Blog Improvement: Reflection

To see the progress I've made with blogging, I went back and read every single blog from seventh grade October. So that was quite a bit. Quite a bit of cringing. One of the first things I noticed was that I summarized the book way too much. Even now I still have a bit of a habit of summarizing the story a bit more than needed, but my summarizing back then was just way over the top, I think. I didn't include much of the prompt and spent a lot of the blog just telling the reader what the story was about, so that wasn't very good..

     I also noticed my overall awkwardness when reading the blogs. If I could describe my old blog with just one word it would be awkward. Without a doubt. Somehow, when I was writing them back then, I didn't think they sounded that awkward. Now, however, I have never truly understood the meaning of the word 'awkward' until I've reread those old blogs. Please let them be deleted and forgotten. I think this might have been spurred on by my habit of being repetitive. I wasn't repeating things very often, but when I was repetitive, I was full on redundant. Incredibly so. Like, "Wow did I just repeat the same idea like five times? 'Cause I'm pretty sure that's what I just did."

   Thankfully, I don't think I write like that anymore. At least, I hope I don't. I'm pretty sure that, at this point, my writing has improved from that terrible stage. I'm starting to try and not summarize my books too much, just giving the reader a very brief idea of the conflict and characters. But, my overwhelming amount of summarizing was a pretty big problem (in my opinion) so I think that might actually take quite some time to completely improve. 

     Awkwardness-wise, I have no idea if I've improved on that! When I was writing those blogs, I thought I was completely un-awkward. Now that I read back, I realize I was pretty bad. So, I'm desperately hoping I'm not writing these eighth grade blogs with a false sense of un-awkwardness like I was in seventh grade. I really hope my writing sounds as natural or casual as I think it sounds in my head when I think about what to write. Seriously hoping. 

     I think I can learn quite a bit from my old writing. As I notice all the things I could have improved, I also take note of it as a bad habit I used to have or still do have as I write. For example, because I noticed I am sometimes repetitive, it has taught me to keep an eye out for things I've already said or suggested. In the same take-note way, I've also learned to keep my amount of summarizing in check. It really is like me learning from my mistakes.