Brendon Canal
Professor Wend
Composition I
13 October 2015
Distraction
The article I chose focuses on the concept of distractions whenever people write. It is a common thing amongst any and all writers. The author of the article talks about how he was taught some right and wrong methods of avoiding distraction. For instance, he was taught to never go on the internet for it supposedly doesn’t help with writing in any way. He exclaims that he knows where those people were coming from, however, he is certain that what they said is untrue. The author also gives a few tips on how to avoid any potential distractions that one may encounter. The one that really caught my eye was the last one that mentions real time communication tools. It’s the one
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I, myself, do not have set daily word goals whenever I write because I like to mostly write what comes to mind almost immediately after it pops up in my head. I do think it would be helpful to have a daily word goal and I honestly am considering having such a thing in the future. However, I prefer to just speak my mind in my writing without having to constantly check my word count to see if I have reached the daily word goal. That alone could be a distraction in and of itself. Not really a jarring one, mind you. Besides, I always enjoy not checking my word count after writing for a period of time. When I get tired, I check my word count and see how much I have accomplished. Usually what happens is I grow tired of the writing session, check the word count, and get somewhat impressed with myself for writing more than I initially thought before checking. This could potentially be used as some sort of drive to keep me writing. It is that feeling of accomplishment that I get after seeing if I wrote, say, 100-200 plus words with what feels like a mere 50 words. But I could definitely see myself using a set daily word goal for future assignments if I ever have a bigger workload than I already
One for example is when he talks about how he used to be deeply immersed in readings and now after two or three pages he says “I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. I feel as if I’m always dragging my wayward brain back to the text. The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle.” (Carr, 1). Most people would look at the statement and agree. With social media prevalent in society today and with the length of articles getting shorter and advertisements constantly popping up it’s hard to stay focus on just one story. People only scratch the surface when they read now instead of diving deeper into the story. Carr argues that people’s attention spans have gotten shorter over time. But, it’s not only reading stories on the internet, it’s how we’re connected to our electronic devices. A perfect example is we’re always within arm’s reach our phones, ipads, laptops, etc. which can make people lose focus. When’s the last time you looked at your phone to look at a text or check Facebook? Was it 5 minutes ago or even 2 minutes ago? The things we can do with our phones is so technically advanced and Carr believes it’s taking over our minds in a negative way. This generation of children and young adults today are connected to the web constantly. An answer for something is always a click away, which can be a good thing and a bad
Clive Thompson is a journalist, blogger and writer. He mainly focuses his writing on science and technology but this one chapter from his book Smarter than you think, “Public thinking,” has put a spin on writing and technology. Multiple times he talks about writing in many different forms. For example, he speaks of writing on blogs, on internet short stories (or fan fiction novels), in schools, in studies, and even on a regular basis. Thomson is trying to explain to his readers how writing, and the sharing of information across the internet, is beneficial to our society and ones well-being. In my readings of Thompson’s excerpt, I will examine Thomson’s examples and show how they are relevant and that it is beneficial.
This is how you train your unconscienced to kick in creatively.” (Lamott 96) This is overall good advice for most. Some or all of us get distracted by many things chores, life, kids, work, cat that won’t stop meowing even a simple list that Lammot states is “Nurse Ratchet like listing of things that must be done right this moment” (96). The author says that we need to ignore all distractions no matter how much our brain may scream at us to get the other work done or something bad will happen we must persevere to finish or at least start the paper. Or else it will never get done and you will be putting together a Frankenstein like paper at two in the morning.
Michaela Cullington, a student, wrote a paper “Does Texting Affect Writing?” in 2010 for an English class. The paper is an examination of texting and the belief that it negative effective student’s writing. Cullington goes into detail about textspeak- “language created by these abbreviations”- and their use in formal writings. She organizes the paper in a way that is confusing to understand at first (pg. 1). At the end of the paper, she discusses her finding in her own research which comes to show that texting does not affect writing. But this is contradicting to the information she received from the teachers. The students and the teachers were seeing differences in the use of textspeak in formal writing. Cullington has good support for her
Writing 150 has been a truly enjoyable course for me. While I have always loved language and literature, this class gave me a fresh, new perspective on what it means to be a writer. From the very first class, I was redefining what writing means to me and how I could use it in my life, even if my career path isn’t centered around writing. As the semester comes to a close, I want to share with you which paper was my favorite from this course, how my identity as a writer has changed, and how I will approach future writing tasks with a new and improved writing process.
Recently, I have been writing quite a few essays and papers throughout my college experience. This entails, but not limited to, English, History, and Economics. My style of writing and methods have generally remained the same throughout the process. In this assignment, I will be discussing how I prepare to start a paper, what my thoughts are through the process, and my strengths and weaknesses of what my final drafts look like.
Zero awoke to find himself standing, it was not something he was familiar with and he searched his memory for any recollection of it happening before. Quickly he discovered that large parts of his memory were missing, gone were the seemingly endless data bases of information. Quickly he sent out feelers trying for a connection of some sort but he drew a blank. It seemed that where ever he was now, had limited connection capacity. Instead he used his visual feed to survey his surrounding, it appeared he was in some kind of desert of discarded parts.
Self-regulation is a critical component in learning to write. There have been 25 studies that have shown that teaching students self-regulation strategies in writing has improved their ability to write. Self-regulation strategies have even improved writing in students with learning disabilities. So what is self-regulation in writing? In general self-regulation refers to the thoughts, feelings, and actions writers initiate to reach their writing goals. There are three types of self-regulation writers can impose to help improve their writing. They are environmental, behavioral, and personal. Taking a closer look into each of these will allow one to have a greater understanding of why self-regulation is a critical component in learning to write.
What Douglas Martin had to say when he came to our class is probably the most valuable advice I've heard so far this semester. Martin's reasoning is right in tune with my own thinking about writing, and probably why I'm a Creative Writing major versus an English or Lit. major.
Writing is a process I’ve grown to despise. Ever since grade school, I’ve had problems trying to express my ideas on paper. My writing process involves thinking about what’s being asked and trying to reflect my thoughts the best way I can on paper, but my thoughts don’t always come out as clear as I want them to be sometimes leaving a question not fully answered. My writing process isn’t a consistent set in stone process, but since being in ENC 1101 I always follow some of the same parameters such as revising my drafts, grammar usage and considering context and audience.
In the article, “Does Texting Affect Writing?”, the author Michaela Cullington conveys her speculation that texting does not correlate to how students write formal essays. At the beginning of the article Cullington introduces the term texting and the convenience texting brings. Later expressing her concern that the texting language “Textspeak” is actually affecting students writing; then contradicts these views by using primary and secondary sources (news articles, books, her own surveys and research). In addition, she uses an anecdote to tell of her own experience with texting and writing. Together with other evidences and research put together, she uncovers the debate between textspeak and formal writing. On the basis of her research, she concludes that the state of texting does not interfere with writing or writing abilities.
In the chapter, “Internal Revision,” Murray discusses the writing process and how we as teachers should teach it. He states, “And yet rewriting is one of the writing skills least researched, least examined, least understood, and—usually—least taught” (75). I believe that rewriting is a vital step of writing an essay, story, or anything that you are putting together. Growing up in school, I never had a revision time. Once it was due, we had to turn it in and then we get it back with a letter grade. With not knowing why you got the grade and how you can fix it makes you discouraged for the next assignment. It was not until high school that I started to get a little feedback from the teachers on why I got the grade that I did. We still did not
Another important thing to me when writing, is that I can not have any distractions near
Ong, Walter. “Writing is a Technology that Restructures Thought.” Writing Material. Ed. Evelyn Tribble. New York. 2003. 315-335.
Taking a creative writing class was a good way for me to express my thoughts and feelings onto paper, as well as read my other classmates stories. Reading stories created by other people lead me into their mind brain to experience what type of writer they were, it was an overall exquisite class. I believe that every person has a way of expressing who they are through writing stories of their own, fiction is the best way to express your creative imagination. This class that I took for two years helped me become a better writer and helped me understand the types of writers we have.