Villain of Writing

this is the last revisment that i’ll post!

December 2, 2009 at 9:40 pm (Uncategorized)

i have a couple more papers to revise but this will be the last one that i post on this blog.  in the face of sounding cheesy and stereotypical i will reference this song in honor of this very first paper i did for this english class.  so without the intention of being cheesy i’ll take you back to the start…

Ashley Krolikowski

Alley

English V01A

December 2, 2009

Readings on Writing 1: The Everyday Writer and The Craft of Revision

            The first chapter of Donald M. Murray’s The Craft of Revision discusses rewriting before writing.  This was a concept that I did not entirely understand.  How can you re-do something before you actual do it?  I kept thinking about it through out my reading and the answer I received did not explain the concept as well as I would have liked.  The answer, apparently, is that rewriting is a process where you consider the thoughts in your head before you write them.  The problem with this answer is that it did not explain how you could call that rewriting, however that was the only problem I had with this chapter.  There were plenty of things I found helpful such as the techniques for thinking of what to write.  This is includes brainstorming (which I have tried before but this chapter explains it better) and interviewing oneself on the topic at hand.  The brainstorming will help think of what to write and the interview will help me process the information I have on the subject.  The last part I liked was how the author made an emphasis on revision and how you can always go back and make a piece of writing better.

            This particular text was chosen to be read because it was the first chapter in the book and it makes sense to start from the beginning and to go from there.  It was also chosen because it has information that prepares a student for writing which, makes sense to read in preparation for an assignment such as a paper or an essay. 

            In comparison Andrea A. Lunsford’s The Everyday Writer explains how to revise a piece of writing.  I found it interesting how it made a point to state the common errors that students make and by stating these errors the book showed specifically what to look for when revising a piece of writing.  I am still uncertain about the placement of commas and hyphens but I am now more confident in writing sentence fragments.  I also found the section on college writing interesting because it had a paragraph on formal emails, which can help me outside of the classroom.  There was also a section on class presentations.  It had some great advice on how to be prepared for a presentation and how read off of a script or note cards.   The advice on PowerPoint presentation was especially helpful because I sometimes put too much information on one slide.  The last section was the least help because I found most of the information to be basic commonsense.  However it had some good information if you aren’t technologically inclined and is something I can refer to if I need some pointers.

            This text was chose to be read because it had a lot of information on grammar, college writing, presentations, and multimedia formats.  In addition, it has information on preparation for writing in different areas of the English curriculum.  So if we have to do a presentation or speak in a group those who read the assigned reading will be better prepared or those who make grammar errors often will be better prepared to revise those errors.  The reading will also help those who read prepare for the essay assignment that the class will receive in the immediate future.

Works cited

Lunsford, Andrea A.  The Everyday Writer.  Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2009.  Print.

Murray, Donald M.  The Craft of Revision.  Boston: Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2004.

            Print.