Allen Singletary 4-30-2012
Dr. deGravelle Block 2
Writing WrAP up
Throughout the year we have written several different
papers in English class, and in all of them I have seen similarities relating
to weak and strong points of my writing. Out of all of the different sections
including: organization, support, sentence structure word choice, and
mechanics, my best in all of my papers was word choice and organization. My
worst seemed to always be sentence structure and organization, while the
others, such as overall development and support were always somewhere in the
middle.
My strongest point
in nearly every paper was my word choice because nearly every time I was
describing something in writing I would get a positive comment on the clarity
of the description. I was glad to see that feedback because whenever I read I usually
find that the setting and descriptions interest me the most out of all the
different aspects in writing. I am also a very visual person and tend to
picture the characters and landscape when I read, so that might have helped me
be clearer.
The worst points in
my writing are usually sentence structure and organization, but in the wrap
test it said that sentence structure and support were the most lacking. In the
wrap test support was probably lower than usual because we don’t get to
research the topic and this could have caused some uncertainty when writing.
Organization is one of my lows because if you know me you probably already have
realized that I am not exactly a very organized person, so when I write my ideas
and thoughts come randomly in short bursts so it is hard to organize them on a
timed assignment. Finally, my absolute lowest point in every paper I have ever
written is my conclusion. When I try to write conclusions it feels unnatural because
lots of the time I feel like I'm repeating what I just said in the body.
The rest of the
aspects of my writing will sometimes vary in quality, depending on the subject
or point of the paper. Usually the things that vary are my introduction and
just following instructions. My introductions used to be my lowest point, but I
figured out how to keep them relevant and interesting. Following instructions
is also in the middle because I will start out knowing exactly what I'm doing,
but as the paper goes on I stray farther from the original point and I lose
what my main idea was going to be.
This year I have
improved a lot on most of my writing, and a lot of it is due to getting a
tutor, but my best improvement seems to be organization and maybe word choice.
I learned how to read my own writing and find the “foggy” spots where my organization
has caused something to become unclear and my vocabulary has improved because I
learned some words from my tutor. This year I do think that Dr. D has graded me
harder than my past English teachers, but I have definitely learned where I need
to work on my papers the most. I still need to work on my conclusions more than
anything, but at least I have still improved in my other areas of writing and I
now know to look more carefully when using the rubric to grade myself. Overall
my writing has improved and I know not to procrastinate as much when writing
essays, so my freshman English year has been positive.
Common Errors:
More creative titles: The title of my personal narrative was, “Personal
Narrative”, I need to make sure that I come up with creative titles for papers.
Book titles: I need to make sure I put correct title formats and not just
quotes like, “Hatchet”, by Gary Paulsen.
Hyphens: I need to use hyphens on things like, “fast paced”
Sizes: unlike I did in the profile paper, I need to find different ways
to tell sizes
Commas- I need to put commas after prepositional phrases such as, “Off to
my right is a stream”, which should be, “Off to my right, there is a stream”.
Transitions: I need to make sure my transitional phrases flow well with
the thesis
Possessive apostrophes: I need to make sure I show possession, “the dogs
bone” should be “The dog’s bone”
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