Part one: Writing a personal essay. Get to know the personal essay as a genre and move towards you own -- Find a way to structure and compose your personal essay -- Get feedback on your draft and revise it -- Part two: Writing an essay about a text. On reading and writing about texts -- Read and respond to your assigned text -- Write your essay about a text -- Learn from other writers as you revise your draft -- Part three: Writing a research essay. Confront your research assignment -- Do your research -- Write your research essay -- Get feedback on your draft and revise it -- Part four: Mindfulness and essay writing. Introductory thoughts on mindfulness -- The psychology of writing -- Part five: Giving and receiving feedback in peer groups. The psychology of feedback -- Being a peer responder.
Summary:
"The Essays Only You Can Write offers a perspective on essay writing that spotlights a writer's uniqueness. Resisting the perception that personal and academic writing are at odds with one another, it treats the impulse to write "personally" as potential fuel for a variety of writing purposes. The book encourages students to think like academics--pursuing their enthusiasms, trusting their ideas, and questioning their conclusions--by leading them through three main writing assignments: a personal essay, an essay based on texts, and a research essay. Each chapter offers exercises and strategies for various stages in the pre-writing, drafting, and revision processes. Freewriting; extensive attention to planning; devising a structure and order of ideas that both promote and reflect engagement with a topic; developing rhetorical awareness and knowledge of conventions; and an advocacy for expressive, socially-responsible writing--all are central elements of the text's instruction. By acknowledging the emotions inherent in the writing process, many of which can muddle thinking--I don't want anyone to see this; what if I make mistakes?; what if the writing isn't good?; I don't want to be critiqued; etc.--Papoulis helps beginning college writers to navigate the psychological as well as the technical roadblocks that can get in the way of their best personal and academic writing."-- Provided by publisher.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.