Ten Ways To Think About Writing
The article “Ten Ways To Think About Writing: Metaphoric Musing for College Writing Student” by E. Shelley Reid discuss the various ways in which students make common mistakes in their writing. In my opinion English professors and high school English teachers portray writing as being easy. I was perceived myself as being the only student having difficulties writing. With this being said I am very glad to realize thanks to Reid’s article that I am not the only college student struggling in the same areas as I am.
One way I was able to relate to Reid’s article was the first metaphor “A THOUSAND RULES AND THREE PRINCIPLES”. This metaphor explains how students are told to writing using rules which cause students to have writers block or not writing their personal views but to keep a structure they are told to keep. It also mentions three important principles which are: 1. Write about what sparks your attention or can find to be interested in, 2. Be descriptive, 3. Adjust your writing to your audience. As a student I constantly found it difficult to follow certain rules such as not being able to use “I” or “I before E”. Now the only rules I am going to follow are the three main principles mentioned in the first metaphor hoping to improve my writing.
“SHOW & TELEPATHS” the second metaphor is another great example of a mistake I commonly make in my writing. This metaphor tells how it is easy to loos a reader when your not being precise enough developing an idea. I have noticed in the past that I don’t finish my thought in other words I write as if my reader knows what I am thinking of.
I have also made the mistake of not knowing how to be specific which Reid goes more in depth in her third metaphor “THE LITTLE GREEN BALL AND SOME PEOPLE:DOING DETAILS RIGHT”. I tend to write an idea without using enough facts, statistics and examples. Reid gives the example of a writer speaking about a green ball but the green ball the writer is talking about can be very distinct from the one the reader is imagining. Therefore it is very important to use descriptive language no matter how long a paragraph ends to be.
After reading the fourth metaphor I realized how I could relate to it. In the example “LOST MONEY AND THANK-YOU NOTES: WHAT’S IN AN AUDIENCE?” uses the thought of having to borrow money from different people to explain how a writer has to adapt their writing according to their audience. For example the diction and explanation of why you need money would be different from the reason you give a friend for them to lend you money. Having this example in mind will hopefully aid me to write according to my audience.
It is hard enough for me to write the most important paragraph of an essay to grab a readers attention, but keeping the readers attention is even harder and important. The example “PINK HOUSES & CHORUSES KEEPING READER WITH YOU” makes it easier to understand how we must keep brining up the topic we are writing about but not too much where it gets repetitive. I also agree with Reid when she mentions how teachers amplify the use of a thesis statement and topic sentence but then other teachers say it is not required? This has always confused me but it is clear now to me that we have to warn our reader what we are writing about in one way or another. It is something that has to be done although it does not have to be extremely structured.
Work Cited
Reid, E. Shelley. “Ten Ways To Think About Writing: Metaphoric Musings for College Writing Students.” Ed. Charles Lowe and Pavel Zemliansky. Vol. 2. West Lafayette, IN: Parlor P, 2011. 3-23. Writing Spaces. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.
