Thlog Week 3

            

My idiot self forgot that we were supposed to be writing weekly thlog posts so this thlog will include what I learned both this week and last week. The things we have learned recently that are really sticking with me are actually turning out to be the small things. I have always had issues with proper grammar so I was happy when we learned some tips for that. I never knew how to determine when to use a hyphen but the way Zack explained it made a whole lot of sense to me. I also enjoyed the oxford comma rant because I have always been an advocate for that lil’ guy.

 Another tip that I have already started using in my writing is copying and pasting an awkward sentence three times and then rewording it until you find something that pleases you.

Something from the readings that I found useful was “Responding to Other Students’ Writing”. When I was a junior in high school I was a T.A. for an English class and that typically meant I would just be editing papers for an hour and a half, three days a week. I always really liked editing the papers because I felt like if I could correct some of the things they were doing wrong I would be helping them write better papers. However, after reading about how to respond to others writing in the course reader I realized I hadn’t been doing a great job. I was always good with the whole constructive criticism thing but looking back on it now I should have been patting those kids on the back more for the things they were doing well. When I was editing I didn’t understand that compliments were also a part of my job but I understand the importance now of keeping the criticism equal to the praise.