Reflective Essay: Improving My Writing Process

When I communicate, I will focus on what my audience needs or wants to learn, not on what I feel like telling them. Strive to see things from their perspective. Writing is a complex mixture of skills which works best for me by breaking down the process. The writing process involves a series of steps to follow such as pre-writing, drafting, editing, and publishing. I found that by focusing on the process of writing, I learn to write successfully. Developing the act of writing down into distinct steps allows me to maintain perspective on my writing, to understand that the feedback is about a specific aspect of my writing, and to discover that I can master and yes, even enjoy writing! Plagiarism content symbolizes that you have not worked carefully

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.

Upon entering English 111, I knew I would be writing papers. However, I did not anticipate how much room I had for improvement. Throughout this term I have been enlightened with so much knowledge that I may have forgotten or have been exposed to for the first time. Certainly, my experience with essay writing has been solidified due to newfound knowledge of proper work citing, MLA standards and the steps of planning an essay. Perhaps, my time away from a learning environment slowed me down a bit, other times I feel as though I have an advantage due to life experience. An online environment has certainly been challenging but throughout the course I have provided solid work and consistent grades commendable of an A grading.

Before I start to write a research paper, I do research and collect all available information about that subject. I take notes, bring all available data together, and analyze them. Whenever I feel ready, I start writing. I can describe my framework better, and organize writing easily with this strategy. So, I feel more comfortable when I write.

I immensely struggled when writing. Taking my scrambled thoughts and uncoordinated analysis and converting it into clean and understandable words on a page was arduous. I could not express my thoughts in proper academic format. I understood the importance of writing to every subject. It was essential that I learn to condense my ideas and feeling into coherent written word. After much debate, I decided that the best way to improve my writing skills was to take an advanced English course.

Looking back at this year I know that developing my writing was something that was there but needed some improvement. When there were no teachers around to go over my writing I found websites that would correct my grammar and used that to my advantage. This would either make or break my writing because it could make it shorter or longer. My writing when there is a rubric to follow is great because I know what to follow but with reflections like these, it’s hard to develop good

I totally agree with what the author is saying in the text. It takes time to get a good product out even though we think some people are deep and wonderful they still have the same struggles that we have when it comes to writing. I like this text because it is realistic it is giving an account of first drafts from common day people and shows how it is even for professional writers have problems with. This point is important because as people we sometimes feel we are not as good or capable of doing something not realizing that the people we look up to have the same problems we do. Another point that I agree with the author on is that you have to start somewhere. Many times as writers we don’t know where to start when it comes to writing. That being said we will just sit and think for ten twenty minutes when we could've just been information on the paper and then editing it later. In addition I liked that the author used examples from his professional experience when it came to writing food reviews. By him using details like how he went to the restaurant and sat down with friends and took notes of what was said. This was good to me because it helps me connect with him and the things that he does to write his reviews.

     One of the techniques I am going to use through out college is talking to

The writing process has always been a challenge for me. Especially if it has a due date. In the past, I have always procrastinated the process and that never ended well. I knew something had to be done and I needed to come up with ways to make writing a little easier. So, I sat down and I started to look at writing in smaller steps. I started to plan how I was going to finish a paper without getting so anxious and overwhelmed. This process has helped me a lot along the way and I am going to share my process with you.

I think I’ve done more writing this year than I have in the last 4-5 years combined, perhaps even since high school. I don’t remember any significant writing projects I did K-12 except for a term paper on postpartum depression and some occasional poetry. At this point in my life when I really do need the writing skills, I regret not taking papers seriously or appreciating the art of good written communication. Writing objective papers has not been a problem since the layout is simply good logic and researching reliable information. There isn’t pressure to keep your audience’s attention by painting a mental image to get the reader immersed. Even with this journal entry, I’m not anxious about capturing the reader as these are simply my thoughts as they come to me while I type.

My first semester as a college student has been a roller coaster. In English Composition Ⅰ, I wrote many papers; some stood out more than others. The papers I am most proud of are “One House, A Million Things”, “Not Another Family”, and “Starbucks or Starsucks?”. Throughout the course of the semester, I have learned new ways to express my thoughts on a new level. The basics of my writing process has stayed the same, but I have learned new techniques. I always have a topic in mind first, then I normally just start babbling on and on about the topic. This semester we learned to ‘rip the roo’; in other words erase the entire thing and restart. I do not have to completely rip the roo every single time, but ripping part of the roo has become a huge part of my process. I will erase a section here or there to make the flow work better. Once I have my rough draft where I want it, I go back and fine tune the paper to make sure all aspects are where they need to be.

When rereading my major paper one, I noticed a few issues but also a few improvements. My writing had improved from exercise one tremendously, I managed to really focus on making this paper an informational paper whereas in my other writing I struggled with putting my opinion in. My writing also improved in the grammatical sense I noticed fewer comma splices and run on sentences. My paper had taken on a professional tone, that my previous writing lacked. Areas my writing could still use some improvement though is in introducing quotations, when reviewing back through my paper I noticed many of the quotations were awkwardly placed or just not introduced correctly. My writing could also see improvement in avoiding the repetition of certain

I tend to devote the most time to this step. Especially for grad program with extensive research, lots of research. Searching for resources and reading the references. Then, putting thoughts together and organizing them in the outline. Making introduction, stating the thesis, supporting text body and concluding the paper. Paying attention to detail and patience in this step does make it easier for me further in the process.

The course English 2 provided informational work that can help further my writing skills in other courses. I have always had a hard time with grammar when it comes to typing papers or in general speaking. I really did not understand what a thesis statement was before this class, while I still struggle with thesis today; I have an understanding of what a thesis should be. It should be a statement and not a question, which I originally thought was the thesis. One of my favorite parts of the course was learning the definitions of ethos, pathos and logos. The terms really add a lot to describing events in the world or adjectives in an essay. One of my favorite parts of the course was working on the bibliography, which I had never done in any course.

Over the course of my studies at university, I have grown and learned more about academic writing and numerous writing styles. I believe there is so much room for me to master my writing skills to succeed and complete my degree and improve my academic writing and personal skills through more practice. However, I have become concerned with my first attempt submitting my piece of paper through the online test in the Writers’ Diet diagnostic tool and was labelled ‘flabby’ in my writing. Analysing my errors and referring to the textbook ’Communication Toolkit’ by Grellier and Goerke (2014), also submitting my piece of writing to Grammarly and paper rater I was able to measure my weakness in the area of sentence structure, punctuation and grammar.