Strategies 313-328

I like the points that the first paragraph makes about reading texts. Sometimes I find myself reading pages and pages and not even realizing that I'm not paying attention. Especially if it's something that I'm not interested in. Skimming a text is easy enough. That is usually as far as my reading goes. That way when important things pop out at me, I can read those over again. I actaully do always underline word I don't know, but I never find myself looking them up, so I dont really think that does me any good. I think it's a good idea to read the text and take notes as I'm reading the text. I know I wont read it over again, so there is no point in reading it once then reading it again to take notes over it. "When you summarize, you restate a text's main ideas in your own words, leaving out most examples and details." I agree and disagree with this. Usually when I can sum something up, it means I understand it. If i can restate it in my own words, it will usually stay in my head forever. However, it does leave room for error because what if I sum something up that I think I understand but I don't?

More analyzing 518-553

More interpreting. For analyzing, I think it's easier to ask yourself the questions they have in this chapter. That way, you have something to start with then you can just build upon that. "When you analyze a text, you are basically arguing that the text should be read in a certain way." So i don't know if analyzing is more along the lines of a persuasive essay or a research paper like I thought before. "The sheer volume of it requires us to take in everything as a whole, absorbing much while actually seeing very little." I like this because even though it is actually in an analysis, it explains analyzing as well. I would need to look at the piece as a whole, then see what I want to see and talk about it. That is how I interpret that quote.

Analyzing 39-59

I didn't know analyzing something involved so much. I don't understand if analyzing has a right or wrong answer or if it just my opinion. When William Safire analyzes "A Spirit Reborn", it sounds like he knows exact facts, not stating his own opinion. When I analyze something, I just talk about what I see and read. "When you interpret something, you explain what you think it means." So I guess that answers my question. However, what if you interpret something completely wrong? So i use resources from the text and outside sources. Analyzing texts seems like it's similar to doing a research paper. My senior year, I had a teacher named Mr. Funk who taught my class how to annotate texts. So i can ask myself what certain things mean then state my opinion. "Having read the text carefully, think about what you find most interesting or intriguing and why." So don't analyze word for word, I will only point out what is most appealing to me.

219-223 Editing/Proofreading

"Your goal is not to acheive "perfection" so much as to make your writing as effective as possible for your particular purpose and audience." I really like that quote. It is on the first page and I think it was really good to start the chapter. Sometimes when I write papers I am just always thinking of perfect grammar, perfect punctuation, and make it perfect for the audience I am presenting it to. Editing words. I don't like thinking about that. I have to admit, when I use a small word I just click on the right side of the mouse and find that thesaurus tab. I never look up the word in the dictionary. I dont even look it up on line. Sometimes in highschool teachers would write on my paper that the word didnt make sense in the sentence. I need to work on not being lazy and checking my words.

213-218 Responses and Revising

I really only like when teachers revise my papers. I feel like when students revise it, they don't get every problem. I always want to know exactly what is wrong and exactly how to fix it. Since I really don't care that much when I revise people's papers, I really dont think they care when they revise my papers. Deadlines are a big problem for me. Sometimes I just think I can do a paper in an hour, and papers need a lot more time than that. They take several steps to write. I like how on page 215, the author says to give yourself a break from writing. Like walk away from your paper for a little bit. That makes sense to me. That could be why my papers aren't always that good. I usually just write the whole paper all at one time and a lot of mistakes are made. I don't feel like I would ever completley rewrite a paper in another form. I dont think that is worth it. If your paper is supposed to be an arguement, why rewrite it as a story? That seems like wasting time that you could just be spending on revising the actual paper and make it what it is really supposed to be.

208-212 Assessing my writings

I think it's a good idea to start any writing off as free writing. No matter who it's for or what it's about. Then after you have let your thoughts flow on the subject, you can begin to assess it. Usually when I write I just do it really fast to get it over with, but this chapter makes really good points. Free writing is really easy and it would give me a chance to just say what I want to say before I censor it. This chapter also has good tips on how to censor my writing. "Purpose, audience, genre, stance, and media/design." These are all points that I can look at when I am revising my free writing. I think audience is probably one of the most important. I need to make my point based on what the audience wants to hear and based on the point that I want to make.

Organizing my thoughts

This is very hard for me to do when I write. I have all of these ideas and thoughts in my mind but I can't put them down on paper. I dont know how to organize all of my thoughts. I like how they give me the idea to free write for ten to fifteen minutes to see what is on my mind and to give me and idea on what exactly it is I want to write about. I would basically do it is steps. First I could free write, then I could put it into categories of some sort, then comes the outline. The outline would be the hardest part for me because thats when I have to be super organized and my thoughts have to be completley settled and I need to know what it is I want to write about.

The power of reading and writing

The stories that were told in this chapter gave me a lot to think about. I think that I take advantage of the fact that I can read and write decently, and some people don't even get that privevledge. I could never see myself sitting down and copying the whole dictionary down and enjoying myself. However. Malcolm didnt have the advantages that I had. When we were talking about the english language in class, I said I don't think there is such thing as proper english. People cannot help where they come from or who the grow up around. No matter who says whats improper and whats not, people are going to continue to speak how they want to. Language and ways of speaking is a culture. Writing and speaking and knowing how to read is an important part of everybody's life, and if someone doesn't get that luxury, there is a lot to miss out on.

Narratives?

I hate narratives. I think they are one of the hardest ways to write. I can't bring myself to write like I'm in someone elses mind. I try to be creative but I always end up putting something down that I have already heard before and I feel like that is plagierizing. One of the things that I think is very helpful in this chapter is describing the setting. I never thought of to just look and see and smell the things around. I also liked how they explained to choose the topic. It would be so easy to just think of something taht happened to me but just ellaborate on it a bit. The biggest problem for me in narratives is the quotations in the story. I never know where to put them and the longer the story it gets, the hardest it is to place the quotations.

Discovering writing 3-17

One point I like that this book brings up is how the audience's expectaions might affect the way you compose and define your purpose when you write. I do this when I know I have to read a paper outloud or know someone else is reading it. I try not to, but it's hard to pour your thoughts on a piece of paper and be expected to read them to your peers. However, I could use this to my advantage. I can learn to write my paper to make the audience think and feel how I do. I just have to practice how to do that. This way I won't have to worry about what they are thinking because I will know how to convince them to think like me as I read my paper to them.

Writing with attitude is difficult for me. It's hard to write something when I just want to speak it. I just think of all these things in my head, but I can never get them down on paper. I have to learn how to identify my attitude in the first place and decide how I would like my paper to sound. The design sends out a ceratin message as well. I never thought of writing as something you can make your own. I always just thought I was writing and researching what my teacher wanted to hear.

Kellee's first blog!

Hello

This is my first blog ever. I think it might take me a while to learn how to work it so sorry!