One would have not known much about how to write an effective essay until they have clearly edited their previously written essay during the Expository Writing Stations. Anyone who has looked over their writing multiple times and has found ways to enhance and professionalize it will learn to write in a more clear and concise manner than they had done before. The Expository Writing Stations has helped change the students’ understanding of how to write a proper essay by having the the students edit and review one another’s essays, finding some things that they should have put on their own essay to help enhance the writing. Students also find out about what components of their writing sounds and looks clear, and how their writing could have developed. Their understanding of using correct, accurate word choice and evidence has evolved. The following examples of reflections show how one has thoroughly understood the insufficient parts of their essay and …show more content…
has found ways to reflect off of their writing. Looking over other people's and their own main idea, an individual understands which ideas correspond with the prompt most accurately. For example, when someone has written an essay about how smartphones have affected the current world, they will have more evidence to back up the main idea, than if they wrote about how ballpoint pens have affected the modern world. The actual idea behind the whole essay contributes the most to answering the prompt, so the type of ideas that one thinks of evolves when reviewing with their peers and seeing which of their ideas seem the strongest and related to the prompt. Other components of writing, such as having proper examples also contributes to the strength of the overall essay. After one has analyzed their essay in the Development of Ideas section in the Stations, they will have the ability to easily see if their evidence and commentary clearly reflects the thesis.
One can check if their evidence suits the thesis and if it completely supports the main idea. They will also realize if they have a thoughtful commentary that links the evidence to the controlling idea. Many times, students tend to forget to give a short commentary for each piece of evidence before writing the main commentary at the end to restate the thesis.Therefore, one’s understanding of how to include proper evidence and a strong commentary will change because they have thoroughly analyzed their writing and have found ways to improve it. The clarity of the commentary and the credibility of the evidence will change after doing the Development of Ideas section of the Stations. Other than proper examples, and a solid main idea, a writer must use a professional, but functional word choice and use correct conventions at all
times. The Word Choice/ Conventions section of the Stations helps students make some basic, but helpful changes to their writing. One can check for correct conventions, such as properly punctuated quotations, appropriate grammar, and sophisticated vocabulary that makes sense in the writing. Even though things like correct punctuation, and starting a sentence with a capital letter might seem obvious and silly to check for, many people forget these simple rules. Hence, the clarity and skillfulness of the essay decreases. The reflections completed during the Expository Writing Stations show that the Stations have affected the students’ understanding of good writing in positive ways. Students become more mindful of their writing. After doing the Stations, one’s interpretation of an exceptional essay changes. The student edits their essay in an efficient way, understanding how their essay could become more professional in various ways, such as a stronger thesis, meaningful word choice, accurate, credible evidence, and proper conventions.
In our modern society, we have forgotten the art of writing. When we write, we think to ourselves, the longer the sentence, the more intelligent I will sound. Many may say it is by writing long sentences. But is it all that true? In this piece of writing I would like to focus on an essay written by Verlyn Klinkenborg, Several Short Sentences About Writing. In this essay he explains how and why when we write, we should keep our sentences short. he also explains why students should be assigned essays that are not determinate on other sources as evidence. I will also be comparing this to a piece written by Sarah Manguso, Ongoingness. I will be comparing these two pieces on their writing style, and their essayistic ideas. My belief is that we need
In this reflective analysis of NAEYC Standard three, Observing, Documenting, and Assessing to Support Young Children and Families, I will first reflect on my growth, as an early childhood professional, during my course of study. Secondly, I will address my strengths related to the standard and discuss areas in need of further professional development. Finally, I will outline my goals for future growth and development. Early childhood educators demonstrate professional competence by understanding the role of assessment and the various methods of assessing student learning, including observation, documentation and standardized testing. These assessment strategies, along with partnerships with parents, can support students in their development and growth, by informing instruction and evaluating instructional practices.
Every English 111 textbook should consist of three main things: the proper way to write an academic essay, review of proper grammar, mechanics word usage and a short transition chapter of the difference between writing in high school and college writing. Successful College Writing by Kathleen T. McWhorter has many of the essentials but noticed it lacked examples of a noble essay. All throughout class students critiqued essays but never actually saw an example of a good, noteworthy complete essay. Having examples of what a person shouldn’t do in an essay is always beneficial but should be followed by a precise academic essay. How are the student supposed to improve their academic writing skills if they have nothing to go by? Just because the book lacks a few of the basic essentials doesn’t mean the book itself will not be beneficial in any way. The book as a whole is pleasing but still has room for revisions.
As a writer there are many elements of writing that I struggle with, especially when composing an essay. When writing an essay, there are usually many skills that need to be used in order to be successful with the writing assignment. Many times in writing I struggle with explaining and fully developing the supporting details and ideas in my essay. I would also like to improve on incorporating clear topic sentences and concluding sentences, connecting my paragraphs ideas back to my thesis. Lastly, improvement can be made in my writing by avoiding awkward or wordy sentences. Writers face numerous challenges in their writing but strive to overcome or improve these challenges with each piece they write.
I have reflected over my written prose of this past semester I have come to understand my strengths and weaknesses in my comments and short essays. I reviewed the goals of the course to understand how they a line with my abilities and future goals. My strength lies in in my ability for contextualization and critical thinking. My weaknesses are in my ability to write and frame an argument based on evidence within the text. The stated goals of the course helped me to outline my progress over the semester. However, for me, the most important part is my ability to move forward and better my written prose. In a review of this semester, I understand how I have progressed towards certain goals and how to move forward with my future goals in the semesters to come.
In conclusion, when writing, a scholar-practitioner has to ensure he or she present appropriate material to the targeted audience without personal opinion, assumption, and bias. Additionally it is essential that writer, not only checks the validity and quality of the evidence use, but that the writing is objective in tone, clear, concise, and produce a mechanically correct writing that contains evidence-based material.
Writing was something I never particularly looked forward to before taking this class. I had a difficult time putting my thoughts together and really getting my point across. During my time in this class, my level of writing has increased exponentially compared to where it was when I was in high school. This class was very well constructed, and made the learning process one of the easiest I have experienced. Furthermore, I found the discussions made me think critically about the subject and that class participation in these discussions was great. I will reflect in this essay on many of the things learned while taking my first college course, writing 101.
The book starts with detailed attention to the writing process at a pace that is comfortable for the developmental student. It emphasizes the importance of the controlling idea, the process of gathering information from both personal experience and other sources, the structure of an essay, and the way in which ideas are arranged and connected. In Part Two, students learn how to use models for each of the patterns of development. The sentence/grammar material is self-contained in Part Three for flexible use by students studying independently or by teachers who might want to focus on a particular topic. Students learn how to construct different types of sentences and how to use appropriate punctuation. Ample exercise material reinforces the instruction. Part Four, Critical Reading Strategies, focuses on the process of reading and relates it to the process of writing and provides students with effective strategies for summarizing, note-taking, and annotating reading material.
College writers write multiple drafts and revise the entire essay or large sections of the essay for higher order writing concerns of meaning, structure, logical development, and concrete support of ideas and assertions. Revising the college essay is far more than simple editing for grammar and word choice. College essays must say something important and meaningful. Deep Revision helps to ensure that the essay says something interesting and worthwhile. Throughout High School I wrote for an educational finance website for high school students called, Investeens. I was the Head Writer for the “Tech Talk” section and reported on different sectors of the technology world as it related to finance. This was my first exposure to “professional” writing. As I sat down to write this essay I read over all the articles I wrote, and it was honestly painful. All I was doing was spewing out facts and observations without any support or general analysis. It disgusted me because I could see myself writing like that now, and I asked myself why that was. When we came into your class on the first day you begged the question, how does one learn to write? We all guessed haphazardly until someone finally said “through analysis”. I don’t think I fully understood what that actually meant. You described this as looking at the situation in front of you and asking why. Why did you write that? Why did you write it that way and not this other way? And by answering these simple questions you not only create a more meaningful essay but an understanding of yourself as the writer and that’s more important then anything you can ever write down. After taking this course I probably wont ever look at the essays I have written ever again, however, through writing t...
During the course of this semester; the variety of writing styles and essays assigned to me in my communication skills class encouraged the development of my writing skills, as well as provided me with more self-assurance in my abilities. My writing, research, and presentation abilities enhanced through practice, determination, and the understanding I gained during this course. With every single writing assignment, I learned new innovative approaches and skills, which enhanced my abilities to improve my thoughts logically, enabling me to write more clearly, and to organize my papers more effectively. At the beginning of this semester; despite the fact that I already knew the terminology MAP: message, audience, purpose; I never really understood the significance of MAP. For this reason, my writing lacked clarity, organization, and my writings appeared less focused on the topics. As a result my research papers and essays did not flow as smoothly from one passage to the next. Furthermore, I was unaccustomed with the precise procedures used when writing an essay. For instance, my previous classes before college, although requiring a reference page, did not require me to include proper citations in my writings. After evaluating the quality of my writing toward the end of the semester, I recognized vast improvements in several areas of my writing. By concentrating on the beginning stages of my writings, I could distinguish ahead of time my audience and my message. As a result, my essays are clear, and I remain on topic. In addition to that using transition phrases efficiently also helps my writing to flow smoothly. The proper use of transitions makes my writings easy to follow from one topic to the next. I also learned that pre-writing...
Coming to the country where English is spoken encourage me to acquire knowledge on the basic writing skills, which can help me in my day to day life. ENGL 101 is the first level English course that is given at Montgomery College to give an introduction to college writing. Being a second language learner with no background experience of writing skills needs a day to day practice in order to improve the required skills of writing. The various opportunities, including the writing center that Montgomery College provides help ESL students like me to enhance their knowledge of the basic techniques that are needed for a qualified paper. In this writing class, with the help of my instructor, Professor Michael LeBlanc, I have shown a progress in my writing skills even though I still need to work on some of the skills. Two of my writing strengths are integrating information into essays by paraphrasing based on assigned readings and developing paragraphs with vivid details; however, I still need improvement in demonstrating facility with grammatical issues, such as word
Writing is like art- it helps us to express ourselves. However, writing differs from art in that it has to follow specific parameters, such as structure, syntax, grammar, and so on. At the beginning of the quarter, I had preconceived ideas as to what "good" writing was, and how I should go about it. While working on my first assignment, I discovered that to be reasonably successful at this I had to leave behind my perceptions of writing as it is accepted in my country and to start from scratch. Throughout this portfolio, I demonstrate my development and growth as a writer. In the creation of this portfolio, I have accomplished several of the global objectives for this class. These included writing a clear thesis statement, showing awareness of my audience, and revealing the effect of successful, critical proofreading and editing techniques. As I aimed to meet these outcomes throughout the quarter, my writing has slowly, but surely developed into organized, critical, and academically correct text.
During my EN 101A semester, I worked particularly on the use of the writing process, particularly on writing a vibrant thesis statement which offers a concise solution to the issue being addressed. I struggled to improve my expository writing through working at the writing center. In addition, I have also worked on improving my critical thinking, which helped me to develop analytical skills in an effort to add my own thoughts, contemplate a particular topic and analyze important issues. My weakest area in essay development during the semester was identifying a clear thesis statement, which was a crucial part of the writing process. I could not give a road map for my paper; in other words, my thesis statement could not tell the reader what to expect from the rest of the paper.
I argued that in order to help students we must develop their skills in writing through a process genre approach. “Given that writing is a process and that what we write is heavily influenced by the constraints of genres” Harmer (2004:86). It’s imperative that these elements are included in writing activities. I argued that without the ‘drafting and redrafting’ students are unlikely to improve. Moreover, “Teaching and learning are joint enterprises involving both teacher and student in a partnership” White&Arndt (1991:2). Both must fulfill their roles in this partnership, and though essay writing will continue to be challenging, I believe both teacher and student can become more motivated and see writing as communicative, rewarding and
This is where the writer provides ideas and arguments with corresponding analysis, interpretation and evaluation. It also requires proficiency in grammar usage which means a writer should be mindful of the rules and conventions in writing to avoid erroneous sentence structure. Consistency is one of the skills needed in academic writing by making essays free from personal feelings and biases. A clear sense of argument is very important in academic writing because in writing the thoughts of writer would be vividly expressed. One has to give ideas and perception on a certain thing in the surroundings such as real object, picture, text, artifacts, phenomena and