Polina Blinova, Grade 11
UWC Maastricht
When I first came to UWC Maastricht, I was faced with a choice of whether I should study English literature or English as a language. Before UWC, I hated literature classes of any kind, and “hating” is not an exaggeration here. You are taught that your opinions matter, but then they turn out to be incorrect in the end; you study about 30 books per year, which inevitably allows for superficial analysis only, and you have a program that has not been changed since the Soviet era. All of this led me to believe that I was neither good at literature, nor would I want to ever again encounter something even remotely close to it in my future studies. Nevertheless, I decided to give it one last chance, and not in vain as I was later shown.
Having decided that I want to continue studying French as a language at UWC, it was only possible for me to choose English A as my other subject. I was scared that I would be the only non-native speaker in the class, even though I was assured that my English was “good enough” to succeed in this rigorous course. After having my teacher change a couple of times at the beginning of the year, I found myself in a new class of around 25 people, most of whom did not have English as their first language. This gave me hope that it was not an irrational decision to take up that class after all. However, I was still quite anxious when I had to write my first ever creative piece in English. I spent hours and hours polishing and modifying the slightest things in my essay because I wanted my teacher to like my first-ever assignment.
Peer editing was something that I never heard of being used in English class. I was always insecure about my writing, and the possibility of other people reading my essays was not something I felt particularly happy about. I was afraid of the harsh feedback I could receive for a work that was clearly very personal to me. We never did anything like that in my Russian school, and people usually tried to avoid others reading what they wrote, to not endure endless mocking for their mistakes. Teachers who chose to read out the best and worst essays in front of the whole class were not of much help either, although sometimes they were nice enough to not mention your name. Conversely in Maastricht, peer editing was viewed as something highly beneficial and something that could significantly improve your writing.
Before starting our first editing session, we were given a brief introduction to how exactly it was done, and it was the first time in my entire life that I was told to not only concentrate on the negatives but also the positives. In the educational system that I was in before, it was always assumed that people are generally aware of their strengths and do not need any encouragement on that account, while their mistakes are something that needs to be constantly pointed out to help fix them. It was different at UWC, I not only received feedback on where I might work a bit more and suggested ways on how to do that, but I also saw people commenting on what was especially good in my writing. So, something that seemed so frightening and alien at first turned out to be a great experience. It was a completely different approach to editing that I was shown, and I am glad to be introduced to it.
Sometimes, we are unconscious of the fact that our words can be hurtful to others, especially considering something as personal as your own writing. Being this way is not going to help anyone improve, and pointing out the mistakes of others can only be important when you also suggest how to fix them, which, in my opinion, is one of the only good ways to help others enhance what they have written.
Having decided that I want to continue studying French as a language at UWC, it was only possible for me to choose English A as my other subject. I was scared that I would be the only non-native speaker in the class, even though I was assured that my English was “good enough” to succeed in this rigorous course. After having my teacher change a couple of times at the beginning of the year, I found myself in a new class of around 25 people, most of whom did not have English as their first language. This gave me hope that it was not an irrational decision to take up that class after all. However, I was still quite anxious when I had to write my first ever creative piece in English. I spent hours and hours polishing and modifying the slightest things in my essay because I wanted my teacher to like my first-ever assignment.
Peer editing was something that I never heard of being used in English class. I was always insecure about my writing, and the possibility of other people reading my essays was not something I felt particularly happy about. I was afraid of the harsh feedback I could receive for a work that was clearly very personal to me. We never did anything like that in my Russian school, and people usually tried to avoid others reading what they wrote, to not endure endless mocking for their mistakes. Teachers who chose to read out the best and worst essays in front of the whole class were not of much help either, although sometimes they were nice enough to not mention your name. Conversely in Maastricht, peer editing was viewed as something highly beneficial and something that could significantly improve your writing.
Before starting our first editing session, we were given a brief introduction to how exactly it was done, and it was the first time in my entire life that I was told to not only concentrate on the negatives but also the positives. In the educational system that I was in before, it was always assumed that people are generally aware of their strengths and do not need any encouragement on that account, while their mistakes are something that needs to be constantly pointed out to help fix them. It was different at UWC, I not only received feedback on where I might work a bit more and suggested ways on how to do that, but I also saw people commenting on what was especially good in my writing. So, something that seemed so frightening and alien at first turned out to be a great experience. It was a completely different approach to editing that I was shown, and I am glad to be introduced to it.
Sometimes, we are unconscious of the fact that our words can be hurtful to others, especially considering something as personal as your own writing. Being this way is not going to help anyone improve, and pointing out the mistakes of others can only be important when you also suggest how to fix them, which, in my opinion, is one of the only good ways to help others enhance what they have written.
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