Throughout my life, the English language has acted as something much more than a communicative tool. Because I emigrated from Germany to the US when I was almost five years old, my adoption and ongoing usage of the English tongue has connoted a change of cultural, and even personal, identity in my life. I did not know one word of English when I arrived in the US in 2004, and so, as I learned English, thus I became familiar with the new life I would live on the other side of the Atlantic. I quickly became fluent in English and entered public school after one year of preschool. I remember that, for the first hundred days of kindergarten, I did not utter one word. This was not due to a lack of English ability, but rather to my shyness and the fact that I was still acquainting myself to the norms of existence in the US. Following this, my shyness
While writing might seem like a simple task, it can be a daunting task for a lot of people. Sometimes it can be hard to express the ideas in your mind in the words of a paper. This results in a disconnect with what a writer may actually think. A great writer is one that can transform his thoughts into words perfectly. This is a craft that takes many years to perfect, which is why writing is troublesome for a lot of us. Many students also have had bad experiences with writing. Maybe they had a teacher that didn’t try to support them and their writing. They might not have ever gotten the help they needed and may feel that they are in a hole where their writing can’t get better. At this point, they just accept that their writing will never get better.
Think about your experiences of writing at college. Which types of assignments have you found helpful in strengthening your writing skills? Where do you want to improve your writing? What’s the most useful advice you’re received that’s helped you improve your writing. Be as specific as possible.
A person can read and write a great deal in one day whether they realize it or not. Whether it be texting a friend or reading a textbook for a certain class, you are reading and writing constantly and a daily basis. What surprised me the most about the reading and writing that I did on Sunday was how much I am reading and writing on my phone. Whether I am texting to coordinate plans with a friend for the night or reading a random article I saw while reading a Facebook news feed, I am constantly reading and writing on my phone. I never considered it reading and writing when I used my phone, I just saw it as looking at my phone. Just staring at this four-inch screen for some sort of entertainment. What also surprised me was how much we read without noticing it. You can walk down State Street and you will be constantly reading by looking at stores, posters, or even words on a bus that is passing by. Our eyes and brains are looking at and reading words all the time.
My experience have been good but not so good. I'm not the best writer I struggle to get my ideas down.
During my past writing experience, I have struggled with formulating and initiating interesting points of discussion, grammar, and transitions. I have often sat down to work on a paper and found myself completely drawing a blank on anything interesting to write about. Whether I am given a specific prompt or general topic to discuss, I constantly struggle with finding a starting point. Once I do, I become too focused on trying to create a poetic sounding paper, rather than focusing on the main discussion points. In some ways, focusing on making my papers poetic have added detail and depth to my writing. However, this frequently distracts me from my papers main theme. One of my biggest drawbacks with writing has always been proper grammar usage.
Lacking experience in writing and reading, English is my most feared subject. It is the one and only vulnerable spot in my in my mind. I hate writing and I hated reading, other than sports pages in the newspaper or sports books. My earliest time that I started reading and writing was extremely abhorrent for me. Sometimes, you could even say that some of these experiences bothered me. It was quite hard because I wasn’t able to focus on what I need to do. I was even struggling to write my own name. The young mind that I had, it was so easy to get distracted on what I need to learn and also accomplish, especially for the future ahead of me.
I became the literate person I am today by mostly writing, I write all the time and I do a little reading. What made me love writing was the fact I found an escape, not on an emotional level, but writing is something to help ease in my opinion. My personal writing has influenced me more than the writing I was assigned in school, I continued it outside of school as a choice of my own, once I started I never stopped. My viewpoint on reading is different than my viewpoint on writing, reading is not that bad but it can get boring. What made me feel different about reading from writing, is probably the fact, reading just takes time, like when I write, I write any and everytthing however I want. But, to read a book, I have to read it a certain way
Reading and writing has always created a sense of understanding for me in my art. Reading in the literal sense is a way that we understand text or symbols in our minds which in turn create meaning. Writing also in a literal sense is our way of communicating our knowledge and emotions to others through symbols in text. The human experience for all people includes communication and through reading and writing this experience is created. From the beginning of this course, my only prior experience with reading and writing were high school level course over literature and reading. I had an average level of rhetoric,reading,writing and language overall however, understanding the significance of these subjects was never put forth in such a way until I took this course. I discovered through this course that reading is a combination of not only our “visual information” but also our “nonvisual information”. My comprehension of reading has evolved from reading
One of my most challenging experiences in writing was actually in Virginia Wesleyan College. During my last semester, I was taking Professor Ruh’s ENG 250 class called 19th Century American Women Writers, and we were required to write a few literary analytical essays on novels and short stories that were written by women during the 19th century. Even though the class was very interesting, I was having such a hard time writing my essays that I actually thought I would never be able to pass his class after I failed my first essay. I am usually the type of student that never asks for help because I would often feel intimidated by my teachers. However, I managed to speak up and ask for his help throughout the entire semester and because of that,
Writing allows me to express my views as a student. I have always enjoyed writing well as speaking. By writing first, then preparing and reciting notes, I am able to push through the nervous jitters when I have to speak at work. Writing first, then speaking will help you get a clear message across (Young, 2006). For me, being able to write has been healing. As I am sure most families experience issues of some kind, my family had many issues while I was a child. So, writing was and still is a tool for me to get things out and off of mind. A few friends of mine say they do not like to write and would not do it unless they had to. I encourage them to find something they want to learn about, then read about it and the writing will come. We can become passionate in writing about what we are interested in learning about (Quinn, 2015). Well, I do have to write for this class and for school in general. But, I choose to view it as an extension of what I already like to do, which is express my thoughts and understandings about what I read or study. The only difference with school is that someone is telling me what I have to read or study. This can make the learning less passionate, but if I can find one little thing that I can grab on to, it seems to provide me with a purpose to write.
My grandmother always told me that education was the key to all success. When I was a little girl, she taught me how to read bible stories and children books. She also taught me basic writing skills. When I was in elementary school, it was always easy for me to read and write, but that changed once I got in high school. Once I got in 10th grade, I always struggled with writing papers. I always felt that everyone could write essays with no problem, while it took me ten minutes to write one sentence. My mind would always go blank when it came to writing papers. I used to be confidence when it came to writing, but now I feel that I will never be able to write a good essay.
1. I've never considered myself much of a writer. I'm expecting that we will be writing often in this course so, one of the goals I'm hoping achieve from English106 is to become more accustomed to writing. Once this is accomplished, it will easily allow me to make further improvements on my writing abilities. My second goal is to become an active reader. Active reading will allow me to pick up an in dept perspective and pose unique questions on the novel. My third goal is to improve on my analysis skills. I often find myself incapable to analyzing a piece of literature to a deeper level. Hopefully discussions during conferences will me to come up with a deeper analysis of passages.
Who comes to mind when defining an exceptional writer? King, Shakespeare, or perhaps Hemingway? Far away from these talented writers I find myself defining a good writer as someone with passion. Throughout the course of my writing experience I feel I’ve transitioned from being inarticulate to being open minded and finally leading me to have a goal on my fluency and creativity.
All throughout my years of schooling, I’ve had just about, one paper that was about one page long, due every year. My papers never had to be more than one page in length. Therefore, I did not have to do much writing or do many essays. Surely not enough to remember any of the assignments. Writing has never been something I enjoyed doing, so I never bothered to many any memories of my writing experiences. I did not think it was necessary to remember any of them since I only had to do them to get a grade. The only writing experience I remember was the first assignment I had in this English 100 class about a writing experience. All week long, I sat there thinking about what to write about, but nothing came to mind as a topic. Then, one thing came to mind, but it was so very vague, I could not write the length that was needed for the assignment. I could only think of a few sentences to write for it. After sitting for a few moments longer, I thought, how about I write about how difficult it was for me to write this essay before it was due.