The Importance Of Writing In Bonehead Writing

There are many who strive to become famous writers and although some succeed, many do not find such great prosperity. In the words of bestselling author Stephen King, “while it is impossible to make a competent writer out of a bad writer, and while it is equally impossible to make a great writer out of a good one, it is possible, with lots of hard work, dedication, and timely help, to make a good writer out of a merely competent one,” (142). King’s thesis from his novel On Writing can be debated because with “hard work, dedication, and timely help” it is possible for a writer of any skill level to improve to become better. On Writing is intended to teach the basic skills of writing so readers can develop writing skills to progress to be better writers. If one has passion for writing, patience, and the willingness to learn they will succeed in becoming great writers.

While attending writing class, I learned about the 4 steps in writing, bases for revising, organizing, and connecting specific information, and I also learned about the different types of essays such as descriptive, narrative, process, cause and effect and argumentative essay. I have been a student at Milwaukee Area Technical College for 1 semester, and over the course of my enrollment I have grown and learned more that I knew prior to attending this writing course. Participating in this writing class has taught me so much more than stuff about literature and language, it has taught me another way of expressing myself. I have learned here how to write and express myself, how to think for myself, and how to find the answers to the things that I don 't know. Most importantly I have learned how important technique, outlines and organization are. My goal in this paper is to inform writers about how my writing skills have improved.

Teachers, parents, and friends often tell students exactly what the writing process should entail and how long it should take. However, the older I get, the more I realize that the writing process varies not only from person to person, but also from one writing project to the next. Throughout my years of life, I have written countless papers, ranging from a persuasive speech to an extensive research paper, and each project requires an altered version of my personal writing process. While each individual has his own writing process, there can be many similarities between different writing processes. Finding one’s individual writing process takes trial, error, and repetition. When an individual finally uncovers his unique writing process, better thought, work, and writing is produced.

Writing is a practice that most of us were taught when we were young. We were taught the basics of grammar, how to form a sentence, conjunction words, how to write paragraphs and more. Although we have learned this skill while growing up and have used the skill every year after entering kindergarten, this does not mean our writing process will ensure the best work. The authors that I chose each encourage their audience to excel in the art of writing in their own way to help with the writing process.

Writing is different for everybody. After reading the first part of On Writing Well by William Zinsser my perspective toward writing changed; starting off by the fact that he admitted that “writing is indeed hard” (12). This author, with humorous stories and anecdotes, explained several principles that help one understand how to write efficiently. First of all, be yourself! Zinsser emphasizes the fact that you should be true to yourself and your writing in order to engage a reader in your piece. Other essential principles are: Be precise and avoid clutter. He claims that “the secret to good writing is to strip every sentence to its cleanest components” (7). As I read, I noticed how important engaging a reader becomes to an author but Zinsser reminded me how my writing was made to “please myself first” and then an audience (25). The last but not least rules to follow are: to “avoid clichés” (Zinsser, 35) and “separate usage from confusing jargon” (Zinsser, 45). It is important to maintain your reader active by expressing clear thoughts and avoiding typical sayings that only make a literary piece

During this semester in English 107, I have progressed more as a writer. Before I went to University of Arizona, my writing was rigid. I wrote five-paragraph TOEFL style essay all the time in my high school life. After I attended in English 107, I was not confident about my writing skill. Throughout these three projects we have done, I become more and more confident about my writing skill than before. The Student Learning Outcomes also helped me to grow as a writer a lot. In these goals, I did well on several of them, but I still need to work on the other goals.

Since the first time I picked up a pencil and a piece of paper I have been taught how things ought to be done. Dot your i’s and cross your t’s, check your spelling, and do not forget the period at the end of each of your sentences. Writing shows you understand how to fit together facts and bits of information, but when does the real test of knowledge finally come into play? Your writing must express you, while still managing to cover all the appropriate content. All those years ago I wish I would have had someone to teach me that writing could be enjoyable; but for me, it is just another task that must be completed (and a difficult task at that). Writing has always been challenging; a job in other words, which takes time to learn, and despite its best efforts, has attempted to push me to grow.

Writing is not something in which one can become a virtuoso overnight. Becoming a skilled writer takes preparation, creativity, and patience. I as a writer have explored these skills through learning grammar, coming up with fictional and nonfictional stories in one class period, and writing long argumentative research papers.

Writing is something everyone has to do. It is needed in every field, no matter what job you end up with. It can be simple emails to complex lab research papers. Therefore, learning to write correctly is important. It is important to know based on the audience that it will change the way you write and what type of writing you will need to do. In English composition, this semester we worked on this quite a bit. Although, there are some areas in which I improved; there are still other areas in which I need to continue to improve in and have trouble writing as well. Therefore, I will cover some aspects of writing and what I need to improve in my own writing.

If there is anything that this class has taught me, it is that writing is more complex than I ever imagined. I have concluded that writing is like a cake- the good ones are creative with many layers. Coming from a small public school, I was raised on the five paragraph essay style. If you were to get a pile of my senior classes final research papers, it would be hard to tell them apart. We all wrote the same, and our style hardly changed from second grade on. Metaphorically speaking, we all created the same plain vanilla cake.

Before taking my sophomore year of High School, writing was a very big struggle for me. When I first began writing essays in school I did not know how to go about the process. I had struggled many years with how to start the essay and how to make it flow. My first essays were mechanically flawed and constantly changed topic. As I went up each grade level I began to transform my writing a little at a time. Mr. Marhefka’s class helped me set up the organization, but still I did not understand the importance of transitions between paragraphs. I would stop a paragraph and start the next with a completely different topic because I did not what I was doing wrong. After taking my sophomore year of English I definitely changed my writing in many ways. Learning everything I did, I understood many new things that did not make sense before. Having made such changes in the past have made it possible for me to understand more advanced levels of writing that will help my future in many ways.

Recently, my teacher has given me advice and helpful points on becoming a better writer. Writing is not a task that can get better over night; writing is an art. We learn by mimicking the professionals, and making it into our own interpretation. I have learned that when writing an essay, you

The current pedagogical methods of teaching writing are not necessarily effective. A “formulaic” approach to writing limits the originality of the students, thus fomenting a peculiar form of censorship: self- censorship. The experience of the students in learning about writing must “create opportunities for students to engage in meaningful writing” rather than focusing on specific structure (Huntley-Johnson 4). Writing should be made a personal experience, completely contrasting with the teaching of math or science.

Mrs. Brown, my freshman English teacher, sparked my interest in writing as a form of creative expression, rather than the mindless exercise previous teachers had taught me. Instead of encouraging her students to write alongside formal guidelines, Mrs. Brown initially allowed each student to demonstrate their writing abilities through a classic narrative. Her reasoning: narratives allow her to know her students writing style, their strengths, and their weaknesses. It was this unrestricting and optimistic attitude of Mrs. Brown’s which compelled me to express myself clearly in my writing and disregard any inclination of forming an essay which catered to a specific rubric.

Writing had always seemed so calculated. Since fourth grade I was taught that when you write a paper for school it should be a five paragraph essay with an opening paragraph, three supporting paragraphs, and then a closing paragraph. If you wrote in this exact format then you were sure to get a good grade. Up until college writing had always lacked creativity for me and seemed more like formula that was to be followed. Writing had always seemed dull to me and more like a chore rather than a chance to express or research ideas that I truly cared about. It was not until I was in my college writing classes that I began to realize that writing involves a lot more than just following a formula and that writing can be in all different forms with various purposes. College Writing I and II has expanded my knowledge on the different forms writing can come in, what are some of the process steps that can be taken, and that overall writing does not have to be a chore.