Coming into this semester, I had a lot of experience writing papers, but not necessarily a lot of experience as a writer. These may seem like they are the same things, but in reality they are not. This is because anyone can write papers, but in order to be a writer you need to truly understand the writing process, and how to properly use it in order to convey your message. I definitely have not mastered that skill in my weeks here at VMI, but I have started to become familiar with the processes that are involved.

In addition, I have started to think outside the box in my writing. What I mean by this is that I am no longer following the classic means for writing an essay, as far as the standard 5 paragraphs with an introduction, body, and conclusion go. I made the transition into striving for essays that stress fluidity and creativity. What I mean by this is that I tailor each essay based on my purpose, and my methodology is therefore changed for each different essay that I write. For example, on my essay on my discourse community I changed the way I wrote in order to address the prompt. I wrote a different paragraph for each different aspect that makes a discourse community. I did this in order to maintain the idea that discourse communities are made up of several elements.

I also developed in my thesis writing abilities. It’s true that I learned how to write essays in high school. But it wasn’t until college that I finally realized how helpful thesis statements could actually be in helping to mold the rest of my essay. What I mean by this is that a thesis statement can act as a blueprint. Whenever you get lost throughout your writing process, you can always refer back to your thesis statement in order to regain your purpose and drive home your point. During this year, I learned more and more about how knowing your purpose can help you drive home your point of the essay with much greater efficiency. It’s extremely important to keep your purpose in mind throughout the entire writing process. If you don’t, your essay could make an attempt to address too many issues, or even just seem to start rambling. Keeping this in mind, it’s even more crucial to have an effective thesis statement with a clear and solid purpose to keep you focused on your goal in your writing.  In addition, most graders examine thesis statements pretty heavily, so it is a good idea to be knowledgeable on the topic of theses. The better your thesis, the better you’ll do on the rest of your essay and the better grade you’ll get overall.

To be honest, I had always used websites such as EasyBib to do my works cited page back in high school. Through the guidance of Mr. Hamilton and the help of The Everyday Writer, I have learned how to actually write a Works Cited page. I am grateful for learning how to do this skill, as EasyBib often screws up citations. In addition, the use of such websites goes against VMI’s work for grade policy. Not only that, but I have learned the true purpose of having a good works cited page. It not only clears your name for plagiarism, but gives the original author of a piece the recognition that he deserves. I also thought about putting myself in the other side’s shoes, and thinking if someone was using my work for their writing, I would want to be cited. I would be rather offended if I had my intellectual property stolen from me. Doing that has caused me to be much more diligent when it comes time for me to create a works cited page. In the future, I know have a tool in The Everyday Writer for any future citations that I may need to make in my future works.

Although there have been many areas this year that I feel like I have improved in, there have been areas that I feel like I have not made much progress in either. I’m mainly talking about my transitions between paragraphs here. During each conference that I had with Mr. Hamilton, he pointed out that my transitions felt slightly choppy, and offered me advice on how to connect them and smooth them out more. However, even when taking his advice, I never really was able to make an essay that perfectly flowed from paragraph to paragraph and didn’t leave the reader guessing how I got to my next topic. This is definitely a skill that I’m hoping to improve on next semester, and it’s what I’m most consciously targeting to build on in my writing.

Overall, I think my first semester at VMI has matured my writing immensely. I firmly believe that the peer revision process is largely responsible for that maturation. Of course, I have experienced a peer revision session before. However, never before had I experienced a peer review session in which both participants truly wanted to better their writing, and were completely focused on providing  constructive criticism and beneficial advice. I think that this course is essential in all of my academic works throughout my cadetship here at VMI. It has taught me many of the higher level processes that I need to execute in order to perform at a higher level.