“If a man means his writing seriously, he must mean to write well. But how can he write well until he learns to see what he has written badly. His progress toward good writing and his recognition of bad writing are bound to unfold at something like the same rate.”
—John Ciardi
It seems that 2020 is not the year for college students (or anybody really). We have been hit hard by the Coronavirus pandemic and are struggling with our battles each day as we strive to navigate the new world of online school.
After attending a listening session of a fellow scholarship group on WebEx and being attentive on social media, I discovered how much people are having complications with the new state of reality. For those at Marian, it appears that many are drained from this semester and are desperately waiting for it to draw to a close.
What I have noticed as another factor exposing our anxieties and stress is the way people have began to approach writing: quickly and less persuasively. Many students are beginning to check out of the semester and within good reason. However, as a tutor and a lover of writing, I thought what better time to put some advice out there for a struggling writer.
This blog post is entitled: “5 Tips to Avoid Bad Writing.” This video was not created to say that anybody’s writing is necessarily bad. Rather, I made it specifically for students working on academic writing assignments, like essays and research papers. My tips to avoid the mistakes we make when we are in a hurry. My intention with the blog post is to encourage you to engage in revision and to step away from your work when it begins to tread into your already present anxieties.
Lots of my advice and feedback comes from being a student as well as a tutor. I must share a small issue I had with creating the video before you watch it. The program I downloaded was intended to be free from watermarks, but that was in fact not the case. So I apologize if the watermark is disruptive to your viewing pleasures, but nonetheless I hope it gives you a reason to keep writing despite the odds of what is happening around us.
Voila! And let me know what you think about the video or my advice in the comments below. Be sure to subscribe too!
Hi, Dr. O here. Great job! This was an excellent first post. I’m invested in the blog and the subject.…