[에세이 만점은 독서 교육으로부터!] The Star Fisher by Laurence Yep

Level: 05
Synopsis:

Being the only Chinese family in the small town of Clarksburg, West Virginia, is daunting for Joan and her younger sister. It‘s 1927 and most of the people in the town have never seen a Chinese person before, so prejudice and suspicion immediately arise. Joan sees herself in the story of the Star Fisher, a woman held as a bird by her terrible husband who is finally freed by her daughter. Together they flee to the stars, and are caught forever between Heaven and Earth. Slowly, Joan comes to know some people in the town, and they come to know her family, and Joan gains a wider perspective of the world around her.

Essay Question

Joan obviously sees great significance in the old Chinese story of the Star Fishers. Explain in detail how Joan’s story and the story of the Star Fishers are similar. In other words, why does Joan relate so strongly to this story?

Student Essay

Joan felt that her life and the story of star fisher is similar. Star Fisher is a Chinese folklore and Joan is a girl who is 15 and she just moved to West Virginia from the Ohio. She felt that she was not welcomed in there.

In the story, the Star Fisher, star fisher and her daughter gets rejected for they were both magical. Joan and her family also gets rejected because they were Chinese. She even thought she should go back to China. Both folklore and Joan‘s life was like being a pariah. Joan is also related her life to star fisher because her family did not have any money to go to China and star fisher’s clothing was hidden, so they couldn‘t fly without it. Trapped like a rat in a net, she had no way to get out.

Joan strongly related to the star fisher’s story, when she had harsh times. Both situations were similar and matched. Star fisher and Joan were both rejected by the town’s people and could not go back where they belong.

Teacher Comments

Your first paragraph needs to set up the situation more clearly. What we need to know is who/where Joan is, and what the Star Fisher story is about. We need to know these elements in that first paragraph, and cannot wait until the second paragraph to know a basic and important fact such as Joan and her family are Chinese (and they are nowhere near China!). Use your first paragraph to set up the main facts and overall situation of a story. Introduce the character or characters, and make clear what your essay is about.

The second paragraph must show us some hardships she faced. We must SEE her treatment in this town and how it affected her. We need to see that she was treated badly by some because she is Chinese. Examples must be given that show her personally being treated badly, and her family suffering from prejudice. Also, what does she discover about some of the people in the town? Does she come to know any of the other teens at school, for example? What about neighbors?

Show more. Give examples. Those are important parts of writing essays. You can tell me people rejected her, but you need to show some examples. If you describe a time she was teased by a group of kids or called cruel names, then that would be showing us that she was rejected and that there was prejudice. Explain more in the first paragraph, and show me more in your second paragraph, please.