Course evaluation

Please fill out this evaluation once. I appreciate your honest feedback.

1-page autobiographies

6-word memoirs

Here's a place to begin. Be careful. You can waste a lot of time reading these things. All of a sudden, it's super late, you've done no other homework, and that pesky lab report is due tomorrow.

And here are some I wrote (and changed) from a few years back. Added some new ones this morning.

For something completely unrelated yet totally fun, click HERE!

A good personal essay to read

Speaking in Tongues

The final post: Why I Write ...

OK, this will be your last post for the semester. You must post your comments by Sunday December 5 at 11:59.59 p.m..

You're going to post your Ars Poetica. Sure, an Ars Poetica is about poetry and the art of creating poetry, but I think we can make it applicable to Pers Expos. Just go with it. Think of it as the answer to the statement why I write. You read Orwell's answer. You read Didion's. Really give this some thought and tell us all why you write. Heck, you've spent all semester in this course writing, writing, and writing some more about you and your life. Why?

Here's my Ars Poetica from a 2005 writing class I took during my final summer of grad school. While some things have changed for me as a writer, much has stayed the same.

On February 5, 2001 my mother had a massive stroke that left her paralyzed on her left side. Lucky for her she is right-handed. Besides eating and using the bathroom, the only thing she has control of is her language – most specifically, her writing. She writes every day. She writes letters, brief cards, quick hellos – you name it and she writes it. She enjoys writing because it is her way of communicating with the outside world, her way of staying in touch with her friends, her way of staying in touch with herself. And, as she sometimes concludes, “Writing is all I have.” So in many of the same ways, writing is all I have and I write simply because I can.

Where can we find your review?

Cool review from WSJ: The Kinect and a stereo.

Now, please post a link or the product page/album page of what you've reviewed.

Week 13

What amazing sentence, phrase, moment pops out? Since you know the writer well — I hope — try to find something new. Wow us with your selection and tell us why you think your selection is wow inducing — good, bad or ugly.

Writing Reviews: the next assignment

Some places to get inspiration

10 Secrets to reviews

Book Reviews in general

Novel: Dew Breaker

Film: Social Network

Saucony 12: Running Shoes

San Fran Restaurant

Week 12: The writer is you!

You have been writing your own essays for quite some time. What patterns have emerged in your own work? Do you love the semi-colon? Secretly or not-so-secretly over-use the simple sentence? Think about what stylistic devices you rely on most often, what traps you fall into, what tricks you'd still like to use. Go ahead, give yourself a little praise.

Week 11: The pattern watcher

You have been reading your writer/essay/column for quite some time. You should know the writer's tendencies and voice quite well. What patterns have emerged? Does your writer love the colon? Secretly or not-so-secretly over-use the simple sentence? Think about what stands out most, what pattern is present only to the seasoned professional reader like you. Share, comment, keep up the great work!

The Example Essay

This next essay will be an example essay on the topic of forgiveness. Some things to know about an example essay (as stated in "40 Model Essays"):

1. The main purpose of an example essay is to make the general specific and the abstract concrete.
2. You can have a single extended example. This is where you might use a solid and solitary narrative to make your example concrete (i.e.: You offered your sibling forgiveness after she broke your iPod, you forgave the driver of the car who side-swiped you, you forgave yourself for being unrealistic in terms of your athletic ability while injured.)
3. You can draw from multiple examples. This will help you illustrate the range covered by your generalization. (i.e.: Generalization: Forgiveness is not practiced the US. Examples: teachers hold a grudge after you've been disciplined for cheating; former inmates are treated as second class citizens even after serving their time; insurance companies hold accidents against you for 7-10 years.) If using multiple examples, you want to make sure you order the examples in order of importance and impact. This of it as creating a climax. Don't lead with the strongest example as your essay will only fizzle from there.

Week 10: October is about to end

Let's get back to vocabulary! I was reading a piece in Newsweek and a fabulous word popped out of an article: shoal. Shoal is a shallow patch of water or a large number of people/fish, and a favorite word of mine that Macbeth uses in one of this great soliloquies. It's an older word, one used less often these days, but it's presence in the article made me keep reading. So, look for some awesome vocabulary, a word or two or three that really zing from the page.

HOMEWORK FOR TUESDAY!

Check the new syllabus on the right. There is a link to the article I'd like you to read.

Hope you enjoyed COD. I thought the guy was awesome.
mc

Week 9

Try to find a moment or a phrase or something that didn't work. I know this is quite subjective, but that just means you need to argue your point well. Being a good writer means knowing when something doesn't flow or fit with the rest of the piece. Good writing also comes from good editing. So, what piece would you edit out of this week's reading?

College Essays and you

Where to begin? How about here.

Connecticut College

Johns Hopkins

What did college presidents writer about? A great article passed on my Kearney.

Tips from Carleton College

Some other hot tips from the Stanford magazine

Week 8: The closers

Not just a show on the USA network, the closer in an essay is key to an essays success ... or its failure. So, look for awesome closing (or near the end) lines. How does the author tie everything together? share an a-ha moment? conclude? make a call to action? Does the author come back to something mentioned at the start? Or maybe the author ends with a completely new idea? Share what works and what does not.

Great cause & effect essay

From the NYT. Simple story but well done and quite effective.

Lines from the front lines .... ha ha ha

Spelling/grammar errors may be the typist's fault. Maybe.


Outside of the tennis court I am given many opportunities to succeed, but few to be successful.

They had counted on three little kids running under their feet in their thirties, three teenagers fighting over the car in their forties, and three young grown ups asking for money in their fifties.

It was a strange light-headed feeling: sounds were muffled by a high pitched buzzing noise, and the world around me started to morph, spin, and slip.

Made entirely of cement, the room seemed to generate cold hostility.

Dust and cobwebs line the windows so thick that barely any light filters in.

… I grew to love every difference that made me realize the distinction between where I was and where I lived in California …

To many people a couch has little or no importance to them, but to my family we claim ours with pride.

My grandmother always says that people don’t understand the seriousness of things until the fear of God is put into them.

Perhaps the math class was just a catalyst for me to realize my fear of being by myself, but it was not just the loneliness from being the only freshman in my math class that I tried to avoid; I tried to escape any situation in which I had to be on my own.

It had a pulley system that connected a bucket to the house we passed food through, a long wooden stepladder, a rope swing, and even a tire swing.

The island in the kitchen is where my family comes together to share meals.

We stayed up all night multiple times whispering across the room about what is going on in our lives.

I have to do everything last: I become 18 last, I become 21 last and I learn how to rive last.

Costco was my hometown, my element, and some new employee suddenly knew what was best for me?

Tahoe smells great, I thought to myself. We should get some pine trees and natural dirt and granite back home.

The MA gym doubles as the MA dojo …

On the ground there was everything you could think of that had to do with Barbie.

Week 7: Opening Lines!

We've looked at crafty words, high powered sentences, the use of cause and effect, now let's focus on opening lines. Post the opening line to your selection and comment on its success or failure.

Is it weird that I LOVE reading these posts. I hope you are enjoying what you're reading as much as I am enjoying what you write.

Keep up the good work!

Week 6: cause and effect

Excellent posts again! It's like you're reading awesome stuff and finding awesome stuff and then posting awesome stuff. Love it.

This week as we begin cause and effect styled essays, see if your writer employs this method. Since many of you are following columnists, this technique shouldn't be too tricky to spot. Any overt examples? Subtle ones?

Maybe your writer doesn't use cause and effect, and that's ok, so instead look for how your writer employs examples to maker her claim and/or prove his argument.

Keep up the great work!

Week 5: let's get involved

Excellent posts last week. Loved the words you found in your pieces.

This week try to focus on how the writer involves the reader. Good narrative pieces (this is not to say all of your readings are narrative pieces) engage the reader on some level. How do your writers do it?

Paragraphs are made of .... sentences!

More of the fun stuff. A mistake may have been made my the typist, but maybe not.

1. When he laughs over the phone I can just see his million dollar smile in my head.
2. When he sits down at a drum set and picks up a pair of his signature extra-thin mahogany sticks, its as if even the birds know to stop chirping and listen.
3. It's weird to think about how something so simple can bring so much pleasure. Some of my favorite toys were wood blocks.
4. Despite this fact, I don't think I would have my room any different. Even though it looks like a rainbow exploded on everything ...
5. It's the little things that bring me back to that spot, that one desolate town in the middle of nowhere Vermont.
6. My iPod is very cultured.
7. By the end of our stay, however, my grandmother was alive and full of energy.
8. I can still remember the strong wind blowing against the purple and magenta windbreaker my parents forced me to wear as I stared up and could barely see the red bridge because of all the gray swirls in the cold air.
9. I feel as though the tiniest breath of wind could gather me up and turn me into a alfalfa seed and tuck me away in the field's depths, and the world would never know the difference.
10. ... I submerse myself in water and suddenly the only thing I hear is the sound of blurred evidence of the outside world.
11. Before I leave I watch how the pond moves so gracefully onto the edges, how the pickle weeds move with the water, and how the entire pond moves together.
12. Punta Mia is blessed with beautiful women, an athletic paradise, and Mother Nature's best qualities.
13. Press the button and a little jingle radiates from the front of the car to the delight of the passenger who screams with joy.
14. My 15-year-old brother is my rock, my source of endless affection, my idolizer and my idol.
15. In a way the women's movement in American owes Cleopatra a lot.
16. The breeze gives you the feeling of relief and makes you want to sit on the comfy reclining chair.
17. His hair is black as night, shiny like chrome; he braids his cornrows that hang to his waist.

Week 4: words

Ok, we looked at some sentences, now find some something in the diction that stands out. Maybe it's a word combination, the use of simple words, a word bomb that makes you reach for the dictionary.

Keep sharing your great ideas. LOVE the posts so far. Excellent work.

ps: a reminder — post by Sunday at 11:59.59 (please don't stay up that late, but that is technically the end of Sunday and the end of the week and the deadline for a timely post.).

pps: a sentence I just had to share. From the NYT and Mark Bittman: The food processor replaces the whisk; the pastry cutter; the standing mixer (for which there are still some uses, but only if you’re a dedicated baker); the mandoline (which, to me, remains a fine alternative to the food processor for small quantities); the mortar and pestle, which, no matter how lovely, quaint and authentic, is perhaps the most labor-intensive, primitive and damnable set of tools in the kitchen; and, perhaps most importantly, the grater.

Why I write ... sentences

Any gross errors in spelling or grammar may be that of the typist not the writer. =-)

1. We don't talk about things that happen in our days at school, we don't discuss issues, we simply don't communicate on that level.
2. I don't write for recognition by others, but rather to better understand myself.
3. I write because it helps me to learn about myself.
4. So the reason I write is because I am forced to, however I CAN have fun with it as long as it is a subject I enjoy or some sort of creative writing.
5. It is this historical impulse that really drives me into wanting to go deeper into producing a research paper.
6. When it's not required to put pen to paper, I stray away from the terrifying task.
7. I do not fully understand how journal writing allows me to condense my thoughts into essential truths, but for years this has been a compelling reason for me to write.
8. Writing does not work like math where I can find a solution and feel satisfied for a short time being; instead I am left to try to expose my soul and turn in an essay to be judged in a very thoughtful, complicated manner.
9. Some may say that there is a hint of egotism in the enjoyment of writing about oneself, and there is, but by abandoning the models and structures of formal, strategic, and impersonal writing, I can begin to explore the different ways that I enjoy writing.
10. With the help of all of my teachers, I have been able to catch up with the rest of my class and finally appreciate my writing, even though there is still work to be done.
11. Having a grade put on every piece of writing has completely altered what writing is for me.
12. The curiosity in her eyes always touches my heart.
13. Free writing is my favorite kinf of writing because I am not limited to a specific topic.
14. I don't hate writing; I just find it more of a chore than a pleasurable pastime.
15. I will admit that I did at one time fancy myself a great poet (but so does every other "tortured" and angry teenage soul who "hates the world").
16. Words have their limits, as does each creative form, but they have the unique ability to combine logic and emotion.
17. In a sense, I am a selfish writer: everything I write always has an aspect that is solely for my own enjoyment or improvement.

Week 3

You all posted some awesome lines and some great comments on why those lines stood out. Now, I want you to focus on sentence structure. Look for a sentence that moves beyond, way beyond, the subject-verb creation and dazzles you with either a fun piece of punctuation or an interesting structure. Then again, maybe your writer has a case of subject-verb-itis and repeats the same pattern so many times it makes you want to scream. Share and amaze .... and remember to post by Sunday.

In other news -- here's a good read about the precision of words. Maybe you're a little obsessed with the English language, too, and would like to learn more. After Deadline, a NYTimes blog, is a great place to start.

Week 2

What amazing sentence, phrase, moment would you like to share from your writer/blog? Wow us with your selection and tell us why you think your selection is wow inducing. And, wow inducing can be good, bad or ugly.

Since it's Labor Day weekend, you can post up until Monday night.

Day 1

Welcome!

1. The blog (your lifeline to this class: syllabus, postings, and more), the course, the teacher, the students (one word to describe yourself as writer; one word to describe your writing)
2. Goal setting: in terms of writing, set three effort goals. Effort goals are 100% measurable and 100% under your control.
3. Read George Orwell's Why I Write.
1. How would you describe Orwell's style? tone? overall impression?

Homework

1. Check the blog for the syllabus

Your writer & you!

What writer are you following? Tell us a little about your writer.

Why I Write