Portfolio Peer Review Exhibit Essay

Christian McDaniel
Julia Maher
ENG 1102
3 Dec. 2011
Two Birds with One Stone
Although the necessity to create revised drafts for each essay is a useful tool for improvement, further chance for revision is offered through the peer edit. Firstly, the thoughts and suggestions from another student offer a new perspective on your writing. Unclear or unsupported arguments that you as the writer may not have noticed are often identified. Also, the methodic style to the peer review offers a double check that the paper covers all of the requirements that need to be met, such as having an evolved thesis and including support for all of your claims. Furthermore, in the process of having to think about all of the requirements of the essay as well as tips to improve someone else’s, the peer reviewer can simultaneously be making sure that his or her own essay meets the same requirements, and whether the tips he or she is thinking of can be applied to his or her paper. Thus, the peer review offers assistance to a classmate’s work, while providing further insight into the revision of your own paper, as well. Here, I have offered one of my peer reviews from this semester, as well as commentary for how the statements helped my classmate’s, Alex DuPont’s, essay on Gulliver’s Travels in addition to how I used the process and the answers given to improve my own essay.
“What is the strongest claim in this essay? What gives it its strength?
The strongest argument in this essay is that Gulliver's lack of heroism is due to the inability to accurately express his inner emotions, which are the result of a sheltered aristocratic childhood. This is the strongest argument because the purpose of the claims made in the first part of the essay is to build up to this final argument using evidence that links those ideas together. Furthermore, this argument is followed up with additional evidence and a second example that draws a parallel for the argument and offers further support.”
The...