The Importance Of Writing

It is essential to understand that classes taken in grade school do not give students a full understanding of each subject. With the topic of writing, there will always be a new lesson to learn, an aspect to improve, or a differing way to explain. Author Craig Vetter states in Bonehead Writing, “This is your enemy: a perfectly empty sheet of paper. Nothing will ever happen here except what you make happen.” Each story, essay, or response comes from a writer’s experiences. With each attempt at a new piece comes an underlying story of emotions the writer is facing. Each person’s writing is unique and the ideas people have are related to their past experiences and what they believe to be familiar with when deciding which writing style to use. As a high school student, I have learned many things about writing that helped me become the improved writer I am today, but the most essential advice I have received is practice makes perfect. Although there is no actual perfect way of writing, I have discovered that each essay I write, my writing improves. It is easier to spot mistakes, find areas to improve, and ponder elevated word choice to use.

As time passes, my writing has matured. When I was in sixth grade, the sentences I wrote were short and curt. They improved in seventh grade, but then my writing became long and repetitive. Rereading them now, I realize how much my writing style has developed. My vocabulary has expanded and has become more diverse. My papers flow smoothly and are well-worded. Moreover, the

Late one chilly Sunday afternoon I decided to find out what course I would be attending next. When I opened my course schedule, I saw the next course was going to be English Composition; my heart fell into my feet. My eyes instantly filled with water, and I started to pout like a child; I sulked for the next two days. The reason for this extreme level of distress over a writing class is because, writing courses intimidate me, and I usually do not like writing. My dislike for writing stems from my childhood; I never had the opportunity to learn to write correctly as a child. Therefore, my writing skills are very dissatisfactory. Having dissatisfactory writing skills has sparked a dysfunctional relationship between writing and

I’ve always loved to write. Something about creating a new world that people could just get lost in is so fulfilling. I’d find whoever I could to read my work and praise me. It’s baffling thinking that stories and pieces of writing are all just words. Words put together with capitalization, punctuation, and style. The kicker is how those words are put together though. Words put together poorly can be incomprehensible. But, words put together just right can spark interest, thought, and amazement. When I recognize a great book or even a great sentence, I appreciate how well it is put together and soak up as much knowledge as possible to better my own writing.

Personally, I feel I am a strong writer who is creative and has a strong understanding of the elements of writing. I enjoy writing because it is a way for me to creatively express my thoughts and emotions. Writing is both a stress reliever and a passion for me.

Writing is more complex than the naked eye can understand. Over thousands of years, writing has evolved, people have created their own styles, and many, many rules have been created. Through reading such as Verlyn Klinkenborg’s, “Several short sentences about writing’, along with Paul Graham’s, “The Age of the Essay”, the reader is taught to ‘notice what you notice’. The main message of these texts were to focus my mind on avoiding all the rules taught during high school, and to rather write well-thought out sentences that can be short but precise. Short sentences get the point across quicker and straight to the point. Klinkenborg strives to get across to the reader that sentences should be reworked, rethought, and possibly even thrown into the sentence graveyard before it is ever written onto paper. This can be seen when he says that, “Most of the sentences you make will need to be killed.” (Klinkenborg, 13). Sentences shouldn’t be meaningless strings of words combined into a prolonged statement called a sentence, but rather should act as a description of something one notices. Both authors get the point across that all pieces of work that were merely forced are easily distinguishable from those that are well-thought out and well-versed through effort and time.

Some ancient writers, with their thinking expressed by their pen, are remembered by their contribution to our society. Their thoughts are part of our daily language. For instance, “people without literature are people without culture are people without future.” Or, as an old thinker said “they want me to believe that I do not exist that I am nothing, but I refuse to accept that I do not exist, because I think, and because I think I know that I exist, and because I think and exist I write, and because I write I am sure that I exist that I am not nothing.” Those ancient reflections or sayings highlight the importance of writing. However, writing is complex as complex is the human being.

Writing has never been something that I have really enjoyed or was particularly good at. Every year I have been required to take an english class and it has always been one of my most challenging classes, especially if it involves a lot of writing. One reason I never really got better is that I only wrote when I had to for a class. Outside of school or my english classes I would avoid writing as much as possible because I really didn’t enjoy it. However the main reason I hated it was because I wasn’t very good at it and it always just seemed very tedious. Over the years I have started to improve at writing slowly and it has become less of a dreaded thing. This class has been one of the most helpful in teaching me actually how to structure and craft a good essay. I was going to take advanced comp as recommended by my sister but I’m glad I took this class because I got a lot more instruction on writing than I would have in advanced comp. Before this class I didn’t have a lot of writing skills other than basic stuff that wasn’t enough to really make quality essays that I was proud of. And even when I liked an essay that I wrote it usually had flaws that came from me just not being an experienced writer. Coming into this class I had lots to work and improve on and over the course of the semester I feel like I have improved and learned a lot. My first essay was far worse than my last few and it has been mainly due to practice and more knowledge that I gained in this class.

There is much more to writing than just a cognitive process. People outside of the classroom write to be able to communicate with a certain type of audience, and they do this from the knowledge they have on content and writing and basic writing skills. This probably comes very easy to someone who considers themselves a good writer. However, students who struggle with the writing process require more assistance and more profound instruction in not only skill but strategy.

Twelve years of limited writing experiences provides challenges for a writer. There were the little three to five-page essays my teachers would assign every once in a while, but these assignments did not provide opportunities that allowed me to find myself as a writer. I don’t feel like I ever received formal instruction about how to write. It seems that the more I write, the more I realize that it’s not so much about the topic we’re writing about--it’s the way we express ourselves within the writing piece itself. One experience allowed me to express my writing in a sententious way, which made me like writing.

Writing is a continuous journey that begins in one’s elementary years and should hopefully gradually progress all the way up to college. While in elementary school, you learn the basics of composing literature, like stringing together sentences to make one short story, high school is when one’s writing skills should develop the most. Throughout my high school experience, my writing abilities have not gradually been attained. Over these, almost, four years, I have had a couple breaks in the increase of my writing skills. In ninth grade, I took an academic class, fearful of the fact that I would not be able to survive in an honors English class. That year was the longest break of my writing competence. In this class, the teacher gave us “our” rough draft essay. We would have to copy the essay by hand onto a paper, then type it, and she would grade us on the correctness of the paper, leading to everyone usually getting a one hundred. She said this is the way we would learn to write “proper” essays and we completed this cycle for every essay we “wrote.” I felt as though I lost a whole year to expand my writing ability, so the next year I took tenth grade English Honors. In tenth grade, I was genuinely pushed to do my best writing; although, it was intimidating because this teacher gave us less instructions, almost like a college professor would. I found this way that I really enjoy writing essays and writing about all the complicating ideas that came to mind when we were

How important is writing to you? Some people believe that writing is not important on a daily basis, others believe it is extremely valuable to know how to do. There are different ways writing is beneficial. You use writing on an everyday basis and sometimes don’t even notice it. There are many different ways of writing. I personally believe that writing is very important. I discussed this topic and other writing topics with a professor at Shawnee Community College.

The physical act of writing is mostly thought to be lost in the modern age. Anymore everything is done electronically the need to type is even becoming a thing of the past. The disconnection to the actual act of writing is causing it to seem less important. Writing is an incredibly important tool in modern society and in general. It offers great benefits intellectually as well as creatively. HelpingWritersBecomeAuthors.com published an article in the form of a poster to convey the importance of writing. Their efforts to convey this message to through the visual means as well as their appeals to logos, pathos, and ethos is very effective to a specific audience and still effective on a larger scale.

I have come to realize that writing is not only writing long papers. It can include any form of written communication. After graduating high school, I knew I wanted to be an engineer. From just looking in, I expected engineers not to write often. Engineering appeared to be just science and math. While researching, I came across an article about how effective communication is for 21st century engineers. After this, I knew I would be writing on the job. Writing helps current and future engineers communicate with people of other disciplines, understand tasks, and help improve ideas.

Writing 100 has taught 6 important outcomes to know while writing. Three of these key factors are subject matter knowledge, writing process knowledge, and rhetorical knowledge. Subject matter knowledge is important to know while writing to make sure you understand what you are writing about. Another important aspect while writing is the writing process knowledge, to have instructor and peer-review while writing is vital in catching mistakes while writing. It is necessary to be aware of rhetorical knowledge while writing, in order for the audience to understand the writing the writer must know the audience. Subject matter knowledge, writing process knowledge, and rhetorical knowledge are three key factors to know while writing.