However, as I slowly began to learn more about English, it was also the same time when I started to lose interest as I had come to believe that the sole purpose of learning a language is for communication. Why do we have to write all those ridiculous argumentative essays? Wasn't it a complete waste of time? I could spend more time on my other subjects which are going to be more useful in my future studies or career. As a result, I only placed bare minimum effort so I could pass the subject.
As I grew older, I gave more thoughts about English language and realised that writing argumentative essays was not a complete waste of time. It is to polish our critical thinking skills and being able to come up with logical and coherent arguments for a topic to convince and persuade people. Being able to come up with great arguments is one thing, translating it onto paper is another set of skills which takes a lot of practice. These are very useful set of skills that will be able to help me in studies and even in my career next time.
Even though I know being good at English, especially in the area of argumentative writing, would be a great thing. However, the inertia to start was too great. I would rather spend more time in areas I am already good in such as Maths and Sciences. This was to ensure that I could secure a place in the course I want in university as the weightage of GP is rather low compared to my other H2 subjects.
Ending up in ES1102 is the result of me not putting in sufficient effort into studying for GP. But since I am already here, I hope I can make the best use of this opportunity to brush up my critical thinking, and argumentative writing skills, and at the same time correct any grammar mistakes that I may not know of.
