What Does College Writing Mean To Me

As the semester comes to a close, it is always interesting to look back and reflect on the events and opportunities my English class has given me throughout my first semester as a whole. At the beginning of this semester it was evident that I was feeling uncomfortable due to the adjustment that I was going through as a student moving to college. It was very difficult expressing myself through my writing since I was nervous about good impressions and my good grade. While this class was one of the most difficult courses that I have taken this far, it has become quite evident to me that I have grown a substantial amount as a writer and as a person; Especially, when it came to explaining my ideas, writing academic essays, and making arguments.

First and foremost writing has always been a bit of a challenge for me. My writing in high school was mostly regarding essays about a book I was assigned to read and analyze. I've noticed that there's a difference between my writing in high school and the essays i've wrote so far in college. My writing in college seems to be far more formal and includes complex wording. My writing in college tends to be longer than most essays i wrote in high school and far more detailed.

I began writing with basic vocabulary and barely any sentence variety. As the year progressed, I learned to advance my vocabulary and word choice in addition to incorporating a diversity of sentence structure. Nearing the end of the school year, I acknowledge that I have grown and learned more about writing. I anticipate that I will receive even more arduous writing assignments that require more research and time. Although it will be challenging, I feel confident that I will do well because I feel well prepared from all I’ve done this year. As I grow older, I will have to continue to write. I know I can take the knowledge I’ve learned this year and apply it to future papers for years to

In “Expectations for College Writing,” the author indicates the importance of thinking and communicating to succeed after college. A writer’s style acknowledges a social or academic expression. A writer’s skill to rationalize ideas and think critically demonstrates an essential technique for enhancing communication in the work environment.

“The Novice as Expert: Writing the Freshman Year” reflected my writing experience while I transitioned from elementary writer to a critical writer. Sommers and Saltz write, “freshmen need to see themselves as novice in a world that demands ‘something more and deeper’ from their writing than high school” (Sommers and Saltz 134). This line highlights the hardship that most students face when trying to write successfully. My earlier written works were much weaker than my current pieces because I often wrote for the sake of passing the class. While developing my writing, I focused on the new ideas that were introduced rather than limiting my argument to familiar techniques and ideas. Because of my new attitude towards writing, I began to demand

My high school years were not spectacular, nor were they terribly productive.I left high school without learning how to proficiently write an essay. However, CUNY's Borough of Manhattan Community College afforded me a desperately needed second chance. It was at BMCC that I sharpened many of the skills I should have mastered in high school. I was able to greatly improve my writing ability. I began college as a student who found writing a 2 page paper to be a terrifyingly daunting task, but due to practice and numerous resources offered by CUNY, I soon was able to compose papers consisting of 10-14 pages with confidence and efficiency.

measure our development from the first word to our first sentence,College level-writing isn't much different, being able to fully understand the capability of words will help many excel academically, personally, and professionally. As mentioned before, words are important but having a wide vocabulary, knowing how to modify words to fit specific circumstances, and writing with a purpose all go hand in hand and all contribute to the importance of college level-writing.

The importance of college-level writing is a topic that is very much backed up and accompanied by facts and studies. Writing in the college-level is needed in order to master college work in any class. Basically all classes require you to more than likely submit some kind of research paper or essay. Writing for Learning to Improve Students’ Comprehension at the College Level by Fahad Alharbi as well as Luiza Costa Ribeiro, Writing Essays at College: Why it’s Important both go into detail on how important writing at this level is and all the skills learned for during and after college. As well on how you can benefit from them.

This semester was my very first semester as a college student. Being the first, it was probably the semester I would learn the most in. I learned the expectations for writing that I will have to live up to for the next four years of my college career. Though my high school teachers were usually demanding because I was in the Honors English section throughout high school, writing in college has still ?raised the bar? for me. Also, in high school, we would have weeks to pick a topic, create a thesis, outline the paper, write the paper, and then revise the paper. In college, the time restraints are not quite as lenient. I?ve had to learn to manage my time and be more productive with what free moments I

As the year draws to a close, I reflect on what I have accomplished in my first semester of college. Not only have I grown as a writer but also as a person. This year was full of changes but I am glad that I remained steadfast in my beliefs and skills. While I learned things about myself in this course I also gained important writing and research skills.

Over the course of this past semester, my ability to write has improved tremendously. Prior to undertaking this course, my expertise in writing was not as fine-tuned as it should have been. I had never previously been enrolled in a class specifically tailored to writing-- which was quite clear. Upon reading my past works, it becomes apparent that my writing style consisted of fluff, small words, and inconsistently structured sentences. These problems have, for the most part, been remedied with the coursework I have tackled in College Writing. Rather than long, drawn out papers that take an eternity to reach the primary point, my recent work is much nicer in terms of composition and grammar. I credit these improvements to the three primary

Prior to arriving at Berkeley, I initially had trouble with applying critical thinking skills into interpreting texts and providing meaningful analysis on my essays. Before I encountered a college-level English class in my academic career, I would only showcase minimal, simple explanations that were clearly apparent to the readers without providing any significant observations about the text. I interpreted critical thinking as a crucial, important element in not just English classes, but in any class that required writing essays and understanding the content the textbook. Since I had trouble with developing my critical thinking skills, it was hard for me to develop a strong thesis because like how critical thinking is important in any class one encounters in their academic career, a strong thesis is important because the entire baseline and foundation of a student’s essay revolves around the thesis as well as be able to provide evidence to back up one’s argument. Because these problems would constantly follow me around in any class I encountered, I felt an extreme sense of low confidence that I would not be able to advance as a critical thinker in advanced college classes. However, it was not until the College Writing R1A program thankfully gave me the opportunity to further develop my skills as a reader and a writer in my classes.

Our Senior year is the one that makes memories and major changes in our lives when we grow up and move on to bigger and more exciting things. One of the biggest changes I have seen in my growth this semester was the way my writing changed and evolved into a stronger element able to be used when heading to college. This course made my writing stronger which prepared me for college and for future jobs. This course is one I would recommend for the freshman to take to help them prepare for college writing requirements. The biggest changes I noticed in this course was taking out informal language, making stronger thesis statements and eliminating the wordiness in essays.

I learned the slang phrase “One and done” in the NBA (National Basketball Association) Draft this summer. For non-basketball fans, it simply means that aspiring basketball players will try to get themselves drafted in the NBA after completing only one year in college. During the NBA draft night, the player may or may not get drafted depending on if their skills are viewed by the managers and coaches enough to play in the professional level. Throughout my college writing experience, I have been a “One and done” kind of writer. In this case, it means turning in the first drafts of the papers I write without major revision, something that I regret not doing. Not only because of the not so great feedbacks and grades that I got but also because I knew that I could have done better but for some reasons I decided not to.

Walking into the college writing room for the first time, I was hopeful of learning new skills and more about myself as a writer. Not only did I learn new skills, but overall a better understanding of how I write and how I edit. I still have my disorganizing writing style of a chunk writer, but now I know that having a simple outline can cut out hours of trying to paste the paper back together, trying to make sure it flows correctly. Instead of the old way of writing, I found a better way that still works for me. It’s much more efficient, especially of the deadlines that come faster than they seem. Writing in a classroom never worked well for me, but College Writing allowed me to experiment with what environment worked the best. I found out writing in low-lit library early in the morning with my headphones playing Cello Concerto No. 1 in A Minor op. 33 by Saint-Saëns kept me focused on my goals..