I was
an average level writer in high school.
I had grades from Bs to low As on my papers in high school Language Arts
classes; however, I never knew what exactly it was about my writing that made
my paper a B, not an A. I never cared
enough to ask my Language Arts teacher what I did poorly in my writing and what
I could do to improve it because I didn’t like Language Arts and I didn’t want
to invest any more of my time on it.
Then, I
went to a college. I had my first
writing assignment in my freshmen composition class. It wasn’t easy not necessarily because it was
a difficult writing assignment in terms of its depth and its difficulty level
but because it was longer than the usual length that I was used to in high
school. That was it. I thought the length was the only problem
standing in my way. Well, I was wrong; I
didn’t realize that there were much more things that I should have considered
difficult other than the length of the assignment until I got my paper back
from the professor.
76. I had never seen a grade in
70s in my entire life, and there it was. A 76 on my first writing assignment in
my first college English class. I was
shocked and ashamed to see the grade on my paper. Actually, I was more ashamed to see all the
marks and scratches on it. As soon as
the professor handed the paper back to me,
I quickly folded it in half so nobody could see all the embarrassing red
marks and scratches on it and came straight back to my dorm. I had to take a few minutes to calm myself
down before I could seriously delve into the graded paper and figure out where
I wrote poorly and why the professor had to mark it with his red pen.
Some
people might say that I’m over-exaggerating it, but it really was an
enlightening moment. It was the very
first time that I physically saw my mistakes and lack of my writing skills
marked all over my paper in red ink; it was also the starting point when I
actually wanted to be better at writing.
In class, we had short reading quizzes on the reading assignments that
we were required to read for the class; then, we had a class discussion on the
reading quiz questions, which was helpful to comprehend the reading assignment
better; during the workshop weeks, we would write 2-3 drafts, revise and edit
them; the professor would have individual conferences with each student and
help them organize their thoughts, structure their essays, direct them where to
focus and where to de-focus.
I was a
student who only did the bare minimum in class, especially in the Language Arts
class. Ever since the 76, however, I
started putting more efforts in writing drafts and revising them. I remember going above and beyond what was
required for me to do in the Freshman Composition class. I would write 4-5 drafts and revise each
draft at least 3 times when I was only required to write 2 drafts; when I say
“revise”, I mean restructuring the whole paper, adding new ideas, deleting
long-thought-through paragraphs, and rewriting almost the entire paper. The
rigor I put into writing and revising was first motivated by a little bit of
anger and eager to get better grades in the class.
However, the rigor did not stop even after my
original goal was reached. The rigor,
which was generated by the eager to get better grades, later generated greater
interests in writing and in the English language itself as well; that is how I
came to major in English and English Education even though I had never enjoyed
my Language Arts classes in high school.
Because I tasted true joy in writing (revising and playing with a
variety of ways to express one thought/emotion) through the writing workshop
experience in my Freshman Composition class, I was able to endure hardships
that I encountered later in other English classes and continue to work towards
finding that joy again. Unfortunately,
I do not think that I have experienced another experience like the freshman
writing workshop experience again, but I am still searching for a similar
experience to hopefully be able to taste that joy again.
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Not being confident in your writing, or reaching a critical moment that makes you uncomfortable with the overall quality of it is a common problem. Like you, I went through a phase where I was satisfied with my level of writing and didn't see the need to improve, until I got to that point that I realized writing is more than what I had been producing. For you, the grade of 76 was enough to jar you into action, and for me it took years of pushing, but eventually we both made the decision to actively try and improve the way we write so that we achieve that same sense of satisfaction.
ReplyDeleteEither way, keep trying. I enjoy your writing.