My name is Malick, I am a 1st year student at The City College of New York. Before stepping into this class, I used to think writing was just putting words on paper and just turning them in. I didn’t really think too much about what I wrote down on the paper, and I wasn’t really giving it my all. But, after being in this class for a few months, it taught me a valuable lesson. Writing is about being authentic and true to yourself, also I learned that one set of eyes obviously is going to see less than 2-4. More directly,  in English 110, I learned that having multiple drafts and many perspectives to review my writing, like the various people from peer review and the professor from the 1-on-1 meeting, really improves my writing. We also learned about how to use the digital Library, different strategies for reading and writing,and how to create an outline for our major assignments. I learned to be as real as possible and to have other people look over my work.

Back in high school I didn’t really take my writing too seriously. I would just procrastinate until the last day and then write everything down and hope for the best. I feel like even now, this is a habit that I haven’t grown out of. Doing this isn’t the best approach to taking down assignments because rushing all my work at the last second will make it more likely to make mistakes and lower the quality of my work, but I feel like creating multiple drafts really counters this. Creating the first draft is basically just getting the ideas out and onto the paper, meanwhile the revision after the peer reviews is really what makes the second draft because you’re reshaping your ideas and also shaping meaning helping the writing speak out to an audience more. After re-reading my writing after I revised it I can really see a difference. My ideas felt way more clear, there were no more little mistakes, the structure of my writing looked way better, and there was a lot more depth.

I do think I learned a lot about myself as a writer through taking this class and peer reviews. For example, I need outside perspectives to see my blind spots in writing. I feel like I’ve also become more confident in my voice after sharing my ideas with the people around me and also from the translation 1 presentation we did towards the beginning of the semester. I also feel like a lot of skills that I had grown a lot like analyzing readings, connecting ideas, and developing arguments and I feel like getting feedback from peer reviews and 1 on 1’s really help me improve those skills. I’ve always seen stuff like that as people judging my work before but now I am way more comfortable receiving feedback. The 1 on 1 meeting also really helped a lot because it’s very good to get a more professional perspective on your work that can differ from your classmates point of view. I also learned that making a checklist of things to edit really helps me keep track of what im missing and what I need to edit.

Here’s a picture of a checklist I used to revise my work:

Something else I learned about is the CCNY Library. Every once in a while in class we took a trip to the library and talked to the librarian about how to use onesearch, CCNY’s very own digital library database. There, we learned how to navigate the website and use it to find sources for us to utilize in our synthesis essays. This helped me improve as a writer because before I wasn’t really thinking too hard about sources and I just searched everything up on google. Now I know I have to take credibility into account while searching for sources to help support my claim. This is a skill that would really help me in future classes and assignments.

Here’s a picture of some articles I was thinking about using for the synthesis essay that I found using OneSearch:

Learning to create a proper outline was also a big part in helping me grow as a writer. For homework we would receive worksheets online. In these worksheets we basically practiced some skills that we can use for our writing like researching using google scholar or creating summaries for sources that we find to better our writing. These skills proved very useful in the long run because I already had my ideas written down in a separate place so it made it way easier to write for my assignments with the evidence and stuff already down on a separate google doc. Creating an outline really helps you decide on your stance and what you’re going to write about already and helps you gather your evidence beforehand so you come more prepared when the time comes to start writing your drafts.

Here’s an example of a worksheet that we did for homework that helped me with my synthesis essay:

In conclusion, I learned that using multiple drafts and peer reviews and 1-on-1 sessions all help me really improve my writing because it gives multiple other perspectives on my writing and helps me make up for all the places I don’t see things I can add on to. Coming to this class has given me a brand new perspective on writing and I’ve also learned about different strategies to use and improve my writing. Overall, this course didn’t just make me a better writer—it made me a more aware thinker. I now understand that writing is a process, not a one-time task, and that good writing only happens when you’re willing to revise, reflect, and listen to feedback. I also feel like I have improved my writing skills and learned new ways to make my writing better like using the OneSearch to find some credible sources and creating a plan before tackling my writing.