Collin Brooke and Allison Carr
“Almost all good writing begins with terrible first drafts. You need to start somewhere.” is such a true quote because no matter who you are, where you are, or what you’ve done, your first piece will never be the “perfect” piece. Writing is such a long process and I even teach my second graders this and we learn how publishers take years to publish a book or whatever it is that they are writing about. That is my go-to response when they tell me they finish writing haha. They explain how writing needs failure and that is how you succeed. “Failure is the opportunity for growth”, you need to know how to fall and get back up. Brooke and Carr do a wonderful job of explaining this process and their message on to not lose hope. You are going to hit tons of obstacles, and that should not stop you from achieving your goal.
Doug Downs
Downs also highlights, just like Carr and Brooke, how writing is not “perfectible” and that there will be more than just one or two drafts. Downs also mentions how successful writers revise their work and if they do not revise, they will not see positive results. The key to revising is to look at the text that you created but look at it differently. This is new information to me and it is interesting because when I think of the word “revision” I think of just editing, proofreading, and adding/changing some words. Even growing up, the school system teaches you that “revising” is just changing some words, adding some new stuff, and then making sure your sentences make sense, you have capitals and periods, etc.
Charles Bazerman and Howard Tinberg
In this passage, they highlight how “writing is a full act of the mind” and it goes on about the nervous systems and engagement. I agree with this statement because a lot of people journal and write to cope with something when they are stressed, and pretty much when they feel all the emotions. People can write when something good happened to them, something bad, etc. Writing can make someone feel relaxed, release tension, and make someone feel better.
Nancy Sommers
Again, Sommers emphasizes the revision process, and she says that it is to further grow what is already there. Her case study was very interesting to me too. Where she got the college writers and it is funny because even they said that revision when they did their revising, they either added, substituted, deleted, or reordered words in their essays. She even said that they do not use and did not feel comfortable using the term revision which seems weird to me. Then, when she had the students say the term in their own words, it was all about grammar, editing, and adding/deleting words and phrases. It is clear that a lot of people do not truly understand the definition of “revision”.
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