Dear Reader,
I
came into College Composition with useful writing skills that I had learned in
11th grade and also with a love for writing. I loved writing about topics that I was
interested in and that were familiar to me. This class has made me realize that even if you don’t like a
topic to begin with, you can learn to write in depth about it after research
and applying writing techniques used in class. An example of this is for the 9/11 narrative paper. I didn’t have a personal story about
9/11, and I thought that it would be really difficult to come up with a
fictional story about someone’s experience, but after researching the event
more and using “The Ashen Guy: Lower Broadway, September 11, 2001” by Thomas
Beller for references, I was able to come up with a theme and story line. Along with being open to new topics, I
am also able to write with a lot more description through our “explode a
moment” exercises. This technique
makes writing a lot more fun and interesting.
Coming
into this class, my expectations were that we were going to be writing essays
that would help prepare us for assignments that we might receive in
college. I believe these
expectations were met through the modes of writing that we discussed in class
and through the many different writing techniques and strategies that we
learned and applied to our writing.
This class was structured around the different modes of writing that we
took notes on during the very first week of the course. The four categories of writing were
narrative, descriptive, persuasive/argumentative, and expository. Within these units, we went further in
depth and talked about useful techniques such as sensory detail, connotation
and denotation, dominant impression, showing vs. telling, exemplification,
definition, process analysis, and transitions.
I
learned a bunch of helpful tools that have helped me to write more
effectively. Two of these tools
are transitions and the technique of listing. The transitions that we discussed in class: for example, for
instance, at last, instantly, and denotes, all help to make my writing flow
more easily and help the reader to understand the point that I am trying to
convey. Also, with the listing
technique, this comes in handy when there are many different examples that the
reader would benefit from knowing.
For example, when we made a list of our favorite Halloween candy and
then incorporated that list into a short, memorable Halloween story. One of the short pieces we read in
class that used listing was “What Is REALLY in a Hot Dog?” All of the ingredients used in the hot
dog were listed.
Two
major areas in which I grew during this course were my ability to write with
more description, and also, applying various writing techniques to my
writing. One exercise that we did
in class that helped me write with more description was the “explode a
moment.” Instead of writing a
simple sentence about an event that took place, I expanded the moment into
intricate details that really helped to define each specific part of the
event. This technique comes to
mind when I find a boring section in a paper that I am writing, and am then
able to expand that less interesting part into a more descriptive scene. Dominant Impression is another category
under description that I grew in over the course of the semester. When you write a paper with great
detail, the reader can better understand the general feeling/impression about
someone or something that you are trying to introduce. For example, in “The Miss Dennis School
of Writing” story by Alice Steinbach, the dominant impression of Miss Dennis is
influential and inspiring. Another
descriptive technique found in “The Miss Dennis School of Writing” is sensory
detail. This technique helped me
to describe every aspect of the situation that I am explaining. It consists of the five senses: sight,
smell, sound, touch, and taste.
Some pieces that we read in class that use many examples of sensory
details are “The Mute Sense” by Diane Ackerman, and “A View From The Bridge” by
Cherokee Paul McDonald. An example
of sight from “A View From The Bridge” is “blue base-ball caps with gold braid
on the bill and a sailfish patch sewn onto the peak,” and an example of sound
is the boy’s “shrill voice.”
The
other major area that I grew as a writer was using writing techniques. A technique that I learned a lot from
was the showing vs. telling. I
tend to just write pure narration, but the Blog posts helped me to work in
dialogue to create a narration and scene version. This was very helpful in my writing. Another technique was
exemplification. This is a method
of development in which the writer uses a series of examples to support a
point. I tried to use as many strategies
as possible from this technique, such as facts, events, people, statistics, and
details. Two pieces that we read,
“Red, White, and Beer” by Dave Barry and “English Is a Crazy Language” by
Richard Lederer, did a great job of introducing exemplification. Definition was another writing
technique that I improved upon throughout the semester. In my definition paper, I used
strategies such as surface meaning, dictionary definition, compare/contrast,
description, and examples. Lastly,
feedback was very helpful for me during this course. I improved upon my definition paper by reading feedback from
my peers, and also added another example to my exemplification paper after
reading the feedback from Ms. Basko.
It’s important to understand how others perceive your writing and know
new ways to make your writing even better.
As
I read through my first papers and my last, I see a definite improvement in my
ability to write in detail and give many good examples. The tools that helped me the most were the writing
techniques, and I know that as I go off to college, I will always keep them in
mind and continually use them to strengthen my writing and give my pieces a
deeper meaning.
Sincerely Yours,
Sara MacNally
