The two comments I received from Ms Wisemen to drive my thinking moving forward, in order to improve for my HL essay, was  about how I might provide further insight when unpacking evidence from the texts and how might I provide more discussions of ideas, themes and implications to avoid simple descriptions.

Both of these comments go very hand in hand, as providing further insight would entail a greater elaboration and discussion of ideas, themes and implications. I need to ensure that all my evidence is connected to a bigger idea or a sort of consensus in order to provide that further insight. Moving forward rather than just stating that the text shows this idea, I need to link the evidence directly to that idea being discussed. I want to try and avoid un useful adjectives and adverbs such as highlighting or emphasising because they often are followed with very basic descriptions that essentially say what the reader already knows.

I also want to make sure that my personal insight isn’t just the insight of the author. I have previously concluded with just explaining the greater ideas and insights the author is sharing, however I need to provide more about my own reaction to his insight, like my perspective on the ideas and messages the author is sharing. Furthermore, when I am working on my HL essay, I am going to double check, draft and re draft my essay and particularly my unpacking of evidence to ensure I have further insight and am commenting on the bigger idea rather than just the basic purpose and surface meaning of the text.