An Introduction to Writing

Reflecting on Why We Write

Welcome to the University of Arizona Foundations Writing! By enrolling in a Foundations Writing
(FW) course at UA, you are taking the first step in becoming a stronger, more flexible, and more
confident writer. Writing is a skill you will rely on throughout your life, no matter what field you
work in. This course will introduce you to writing at the UA, helping you learn the trends and
details for writing, both here and beyond.

As you begin your writing journey at UA, we should start by reflecting on why we write. Former
FW students share why they write:

● “I write because I enjoy being able to concretely share my ideas with others.”
● “I write because my academic success depends on it.”
● “I write because it allows me to put my thoughts into words or create a story with
them. I write because it is my way of letting my emotions out. I am able to vent
onto a piece of paper that no one will ever see. It brings peace and calmness into
my life.”
● “I write because I'm better at articulating myself on paper.”
● “I write because it is necessary to be successful in today’s culture.
Communication is key.”

Writing is all around us and impacts every aspect of

our lives. Take a moment to think about how writing
influences your daily life. We interact with countless
types of writing throughout our lives, both by reading
written texts and writing those texts ourselves. A text
is not just something you send on your phones; it can
refer to any written, spoken, or visual artifact that
communicates a message. Some examples of texts
include a newspaper article, a petition, a contract, a
tweet, an email to your teacher, a TED talk, an
organization’s website, or a video instruction manual.

Why you write and how you write depend on many

factors. Some questions you might ask yourself before
writing include:
1. Who are you writing for/to?

2. What is your relationship with that person? How will that affect the language you use to
communicate?

3. What do you want that person to do or believe after reading what you wrote?

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 4. What format will your writing take? Will it be a long text with many paragraphs or a short,
simple phrase? What will the final product look like?

5. Why am I writing this? What do I hope to gain from this?

Reflecting on How We Write

We all have our own styles of learning. Some people are kinesthetic learners, meaning they
learn best by doing. Others are visual learners, meaning they learn best by seeing things written
down. Just like learning, we all have our own writing process “styles”. Different writers often
have distinct habits that dictate how they write. For this section, we will be focusing on a specific
type of writing: academic writing. Dr. Lisa Ede, an English professor, identifies four types of
writers in her book Work in Progress: A Guide to Writing and Revising. Take the quiz below to
find out what type you most closely resemble!

Activity 1: Type of Writer Quiz

Take this quiz to discover which type of writer you most identify with. For each question,
choose the answer that is most like your writing process. (Keep in mind that you might be a
blend of more than one category, or these categories might not completely fit how you write.)

1. Before I start writing a paper, I first…

a. Think thoroughly through what I want to say and how I want to say it.
b. Start freewriting on my topic to find out what I have to say.
c. Create a detailed outline of what I want to talk about in my paper.
d. Wait until I need to write my final draft.
2. My first draft is usually…
a. Very organized and thought out because I have been considering the paper in
my head.
b. An exploratory draft, where I start thinking about the best way to organize my
thoughts on the topic.
c. Very close to my outline. I often take my outline and turn the different points
and sections into complete sentences.
d. Not very complete, as I know this is only the first draft so the final paper isn’t
due yet.
3. “Revision” is the step in my writing where…
a. I don’t worry too much, as I already achieved most of my writing goals from
planning ahead.
b. I spend most of my time. My first draft is a starting point, but revision is where I
can check and add all the necessary parts.
c. I continue to work through my writing. I usually perform revision while I am
writing, paying close attention to the shape and form of my ideas and writing.
d. I don’t spend any time because I don’t have any time. I usually write my final

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 draft at the last minute.
4. When I am assigned a paper to write, I…
a. Start thinking about the paper in my spare time, planning and organizing my
ideas before I even start writing.
b. Start writing. I need to get my ideas down to help me get the process started.
Once I have that first draft, I spend my time revising and changing that draft to
turn it into my final draft.
c. Start outlining my paper. Once I have that outline, I can write a draft and then
revise that draft into the final product.
d. Don’t do anything right away. I wait until the deadline is closer before I look at
the assignment more closely.

Add up all of your answers. Which category do you fall into?

Mostly A’s→ Heavy Planners: These writers “generally consider their ideas and plan their
writing so carefully in their heads that their first drafts are often more like other writers’ second
or third drafts. As a consequence, they often revise less intensively and frequently than other
[writers]. Many [heavy planners] have disciplined themselves so that they can think about their
writing in all sorts of places—on the subway, at work, in the garden pulling weeds, or in the
car driving to and from school” (32).

Mostly B’s→ Heavy Revisers: These writers “need to find out what they want to say through
the act of writing itself.…Heavy revisers often state that writing their ideas out in a sustained
spurt of activity reassures them that they have something to say and helps them avoid
frustration. These writers may not seem to plan because they begin drafting so early. Actually,
however, their planning occurs as they draft and especially as they revise. Heavy revisers
typically spend a great deal of their writing time revising their initial drafts. To do so effectively,
they must be able to read their work critically and be able…to discard substantial portions of
the first draft” (32–33).

Mostly C’s→ Sequential Composers: These writers “devote roughly equal amounts of time to
planning, drafting, and revising.…[S]equential composers typically rely on written notes and
plans to give shape and force to their ideas. And unlike heavy revisers, sequential composers
need to have greater control over form and subject matter as they draft” (33). These writers
often slowly work through paragraph after paragraph, rereading and revising as they draft,
working from outlines, and planning ahead.

Mostly D’s→ Procrastinators: Although we all occasionally procrastinate, the group Ede labels
as procrastinators are people who habitually delay writing anything until they write a final draft.
They might wait until the night before the paper is due to begin; therefore, they only have time
to create one draft and possibly proofread it before handing it in (36). Procrastinators may
justify their process by claiming that they work well under pressure, but they have rarely
explored alternative approaches.

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It is not important to pinpoint exactly what kind of writer you are; you might even fall into a
different category depending on what you are writing. The goal here is just to recognize your
general tendencies and consider the advantages and disadvantages of your approach. For
example, if you know you are mostly a heavy planner, you can develop writing strategies that
best support your approach to planning. In addition, you can deliberately work to develop new
writing strategies by incorporating useful strategies from other writer categories. That way, if
your usual method ever fails you, you will have another option to help you proceed.

Activity 2: Reflecting on Your Writing Processes

1. After you have taken the quiz in Learning Activity 1.2, reflect on your result:
● What was your result from the quiz? What type of writing process did it say you
have?
● Do your results match what you think your writing process is? Why or why not?
● Do you feel like you fit into the four categories from the quiz? Would you add
another category?
● What can you learn from the results of the quiz? Do you think you could apply
features of other writing processes to your own writing? What features would
you use?

2. Now, reflect on your writing processes in general:

● What does your writing process look like?
○ Has it shifted throughout the course of your education?
○ Does it change when you are writing in different situations (for school
versus for yourself)?
○ Do you have the same writing style for every type of writing? Why or
why not?
● Have you ever tried any new or different approaches to writing?
○ What worked? What didn’t work?
○ What might you try in future writing situations?
● Do you change your process to incorporate approaches from different writer
types? Why or why not?
● In what ways has your approach to writing changed because of a particular
assignment, activity, or concept you have learned?

What is “good writing”?

Now that we have considered why we write, let’s turn to the question of what makes writing
“good.” Put simply, what do you think “good writing” is? Brainstorm a list of characteristics of
“good writing” with your instructor and classmates.

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Now look back at that list. What aspects of writing do the characteristics relate to? For example,
are they related to the content or ideas of the writing? The form or style? The organization?
Something else entirely?

Look at your list of characteristics of “good writing,” and consider the writing in Figures 1, 2, and
3. Would you consider any of these to be good writing? Why or why not?

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(video link)

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https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6880796

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One could argue that each of these examples is “good writing” because each achieved its goals.
The protest sign in Figure 1 attracted the attention of news photographers and has been
featured in a Time magazine article as well as numerous other news stories. Figure 2 shares
lyrics from the hit musical Hamilton: An American Musical by Lin-Manuel Miranda, whose goal
was to create a musical that provided a new insight into American history for a new generation.
Figure 3 features two paragraphs from an academic paper that was so successful, it won an
award from the Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).

None of these texts look like traditional papers that you write for school, and they may not meet
the characteristics of good writing that you brainstormed as a class. However, they all achieved
(even surpassed) the expectations for “good writing” within a particular context, for a particular
audience, at a particular point in time, and for a particular purpose.

What this activity suggests is that we need a flexible understanding of “good writing.” Good
writing depends on the context, the audience, and the aim(s) of the text. In your Foundations
Writing courses at UA, we hope to help you develop your understanding of “good writing” as tied
to context rather than being related to just one type of writing.

What is Academic Writing?

Writing in an academic context is a bit different from writing in other contexts. Often, academic
writing:

● is written for a teacher.

● is assigned a grade.
● is used for students to demonstrate their
knowledge of
course content.
● incorporates source material, such as readings,
films, or lectures.

Because of these characteristics (and others),

academic writing has some unique features. Some of
the following statements are true, based on research
of academic writing; others are not true. Which do you
think are true statements?

a. The use of hedges (such as might, could, tend to) is relatively common in U.S. academic
writing.
b. U.S. academic writing is indirect; writers can rely on readers to understand the meaning
of their text without directly stating main ideas, claims, or arguments.
c. Most academic papers are five paragraphs long.
d. Citations to other sources are common in academic writing.

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 e. Academic writing uses more specific and precise vocabulary compared with
conversational language.
f. The first-person pronoun I is not acceptable in U.S. academic writing.

Compare your answers as a class. For the statements that you think are true, consider why
these might be common characteristics.

Of course, even the statements considered true above will not apply to every kind of writing task
you complete as a university student. Because writing depends on audience, purpose, and
context, you will find that there is no single best way to write; instead, you will have to consider
the best approach in each setting.

One challenge of undergraduate writing is that you will be exposed to and create many different
kinds of texts, such as short responses to readings, in-class essay exams, lab reports,
presentations and accompanying slides, posters, research papers, case study reports, and
possibly even an undergraduate thesis. Outside of school, you might write on social media, in a
blog, or in letters and emails; you might write as part of a social group you belong to, for political
activism, or for your needs as a consumer (such as a letter of complaint to a company or a letter
of request to your landlord).

In your FW courses, you will learn strategies to prepare for these numerous situations and types
of writing so that you can become a flexible writer. A major focus of your FW courses will be to
consider the series of choices that you make as an author so that you can write effectively in
different situations.

Activity 3: Writing Across University Courses

1. If you are taking other courses this semester, you probably have already received a
syllabus for each course, outlining your assignments. If not, look at the syllabus from
this course and/or from others you have taken in the past. As you look through these
syllabi, answer the following questions:

● What are some of the types of texts you will write in your courses this
semester? Make a list of at least 10 types of texts.
● Choose three items from the list you just created.
○ What do you know about your instructor’s expectations for these texts?
○ Is there information in the syllabus or has the instructor discussed this
in class?
○ Do these expectations meet the description of academic writing from
above? How are they similar or different?

2. You will not only be writing for course work this semester. Think about what you do
outside of the classroom (for example, extracurricular activities such as clubs or sports

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 teams, communication with friends and family, etc.)

● What are some of the types of texts you will write outside of your courses this
semester? Make a list of at least 10 types of texts.
● Choose three items from the list you just created.
○ What are some of the expectations your audience will have for these
types of texts?
○ How do you know what to include in each type of text?

3. Share your lists and expectations with your classmates. As you share your lists in
class, consider how your lists are similar and different from the others. Why do you
think this is?

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Notes related to What is Academic Writing? Activity

Research of academic writing shows that a, d, and e are generally true statements. In contrast,
research has shown that U.S. academic writing tends to be fairly direct (statement b). Many
students have learned to write five-paragraph essays (statement c), but they are not in fact
common or required in most academic writing. The acceptability of the first-person pronoun I
(statement f) depends largely on the audience, type of writing, and context of

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