Some of my favorite revision strategies are to brain dump when I’m writing my first draft. It helps me to get all of my ideas out onto paper, so I can then cut back to make a more cohesive paper. When I don’t have any ideas t
o write a paper I will create columns of ideas to write about from all of my different sources, then I’ll use lines to connect ideas for synthesizing comparisons. A strategy I use for revision is to write down my thesis and all of my topic sentences. I use this to check to see my claim sentences are arguing what your paper is about. Before ENG 110 I didn’t use any of these strategies in writing, except for the brain dump technique. And I don’t really use these techniques outside of this class, since this is the only time that I write more creatively without a rigid structure. For future English papers though outside of ENG 110 I plan on using these techniques. These strategies will help me to write better papers in my future classes where I can write a little bit more creatively than my science classes.
Mitch,
You did an excellent job explaining your prewriting and drafting process. As you revise for your ePortfolio, can you come up with an idea for how you can use ENG 110 strategies in science writing? I would argue that the academic essay can be a bit rigid, as well. Try to reflect back on our class (and the powerpoint) on how form and content often complement each other. 3/3