Essay Writing

My ability to write strong essays greatly improved over grade 10 and 11. I have started to enjoy writing them and would choose to write an essay over making a poster or other projects. One of my strengths when writing essays is that I can easily formulate my supporting statements for my thesis. As soon as I make my thesis my brain just gets started on my body paragraphs. I also can make fairly strong conclusions that use the thesis to wrap up my essay but does not just repeat my thesis from the introduction.

Although I believe I am fairly good at writing essays there are still many things I need to work on. For example, I have a hard time coming up with one strong opinion for a thesis. When writing my thesis I almost always want to argue for the "other side" as well. I would prefer to work in the grey but I realize with most essays you have to choose black or white. When writing essays I also need to work on my connecting sentences within the body paragraphs. I hope to make smooth transitions from one "PIE" (Point, Illustrate, and Explain) to the next by the end of this unit. Occasionally when I  form PIEs in my paragraphs I do not make the required two or three but make one point and illustrate it multiple times with a couple supporting quotes and evidence from texts. I believe I have formed multiple different supporting statements but to the reader it is just one large proof. I want to be able to make fluent but clear transitions.