Chapter 21 Reading Response

Personal Reaction: Considering that this chapter is based on the typical layout of a paper, there wasn't a whole lot that surprised me. On pages 420 and 421 the book discusses different ways in which you can ease the writing process, which I haven't heard of all the examples like timing yourself while writing, or beginning very slow by writing a sentence every 15 minutes or so. As far as what to do when you go back to working on a paper, I found it interesting that the book suggests doing things like leaving yourself hints on how to continue, or pausing in the middle of a sentence so when you come back to it you know exactly how to proceed, and switching instruments like writing instead of typing. This chapter also talks about how sometimes it can be easier to start writing supporting paragraphs before you even think about your thesis or topic sentence, personally for me although sometimes I struggle with my thesis, I like to write from beginning to end in order because once I have my thesis done, it really helps me to see how I'd like the rest of my paper to fall into place. Another thing I found interesting is how on page 424 it talks about ending your paper with a topic sentence, which I guess I thought was pretty common as far as restating your point. I really like how Professor Zuko suggested we acknowledge apposing viewpoints towards the end of an argument paper, I feel like that strategy really strengthens the paper, and it would be cool to see that touched on in this chapter.

Professional Reaction: Overall I think this chapter is really useful for anyone who is writing a paper, especially for people who struggle with writing at all. I find it helpful that this chapter covers different ways in which you can work through writers block, what the overall layout of your paper should look like, and even different ways to go about writing different paragraphs. It's very useful that the book walks you through each part of the writing process like the topic sentence, your opening paragraph, all the paragraphs in-between, and how to go about writing your conclusion with different strategies or approaches for each. I think it's safe to say that most of us have been writing and learning about the layout of papers as early as elementary school, and even I found some things that were new to me in this chapter, so I would highly recommend it be read by anyone who has papers to write.

-Samantha Jo Gardner
 English 122


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