Developing My Writing

When I began University I was insistent that I would achieve a first class degree – this is still my dream but recently, I have been wondering whether that is all it is – just a dream. Can I really achieve a first?

Having left school in 2003, I took an Access to Higher Education course in 2009 to enable me to get in to University. I found it difficult to write essays having been out of education for so long. We were encouraged to reference in our assignments but using journals was never mentioned and most of us gained distinctions on our work having only referenced websites and the one AQA textbook we used!

I was getting distinctions in most of my work – the highest I could get – maybe I didn’t need to improve! I began University and it hit me that this was a completely different type of writing – the Access Course should have prepared me for University but I was disappointed that they had not made more of a point of referencing and wide reading.

Still, I passed my first year at Plymouth University and as the first two years are pass or fail only, I wasn’t able to really see if my passes were high or low ones. It was only this year, when we began to be given percentage grades (although the year is still pass or fail) that I realised I was not achieving what I wanted to.

I was planning to have a chat with Pete (@ethinking) about how I could develop my writing so that when our marks begin to really count, I am achieving good marks. Luckily on the day that I planned to talk to him, he addressed our class and said that we need to become more critical in our writing.

I know I am too safe in my writing. If I am asked a direct question then I will gladly give my opinion on it – but when it comes to writing it down, I just can’t seem to form opinions that come out well on paper!

So, my first stop was Twitter. I mentioned I was looking to improve my critical writing, and Amanda Corrigan (@ajcorrigan) gave me my first piece of advice – “Keep asking yourself WHY and SO WHAT as you read and write”. Only 12 words yet it summed it all up for me. I need it putting simply and having this in my head will keep me remembering to be critical in my writing!

Second stop was the library. I took out a few books and found “The Good Writing Guide for Education Students” by Dominic Wyse to be particularly helpful.

I also found the websites from the University of Leicester and Manchester University very helpful.

And so, I developed a list of tips and advice that I have found useful and that will hopefully help me out in my future assignments.

-    Read the key texts.

We are provided with the key texts at the beginning of each module and yet I always leave it too late to get the book out from the library – by which point it has been taken out! I’ll now make sure I get there earlier – if I still can’t get hold of it then I will search electronically – so many books are available online nowadays. I will also search for other books by that author. 

In general though….. READ, READ AND READ MORE!

-    Read the primary source.

Too often do I reference from a secondary source. We are told time and time again to read from the primary source but I still fail to do so – from now on I will!

-    Read more journals.

Journals scare me. I don’t know how to navigate the library to find them, and then how to navigate the journals themselves! This is something to learn.

-    Use paraphrasing.

How easy it is to bung a quote in to an essay to take up some of the word count. This is something I won’t be doing. I have been gradually moving on from using direct quotes to paraphrasing – it is a daunting task as it seems a very easy thing to get wrong, but practice makes perfect.

-    Plan and plan again.

I already plan my essay. I make small titles for myself and then write it in sections, before ensuring it flows well. From what I have read, if this works for you then it is a good way to plan – but to plan, and then plan again. Plan to form a structure for the essay. Plan again to form a structure with questions to answer and points to be made.

-    Stop and think.

I came across a quote from Piaget. “I have always preferred to reflect upon a problem before reading on it”.

I usually dive straight in to an essay – I read and find other people’s opinions before thinking about my own. If I want to develop a more critical writing style then I need to stop and think. Stop reading and planning and writing and just think for a while about what I think.

-    Balance.

Writing needs to be both descriptive and critical and I saw a good way to evaluate whether my writing is a good balance of each. Using two pens highlight one colour for descriptive writing and one colour for critical writing. If the critical writing colour is more then you are on the right track!

-    Recognise my limitations.

When putting down my ideas, I need to recognise that my knowledge and experience is limited in relation to others, but that this does not mean that my opinion does not matter.

From now on I will be checking through this list, making sure that I am being critical and that people will be convinced by what I am writing and the words “Keep asking yourself WHY and SO WHAT as you read and write” will be with me whenever I write a sentence!

I feel like that first class degree is now within reaching distance again!

Since publishing this post, I have had heaps of advice on Twitter... 

Thanks everyone for your help and advice!