Hello,
Could you please read my essay and give me some feedback?
The prompt is:
Each person has had an experience in life that created a positive memory, or a negative memory. Please describe the event and why it made an impact on you. Write the event as if you were submitting it for the next Chicken Soup book. In the last paragraph, or two, write why you remember it, and if it has made an impact upon your life and behavior as an adult.
Thank you in advance
Frederic
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I am a French man who has been studying at an online American university. This requires a lot of hard work to ameliorate my command of the English language in addition to my comprehension of the American culture. Among the different methods I usually utilize so as to perfect and enrich my vocabulary and grammar, I particularly enjoy watching American and English television shows and running commentaries. A few months ago, an episode of the series "Everwood", which was titled "Daddy's little Girl" especially took me aback. As a matter of fact, the plot reminded me of an event that happened during my early childhood.
When I was six, my first teacher started teaching us the basic educational abilities. Obviously, she introduced us to the French alphabet and its inherent difficulties. Indeed, French language sometimes requires that one ignores the presence of some letters when reading. On the contrary, one has to pronounce some especially complicated combinations of letters according to stringent, incomprehensible rules that are littered with exceptions. Finally, when this goal is achieved, one is still faced with other predicaments such as an incredibly obscure jungle of grammar and syntax rules. All this intricacy represents an actual challenge for a six-year-old child.
Therefore, as any of my classmates, I experienced great pains on my way to the bigger boys' heaven, i.e. the first grade. However, at variance with my counterparts, my progression was not as fast as theirs was. Indeed, other children could rely on their parents to support their efforts on a daily basis through additional readings and supplementary exercises. Unfortunately, my parents were not educated and they had to occupy two positions to provide for my two young sisters and me. Furthermore, their schedules did not meet and only one of them could be at home to take care of us when we were at home. Consequently, not only did our parents spend most of their time at home carrying out the domestic drudgeries but their somewhat impaired literacy prevented them from helping us when reading and writing was involved.
Subsequently, my classmates, who were far from appreciating the nature and extent of my parents' predicament, did not comprehend why my progress did not evolve at the same pace as theirs. When our teacher asked for me to read, I experienced great difficulties in deciphering the words. My plight rapidly became a source of mockeries on the part of my classmates. The more they ridiculed me, the more I was ashamed and stumbled on the words. Their amusement, sometimes tinged with genuine contempt, kept undermining my confidence in my aptitude for reading.
However, fortunately for me, our teacher, Miss Garagnon, was more than a teacher: she was a dedicated educator and communicator. Indeed, she observed that despite my hurdles I had never lost my motivation. She was determined to discover the quality and degree of my difficulties by asking me a few questions about my life outside the classroom. She elucidated the causes of my impediments and decided to help me. Accordingly, she spoke to my parents and provided me with the opportunity to spend one supplementary hours every day after the class. Additionally, she invited me to a reading group for youngsters on Saturday mornings.
Not only did my reading skills significantly develop in a relatively short amount of time but my assurance also kept augmenting. A few years later, when I was ten, I started learning English at school and I am now sufficiently competent to undertake a college education in an American university. Moreover, I have endeavoured to perpetuate Miss Garagnon's legacy by volunteering through coaching young children who have failed in their early school career. Every day, on my way home after work, I spend a couple of hours in a community centre to help children make their homework.
Beyond her immediate and applicable aid, this teacher, above all, taught me something fundamental for my present and future life. As a matter of fact, in those days, she gave me a lifebelt with which I have managed to preserve myself from drowning into the vicissitudes of life. Notwithstanding Miss Garagnon's decease twenty years ago, her acts are a still vivid memory. Therefore, when I watched the episode of "Everwood" with Delhia, a nine-year-old character, describing her mother as her greatest hero, I realized the extent to which one's behaviour with children could be influential. Despite expressions of love and concern for children may only be an insignificant gesture for adult benefactors, it will certainly remain forever engraved on the young beneficiaries' memory.
Greetings!
You express yourself so well, I would never have guessed that you'd had any sort of problem with it! I have only a few editing suggestions for you this time:
Accordingly, she spoke to my parents and provided me with the opportunity to spend one supplementary hour every day after class.
I spend a couple of hours in a community centre to help children do their homework. (Although French uses only one word, "faire," for "to make" or "to do," in English the two are not interchangeable; one always refers to "doing" one's homework.)
her acts are a still vivid memory. - If you keep the words in this order, then "still-vivid" is an adjective, which should probably be hyphenated: a still-vivid memory; or, you could say "her acts are still a vivid memory."
Despite expressions of love and concern for children may only be an insignificant gesture for adult benefactors, it will certainly remain forever engraved on the young beneficiaries' memory. - This isn't quite grammatical. Better would be "Although expressions of love and concern for children may only be an insignificant gesture for adult benefactors, they will remain forever engraved on the young beneficiaries' memories."
Keep up the good work!
Thanks,
Sarah, EssayForum.com
