Well, this is my trial. I'm fifteen and I'm from Vietnam. I'm going to take an exam for the Singapore scholarship next week but it has been a long time I haven't written essays. I hope you can help me.
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I am a crazy music fan. I've usually found lessons from the songs. And the best advice I've gotten is from "Hero" by Mariah Carey. It tells me not to give up and believe in myself. Whenever I face an overwhelming challenge, I think about it and have more strength. It has helped me through a lot of problems, and now I will tell you the most memorial one.
Last year, my English teacher told us to do a report about recycling, reusing and reduction. It was so interesting, I'd always liked reporting and the topic was so fresh. However, I worried about it, too.
The reason I worried was my group-mates. My group is a biggest group in class with 15 people. However, nine of them are average - weak students. And the good ones are too busy with the extra classes. It's terrible to do a groupwork without co-operation.
I still believed that it was okay. Then I did a lot of work that was supposed to be done by my group-mates. I wrote the play, I made the Power Point of the report, I also took a part in the play... I'd done a lot of things and I just wanted the report to have good receipts.
But it still was a group's exercise. My teacher wanted the weak students to take part in reporting. It was such an disaster. The report was such a long one. I couldn't imagine that the weak students could take it. "What should I do while the bad ones overwhelm the good ones?", I started thinking I should give up.
I was really fed up with the report. I felt like I just wanted to runaway and forget everything. I wondered why God could be so cruel to me.
Occassionally, I heard Mariah Carey "Hold on, there will be tomorrow. In time, you'll find the way...". There was something growing inside me, I tried to figure to way to solve my problem. Then an idea came: dividing my group into three small groups. Each group has 2 good students and me, and 3 weak students. The weak ones's mission are introduction and saying goodbye, it won't take too long.
Finally, the report day had come. I was amazed by my group. They did such a great job. Although there were some mistakes, I'd had a feeling that my group would be the best. Yes, my group was the best with the score 94/100. My friends were yelling for happiness. And I just simply took a long breath "I deserve this".
"Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up" (Thomas Edison)
Well, it was my happy ending. And that advice will always remain in my mind.
I don't think you should end the second paragraph after only 2 sentences. Connect it with the third:
However, I worried about it, too. The reason I worried was...
This is very well-written, I like it! You should proceed with confidence. One thing that might make it better is more analysis and discussion of the actual advice in the song. Also, your topic sentences could be better: each topic sentence should express the main idea of the paragraph. That is not always necessarily true, but it is something that helps to create "good composition" (whatever that is!)
:-)
I like your idea.
However, I think you start the sentences with "I" too often:
"I am a crazy music fan."
"I've usually found lessons..."
"I still believed..."
"Then I did a lot of work..."
"I also took a part..."
"I'd done a lot of things and I just wanted..."
...
What I mean is maybe you should try to vary your sentence structure to make it more appealing and less repetitive.
I love the song "Hero" too. Good luck with the scholarships *^_^*
