Outline and Opening – Brianna L.

My chosen prompt will be Resilience. 

The Main Idea of my essay has to do with my struggle with my mental health during my last year or high school and how I was capable of overcoming it. 

Intro: (opening) What led me to feel pessimistic about my first couple of months in the school year 

Event 1: High schoolers always being problematic

Event 2: Trying to avoid stress by skipping school and smoking cannabis 

Event 3: I graduated with a mid GPA average which made me feeling disappointed in myself and led me to be more responsible 

Conclusion: Relationships with others started improving and things started to become more eye opening. 

Overall Message: Something that brought me to light was patience 

Opening for my essay:

I was already down. There was no excitement being emphasized. That summer of 2022 before school started, what I always called “Prison”. That’s what school felt like to me at that moment. There was no desire to socialize amongst people who talked about one another but would still call each other “friends”. The thought of having to wake up at 6 in the morning to get to school by 7:45. Days where I immediately received a test first class when I didn’t even get the opportunity to process anything that’s going on around me.

Coming in, straight faced, going to my seat in the back corner where I don’t have to speak to anyone, getting ready to take my Spanish quiz which in fact I always found useless because I knew Spanish already so I knew I’d ace the final exam for it. Next class, boom, just another quiz. It felt like my mind was scrambled with information that I couldn’t think straight. But, I knew that I had to end up doing it, even though after a while I put my pencil down and quit just because I flipped to a page full of formulas. Formulas remind me of scrambled words that I’m trying to read but don’t understand one bit. I continuously watch the clock where 5 minutes feel like 5 hours when you’re trying to leave school sooner. 

3 thoughts on “Outline and Opening – Brianna L.”

  1. I’m looking forward to reading about how patience helped you get through those difficult moments. I believe that at this time of day, patience is a skill that we should all master. It seems as though I have been able to reach a higher level of peace and understanding when I demonstrated patience under challenging situations. I can view the situation for what it truly is because patience seems to have a way of breaking past the noise and distractions and making everything more calmer and easier. I’m glad that you have also had that experience. I’m eager to read more.

  2. YOu write well. THis could be a good opening. HOWEVER —

    PROBLEM: your ending overall message is NOT SPECIFIC: Something that brought me to light was patience 

    HOW will you SHOW me patience? Did you join a meditation class? Did you become a buddhist? WHAT IS THE CLIMAX going to be? WAS this a talk or self-realization event? HOW did this change you? PROBLEM: WHAT Exactly changed you? You cannot just tell me that you learned patience. WHAT event changed you to learn patience? 

    WHAT IS THE FOCUS CENTRAL MAIN IDEA of this essay??? You say that your essay will focus on your mental health. Again this is TOO vague. WHAT EXACT event or struggle – Did you fail a class and go into depression? WHAT Event is the main focus of this piece. 

    Could the central focus of your education narrative be: overcoming a marijuana addition problem in high school? That would be a struggle that you had to overcome. That would be a focus. That would also would include mental health tied to dependency and how your school life declined

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