Neal Richards II

ERH-101

12/8/15

Help received: tutor

Before English-101, I took stander English courses in high school that every student had to take. I Didn’t care about writing essays that I had to do in English because I knew essay was not a big part of my grade. I didn’t really try on any of my papers and if I had a bad grade in the class, I bring it up on anther assignment just to make par. I didn’t know what to expect when I enter college doing real life college English. When I got the syllabus for English 101, I saw the grade only coming from essay and nothing else. For me to pass the class with a C’s, I had to made up my game plan that I could follow that would make writing essay easier for me. This game plan would help me lot with writing essay.

The writing I did with my game plan in the first semester in ERH-101 were English, jazz and discourse community. My favorite essay I wrote was the “English” essay. It was the most relatable to me with a easy topic. It was also the smoothest essay I wrote. The essay I like the least was the jazz essay. I felt that I was trying to expand on something that I couldn’t put into word easily so I had to push myself to find word for my essay. Discourse community was the hardest essay because it took me awhile to figure out with the essay was about. I wrote at least three different version of the essay having to do the last essay with in a week starting from scratch. I didn’t dislike the essay because of the interesting topic I did.

The type of environment I like to write in is very particular and it is the only way I feel comfortable. My favorite places to write in high school was in a quiet close off room where I can be alone. This skill work for in college because If there people around like roommates, I would try to loss myself in what he or she is doing not doing the essay. I found that a good time doing any paper is to do it at night. It made me feel like I have unlimited time to get some momentum going to write and finish any essay. I cannot write in the day time because of my schedule unless I have to because the little break in my schedule that are one to two hours, I am a slow writer, it feel like the time limit is fast approaching, and it take me at least a little more than an hour to get some momentum. In my first essay called English, I tried to work on the essay in one of my free CP thinking that I could at least a half of a paragraph done. Near the end of the CP, I only did three sentence done in the whole paper.  One of the method I now use in college when I am writing an essay is to work for three hour then take a 30 minute to an hour break before going back to write for two again. Before in high school, I would have no time to cool down and would start to fill the paper up with useless words to get it over with. In my discourse community paper, I give myself at least a thirty minute breaks multipliable time so I wouldn’t tail off the essay.  Another method I started using in my writing in college is to only do one paragraph night. This is so that I can put all my focus into that one paragraph and I also write slowly so it many take me three to four hour to do a paragraph. I did that in my first version of Discourse community to take it essay.

Another part of my college game plan I made was step to write an essay. I these are the particular type of steps I use when I am writing an essay in my English class. When I’m assign a paper in erh-101 I start and finish the paper by taking these step. First, I try brainstorming what the paper is going to be about so that I can have a clear topic to write about on the paper. When I find a topic that is good to use, I start brainstorming idea that would fit in the topic. I try to get at least three good main idea that I could as body paragraph. If I get more three main ideas, I would see if I can combine two ideas into one and/or see which three ideas are most relevant and not use the others  I usually get help from my tutor about idea and I, at time, also brainstorm throughout the day about good idea to use in my essay. Then I put down my three ideas on paper separated from each other ordering them by order of how the teacher wanted the idea. Then I start branching off each idea by putting one or two sentences. I stop to take a one day break to think about more word I could write about in my essay. When I write the essay, I find myself divining the essay three section. The first section I start on in essay is usually the first paragraph or, sometime, the vaguest paragraph idea because those paragraphs are the easiest to write. The next section is the second Paragraph or the paragraph with a more definite idea so I can use the first section adding more idea to this section. Final section is the third paragraph or the most definite idea, the intro, and the conclusion. Being done with the body paragraph, I feel like I have enough information to write the intro and the conclusion paragraph. I do some quick last minute editing and finally I am done with the essay. I did this in all my English and history paper which help me a lot.

The game plan I made in ERH-101 helped me pass all my essay. I will take those step and apply to the writing in later classes. There are a lot of stuff I need to work on like editing and conclusions but I should be fine. The game plan is not 100% foolproof; there are some missing screw like when I had to redo my discourse community. I had to skip some parts that took too long because I didn’t have enough time. That showed that my plan that time to be good. Other than that, I feel like my plan will help me in my cadetship in VMI.