My skills pertaining to a writer happened years ago when I was just a little child. I was near the age of 5, but I had no clue what those little squiggles were on a page. I didn’t know until my teacher and my parents began reading to me. I then realized that these little squiggles were actually real things in my life, but were just written as words in a story. When my teacher taught me how to write my name, I thought that was the coolest thing ever. At first, I couldn’t write the s in Josh, but she helped me through this by making me draw them as if they were a snake. Writing my name was the biggest step for me. After my name, I developed a craving to learn more.
In the following days that past, I couldn’t wait for kindergarten to begin so I could learn more writing concepts. When the day finally came, I was ecstatic! My dream came true, and I could now make up my own stories and end them however I wanted. My hopes, however, were soon crushed when I found out that we would be only learning the abc’s. The abc’s were a big improvement on my writing, but they weren’t the concept that I expected to be learning. With my hopes devastated, I could only wish that first grade would be better.
The start of school was an exciting day for me. Feeling all sorts of emotion, I walked into class and waited patiently for the bell to ring. The teacher began her boring speech, and all I could do was sit there and listen. Her syllabus stated that we would be working on spelling, grammar, and sentence fluency in that portion of the year. “Yay!” my emotions were screaming throughout my body. This enthusiasm slowly disappeared as we worked less and less on writing. Eventually, she realized that we were avid writers, so her attention was focused on other subjects.
In second/third grade we worked mainly on language arts skills. There were some books that we were forced to read and then above that, we had to write a summary. Once we completed them, my teacher formed a group for excelling students. We worked on advanced concepts. Some were hard and then others were easy. This group helped me with my writing skills. It has always been easier for me to learn the concepts ahead of time, and then discuss them in class. I wrote many little kid books in these grades. They didn’t meet the requirements for a decent paper; nonetheless, it’s the effort that counted. I continued to write splendid novels. I really enjoyed writing sequels to the books that I had read. My least favorite books were the ones that required me to write about things that I didn’t enjoy.
My next influential teacher was my fifth grade teacher, Mrs. Jones. Her beliefs on teaching allowed me to learn the most. She let the excelling students move forward rather than hold them back. Once we had shown her that we knew the material, she permitted us to move onto more advanced material. I learned plenty in this class. I still made mistakes, but at least I understood the majority of the concepts.
San Rafael Junior High was where I learned a large amount of my knowledge. Mr. Gilbert modeled his teaching on stuff that I had previously learned, so seventh grade wasn’t beneficial to my education. Mrs. Card, on the other hand, was one of the best teachers that I have had. After having her as a teacher, sentence structure finally made sense to me. I could now write a complete sentence with very few errors. Punctuation has always been confusing for me. Mrs. Card made punctuation a priority in her teachings. I am not saying that I am perfect with punctuation because I’m not. I still make mistakes, but the mistakes that I make are on concepts that I don’t know or have forgotten.
Now that you, the reader, have an idea on how I became the writer I am today, I will tell you about my enjoyments, downfalls, habits, and everything else related to my writing.
Enjoyment is a substantial part about my writing. I tend to turn in a mediocre paper when I don’t have a pleasure in writing it. I enjoy writing papers where I can pick the topic. I must be permitted to write on something that I do as a hobby, have a passion for, or I know a few things about it in order for me to enjoy the assignment. Also, I like papers where you can use artwork and technology to make the paper more expressive.
Downfalls are important too. Once you have your downfalls identified, you can work on fixing them so you may become a better writer. I know a few of my downfalls with writing. Lacking voice is a major problem in some of my papers. I also struggle in turning in a paper that has sentence fluency, correct punctuation, and correct grammar. Conveying my ideas in a text form is another thing I struggle with. My papers always have mistakes in them. In the ACT prep test, my language arts score was in the 60%. I hope that I can learn a considerable amount in your class, so I can improve my language arts skills. Over the years, one could judge me and see that I have improved, but I would like this improvement to be extensively greater.
After seventeen years of writing, you develop habits and certain things that you need to do every time that you write. To begin, my main habit is typing my paper in one sitting. This I do because I forget my ideas and points that I am trying to prove if I wait a few days to finish. The room has to be extremely quiet in order for me to fully concentrate and write my paper. My room is the only place that I can produce a paper that is “somewhat excellent.” Surroundings amongst my room make me feel like it is my utmost sanctuary to escape to. These surroundings are comfortable for me to type my paper. Another thing is that I absolutely do not tolerate writing my assignment with a pen and paper. A computer is what I desire to use. The computer setup that I have consists of a laptop, a desktop with dual monitors, and a computer chair that is relaxing to be in. When I type my paper, I reread every sentence a few times and change things until it sounds fluent. My work habits produced a drastic change on my school work. Some of my work habits are the following: I don’t stop working until the job is done, I always give it my all, I act professional, and I try to make very few mistakes.
To this day, I consider myself an average writer. I would take pleasure in working on getting better at language arts this year. There are things that I need to work on getting better at, but I don’t really know what they are. The most important thing that I know of is making the paper fun to read. A boring paper will be put down instantly, so a good writer needs to have a voice that makes the paper enjoyable.
Finally, this paper has made me realize that I need to improve my writing skills. Writing is constantly being used in this world to further one in life. If you don’t have this skill, you will greatly suffer.
