Writing Skills Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Writing Skills - Essay Example When in doubt, take a look at models written by experts† (Hacker, 1996, p. 23). Although some areas of the course were difficult for me, I value these the most, because I learned the most from them. Some areas of the course were easy for me, too, which gave me some amount of confidence. The most difficult part of the course for me was learning to arrange my ideas in a way that showed structure. When I wrote before this course, I tended to go from one random idea to another. I would start a school paper on tax policy, and wind up talking about the Iraq War, so that by the end of the paper, no one could tell what it was about. I learned that it is possible, with the help of the course, to organize my ideas better, and get a strong idea about my writing before I start it. This way, I am not just going off on tangents: now I keep outlines and follow them. This was also the most difficult part of the course for me, as mentioned, because even now, I am tempted to launch into a new idea, without organizing it first. However, I think that this area of the course was one of great progress for me. One of the easiest parts of the course for me was the actual mechanics of writing. I know that I am no grammar expert, and my punctuation can sometimes use a lot of work. I am also prone to writing run-on sentences. However, when I started to compare my writing and talk to some of the other students, I found that I was having a lot less trouble with grammar and spelling than they were. I never really had a problem with this area in school, and in fact, some of my earliest teachers were very keen on students diagramming sentences in a seemingly endless manner. Even though I did not enjoy this as it was happening, I think it gave me a solid foundation of grammar, and the ability to string a sentence together. Overall,