Feedback from my First Major Essay

In my first major essay, I analyzed the source “Zombies vs. The Joy of Canning: Motivation in the Productive Home” by Erica Strauss. I was able to successfully identify the central thesis of this source and provided ample amounts of evidence discussed by the author to support the thesis. The author of this source was addressing her exigent circumstance to household mothers and other productivity-seeking individuals. I discussed this briefly when explaining how the author employed pathos in her source. I believe my organization was good because it was logical and focused for the most part. I never went on tangents and developed my essay as a whole. The progression was very natural and each of my paragraphs provided new information. I believe I could have done better regarding my source boundaries. I was able to alert my readers with signal phrases, quotations, and in-text citations when discussing  ideas of the author. However, there were times when I failed to provide in-text citations after using a signal phrase.

A certain grammar error I made frequently within this paper was placing commas and periods outside of quotation marks. I believe this is a simple mistake I can fix by reviewing it in my handbook. In fact, Professor Hays provided me with the specific page on the handbook that discusses this problem. Besides this grammatical error, I did not have any other issues with spelling, apostrophe use, run-on sentences, etc.

In this paper, I believe I did an excellent job analyzing and synthesizing my source.  I provided an insightful analysis regarding my source’s thesis and supported it with a variety of evidence. I displayed that I understood the topic with complexity. However, I do need to work on addressing all parts of the essay prompt. Within my paper, I completely failed to address backing, a component of toulmin analysis. I also need to work on improving my grammar skills. I need to start placing commas and periods inside of quotation marks when citing a source. I can achieve a better grade next time through careful proofreading in order to avoid simple grammatical errors. I can also improve my grade by keeping a checklist and crossing off parts of the prompt I address as I progress through my essay.