the crucial details of the story. It still made no sense to me why he would ask us

about the colors of certain objects or about the weather of a certain scene. It wasn’t until later

that he had explained to us the significance of those details. The colors of certain clothing or

miscellaneous items would reveal a deeper substance of the character. The tone of a scene would

be revealed through the time of day or the weather. The words used could also give us clues

about what is going to happen. This improved my reading proficiency and gave me new

approaches to analyzing material.

The different ways of analyzing material that he taught us helped me get the correct

answers on his quizzes. We eventually had an essay quiz in which he asked what happens at the

end of the novel. I thought about it and tried to find a deeper meaning to the ending that had

extended throughout the book. It was hard to come up with a deeper meaning and not something

super basic. The message that I pulled from the book ended up being basic because we only had

a 50-minute class period to write an entire essay. I felt confident that I had written a decent essay.

When the entire class got their essays back nobody got above an 85 and we were all surprised at

the harsh grades. He told us that we all missed what the ending of the book was about. He said
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that the ending of the book is the beginning. We were all very confused and didn’t understand

what he meant. He then went back to show us certain context clues about the character's situation

and wording that the author used to show the reader that the character ended up where he began.

He had accomplished nothing. This enhanced my writing ability. I learned to dig for meaning in

a confusing book. It taught me to understand the technique of looking for important wording.

When I read “The Best Year of Your Life”, I felt a connection because I thought I knew

what I was going to be doing but I didn’t. When I started my junior year English class the harsh

reality set in. I didn’t know how to pass my teacher's quizzes at first and I was doing poorly in

his class. The first quarter of the school year gave me confidence for the rest of the year. I knew

what I had done wrong, and I was excited to move onto the next quarters because I knew I could

succeed. In the essay “The Best Year of Your Life” the author mentions “I never felt more

relieved than the day I flew home from Taiwan”(Johnson 99). I felt the same when I finally

understood how to answer my teachers’ questions and write what he was looking for. He was

looking for us to go outside the box and break through the standard way of thinking. He wanted

us to think on our own and interpret certain context clues that other people may not see. It was a

year of learning from my mistakes much like Menemsha did when she went to Taiwan. I may

have had many struggles while learning these techniques but the struggle helped me master

them. Mastering reading led to my expertise in writing.

Through difficulties, my junior year English class helped form my writing ability. My

teacher had shown me the importance of reading without realizing it. The quizzes I was given

gave me reading skills and showed me how to look for deeper messages. This class helped me

want to work harder. If I didn’t have this class I do not believe I would be where I am

academically today. Struggle is essential for growth and success.

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Works Cited

Johnson, Menemsha. “The Best Year of Your Life.” Waves. Edited by Amber Norwood. 4th ed.

Macmillan Learning Curriculum Solutions, 2021, pp. 99.