Kennedy Abramson

Zack De Piero
Writing 2A
5 December 2015
The End
Prior to my first day of this class I was as close to the stereotypical frightened freshman
as you can be. I, of course, had some expectations for what I was getting myself into. My first
expectation was actually quite positive and it ended up being true; my expectation was that this
class would prepare me for writing in future college classes. My second expectation was less
positive, but thankfully, it ended up being way off base. I expected this class to be completely
void of creativity
Despite being in class for a few weeks before the WP1 was due, I wrote it largely in my
old style. When I say my old style I mean that I wrote it in the way I would have written a
paper in high school. My writing style, as well as the process by which I approached writing,
hadnt really been influenced by this class yet. I wrote the paper to the best of my ability, because
I really wanted to do well on it, but when I turned it in I didnt have much pride in my work. My
lack of enthusiasm for my WP1 proved to be justifiable when I got it back with a less than stellar
grade. I was disappointed with the score I received but I knew that it was well-deserved and I
knew that I needed to change something for writing my WP2. Figuring out what I needed to
change was pretty easy because I had Zacks comments as guidance. I was extremely thankful
for those comments because the majority of my teachers in high school didnt leave comments
on my essays. Zacks comments made a lot of sense to me and I remember thinking alright,
next time I got this

After turning in WP1, I began to be more influenced by the things I was learning in this
class. I started to think about writing as more than just the act of stringing together words,
sentences, and paragraphs. This class made me see writing as a whole process that is full of
different parts that are unique to each writer. For instance, one of our journal 2.2 questions was
about the process by which we wrote our WP1. I laid out, step by step, the process by which my
WP came about:
1. found all my sources
2. made bullet points of the conventions I found in the sources
3. Wrote my introductory paragraph
4. Thought about how I wanted to organize the paragraphs in my paper
5. Wrote the body
6. Took a break and went to DLG
7. Wrote my conclusion
8. Froze my computer and lost my conclusion
9. Rewrote my conclusion
10. Slept
11. Woke up
12. Created works cited
13. Printed
14. Boom Im done
This helped me see that something as seemingly unrelated to writing as taking a break and going
to DLG is a part of the writing process. Zack emphasized the importance of every step of the
writing process, from jotting down some thoughts in an outline to printing it out and turning that
sucker in. That journal entry also helped me see that writing my body paragraphs first is a good
method for me. In the past, I had typically let myself stare blankly at the computer screen trying
to think of my first sentence but it was much more time efficient when I could see what my essay
content was and then introduce that content accordingly. The course readings also started to
influence the way I saw writing in the weeks following turning in my WP1. A lot of the readings
made me think about writing in a new way; they made me dig deeper into my idea of what goes
into everything we write.

So, all that being said, going into my WP2 I could tell that I was beginning to write in a
new style, a post-writing 2 knowledge style. WP2 was extremely challenging for me but I
thought I did a lot better and I was much more confident with the work I was turning in. When I
got it back I was happy I did better than I had on my WP1 but the grade was still lower than I
was hoping it would be. I actually had a bit of a mental breakdown when I saw my score. I hid
under my covers and felt sorry for myself for a while but eventually I emerged with a willingness
to move on and try harder the next time. Despite my dissatisfaction with the score, Zacks
comments made sense once again and I reluctantly admitted to myself that I hadnt written as
good of a paper as I had initially thought I had. The comment that stuck out the most to me was
that I was having problems with my argument in my thesis. I had the same problem with my
thesis in WP1 and seeing it reoccur for my WP2 made me realize that I needed to really focus on
locking down an argument in my future papers. Actually, I think this realization helped me when
I wrote my anthropology and history papers. I made sure that I came up with thesis statements
that passed the arguability test for those papers and I ended up getting scores that I was
extremely happy with. It was at that point when I determined that I was right in my first
assumption about this class, it was truly preparing me for college writing.
Now WP3, thats where it really got interesting. In high school I craved creativity;
creative prompts were what I lived for, yet when I saw the prompt for WP3, I wanted to crawl
under a rock. I think it was scary to me because my idea of creativity when writing for school
was always fifty percent creativity, fifty percent structured rules but WP3 seemed to be
somewhere closer to eighty percent creativity. It was also scary because, as mentioned before, I
hadnt expected this class to be anywhere near as creative as it was so I was a little caught off
guard. However, a part of me, beneath the fright, was excited to try something new and out of the

box. Writing and drawing my WP3 took a lot more time than I anticipated. The self-analysis
paper took a long time also, probably because writing about why I chose to write something in
the way I did was a completely foreign concept to me. The most helpful skill from this class
when writing my WP3 was using my first-order thinking. Reading Teaching Two Kinds of
Thinking by Teaching Writing by Peter Elbow was probably my favorite reading of the quarter
because after I read it I saw the value in letting my ideas flow unrestrained and then coming back
to them later to revise. I used to be an almost strictly first-order thinker when I wrote and then I
developed into an almost strictly second-order thinker when I wrote. However, this class taught
me that there is a huge value to balancing first-order and second-order thinking when writing.
Overall, this class made me value the process of writing; it made me value the complex
system of thinking, writing, and revising. Valuing revising is a very new concept for me. I always
just wrote papers and turned them in; the most I would do was give it a read over and fix small
grammatical errors. After tearing the papers Ive written in this class apart, mainly through the
portfolio process, my eyes have been opened to the magical powers of revision. In fact, I would
even argue that revision is an equally important to actually writing. Due to my revision
revelation, I now prefer to finish writing my papers at least a day before they are due so that I
can look at them with fresh eyes the next day and make revisions. I also think about writing
when Im reading because of this class. A lot of the course-readings emphasized the importance
of being an active reader by thinking about what the author was thinking when he/she wrote what
youre reading. This was a completely new idea to me but I see the value in it now. Being a good
reader can definitely improve a persons writing skill.
This class did the one thing I had mainly hoped it would do; it made me feel prepared to
go forth into the college world and write the plethora of papers I will have to write in

the next 4 years. Ive learned not only how to be a better writer but also how to be a better
thinker, outliner, and reader. So in the end, the endless stress, cramming to get things done, and
all the times I pounded my head against the keyboard of my laptop seem to have paid off. My
parting words to you De Piero are: for the love of god please play some more of The Beatles
music next quarter! And speaking of which I forgot to tell you my fun fact about The Beatles a
few weeks back. George Harrison lost his virginity with all the other Beatles in the room and
when he finished they started clapping. Hope that fits in well with your random music facts that
you can share with next quarters Writing 2ers!