The main improvement that I have focused on in my peer reviews is commenting on the different structural changes that should be made to the essay instead of simply correcting grammar of my peers. Through the peer review experience, I have begun to do this more and more and not only recognize errors in papers, but I now understand the correct way to articulate the suggestions. I also feel that the end comment has been a very helpful tool to me because I am able both understand other people’s comments and let other people understand my comments. I think the main growth in my peer reviews has come from the critiques I have gotten from my professor on my essays and other things I have submitted. One example of this is my comments on claim sentences relating to the thesis. Through my semester in english 110, I have learned that these sentences need to directly relate to the prompt while introducing the paragraph so that the paragraph also directly relates to the thesis. I also talked more about quote sandwiches and effectively framing quotations which I learned more about in this class. Another seemingly obvious part of peer review that I had never done before is point out when people have a really good part of their essay. I think this is important because while peer review is usually focused on critiques, that can sometimes be overwhelming for the essay writer and the occasional “this is really good” allows them to have confidence in their essay. Overall, I think the peer review portion of the class was really helpful in that I received comments on my own essay and through commenting on other people’s essays, I can identify errors more easily in my own essay and have better ideas of how these things work.
