Cover Letter

Dear Professor Fornes:

When beginning English 101, I thought the course was going to be a breeze. I was not quite prepared, even from my high school AP course, for the effort I was going to have to put into my writing. While spending time developing and writing my essays, my style has improved. I have learned how to adequatly proofread in order to catch my errors. These developing skills are revealed through my writing portfolio.
I began this course with a fairly decent background in writing and the development of essays. I have always been fairly confident when writing essays for class and my grammer is usually good. Even so, I have still struggled with developing my closing arguements, a skill that I believe can only be perfected through practice.
In my first essay, "Facing the Facebook," I at first had trouble following the claims of the author of the essay. He seemed to have so many claims that I was not sure how to set up my essay. Upon learning that I did not have to align my essay to his, I was able to construct a paper with a good base and develop it into a readable and 'flowing' essay.
As i go on through my college career, i hope to become an even better writer. I would like to improve all of the skills it takes to be a successful writer, not only to pass my courses, but also to be a contributing member of society.

Paper #1
“Foreign Athletic Limits”
Grade:C-
Explanation: This student did have a thesis and a clear stance on the chosen topic. However, his sentence structure was not very good at all, detracting from the presentation. He also seemed to repeat the same issue over and over.



Paper #2
“Online College vs. Online High School”
Grade:C-
Explanation: This student doesn't have a clear thesis and the positioning of the paragraphs is not very good. he should have kept all the paragraphs about high school together and all the paragraphs about college together. Also, his misspelled was rather distracting.



Paper #3
“Predisposed to Divorce”
Grade:B+
Explanation: This student has a clear thesis and provides good evidence to back up his point. the only problem i really had with this is that one of his major sources was of only twins, but he did say this. also, there were very few grammar mistakes, it was bery easy to read this essay.



Paper #4
“NAACP Case Against Gun Manufacturers”
Grade:C-
Explanation: I could not find a well developed thesis and his introduction is very short and not developed. also he did not develop his argument well, its more of fact then his opinion, not much of an argument. the grammar and sentence structure detract from reading the essay as well.

Analysis of Rebecca Hagelin's Article

Rebecca Hagelin relates in her article, "Video Games Violence in Our Sons," the story of the young man who murdered two police officers and a 911 dispatcher in Alabama. By using this story, Hagelin presents an irrefutable example of what video game violence can do to those who play the games. The young man who committed these crimes actually gave a statement saying that "life is like a video game". this statement strengthens Hagelins arguement, video games desensitize the player to real life situations. players look at crimes and death as something that is quite normal, becuase the player experiences it everytime the game is played.

Video Games and Violence

For the next essay that I am required to write for English Class, I have chosen to analyze the article "Video Game Violence and Our Sons", written by Rebecca Hagelin. Hagelin is the Vice President of a major conservative group as well a columnists for two online news groups. She uses very convincing evidence to back up her point of view that video games lead to violence in American teens. Her major example is of the boy who killed two officers and a 911 dispatcher. She claims that though this was the first time he ever committed such a crime in reality, he commited the same crime all the time through the video game Grand Theft Auto. This is true, however there would be many factors that come into play as to why he committed these crimes. What Hagelin does not bring out is his childhood, whether he had any pre-exsisting health/mental conditions, who taught him how to use a gun?? Video games do not teach you how to fire a real weapon... as it is done with controllers that are shaped nothing like guns. If it is games such as Grand Theft Auto that cuase violence then we must also blame games like Duck Hunt... because in that game you actually use a controller that is in the shape of gun. I chose this article becuase I obviously do not agree with Rebecca Hagelin, but she does back up her point with better evidence than the other article author does.