Journal: Finish this thought in one paragraph: If I could change one thing about myself (if you can't think of anything, you might want to consider telling how you got to be so perfect!) ...Binder check: Is your syllabus in there? Are your handouts in there?
Shitty First Drafts is the name of an essay in Anne Lamott's book called Bird by Bird. This is a hugely successful book about the writing process, and I recommend it to anyone interested in the writing process.I asked you to annotate the story because when you annotate effectively, you are more likely to retain what you have read. Let's go over the essay.
Active Reading Outline
https://docs.google.com/document/d/14iFNvjnQh6uZjNRkPvl3jRiiETJJ38G523SZBM1-VuM/edit
But Why Encourage Shitty First Drafts?
1. Encourages and enables composition
2. Motivates substantial revisions
3. Increases the writer’s confidence and trust in their writing process
4. Engages rhetorical awareness -- in other words, expects you to anticipate the questions and needs of your audience.
Shitty First Drafts motivates substantial revision. What does it mean to revise?
Revising does not mean fixing style, grammar, and mechanics. This is editing. Revising does not mean cutting and pasting, or moving things around, or fleshing out transitions. That is also editing.
"To revise" means "to look at it again," "to re-see," "to revisit." Revision entails the review and, often, alteration of one's very thinking -- of such elements of one's argument as thesis, agenda, analysis, evidence, and terminology. Sometimes revising and editing overlap: sometimes one can modify or enhance one's argument without starting from scratch. Often, however, trying to effect such change while working with what is already on paper or on the screen can make an essay worse by rendering it incoherent or contradictory.
Hence, revising often means rewriting a paper on a blank screen or blank pad of paper. One mark of a good writer is a willingness to revise, where necessary, by starting from scratch. Such revision does not imply that the effort one has put into one's draft is in vain. Rather, it means that one has found out which way to go by finding out which way not to go, while at the same time learning what one needs to learn about one's topic to write effectively on it.
Journal one more time -- Write one paragraph answering this question -- HOW HAS READING SHITTY FIRST DRAFTS CHANGED YOUR OPINION ABOUT THE WRITING PROCESS? In other words, how has it encouraged you? Please put your name at the top of the paper and hand it in. Thank you!
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Writing responses. You will be asked to write several "responses" in this class. A response is to a reading that you have read.
Assignment - Write a response to Shitty First Drafts.
What is a response to an essay?
What is the purpose of a response?
How to write a response -- Page 6 in Back to the Lake
Summarize
React
Consider what you learned about the WRITING PROCESS in the essay.
Each paragraph should have a quote from the essay that supports your opinion.
Cite paragraphs with (par. 3) or (pars. 3-5).
Due Friday, January 31: Response to Shitty First Drafts
Homework for next class: Read and annotate Chapter 1 -- Good Writers are Good Readers. Complete Active Reader Outline
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1C9Kx--fDyz1Gn65LQYRoJ04RYLrJr6K0NgQf1KZJvHI/edit
