Theory Of Writing Essay

Everything in life has a process. A system or set of rules for how to do something

in a particular way each time whether it's intentional or not. Oftentimes these processes are

things we rarely consider in detail as they become a normal and almost instinctual part of one's

life. Learning to identify and refine these processes can be an important step in bettering one's

life. Arguably one of the most important processes in writing. It is a useful skill in many walks of

life and it's vital to understand how to do it most efficiently and with the best results. This means

looking back on what the process is, how it got to that point and how to make it better with

research and new skills. This essay will focus on my process of writing, the background of how

it got to that point, and research to help make it better.

The process of my writing involves several large steps rather than many small

ones. My first step is to analyze what a particular assignment or writing prompt is asking me to

do exactly. Many times this means mulling over it for a day or more and revisiting it later. This

allows me to get brainstorm about how I might want to answer the prompt. Allowing myself time

to think about a prompt also helps ideas come easier when I come back to the assignment or

prompt later.

Second I brainstorm, this is the step that takes the most amount of time out of any

of the steps. It can take several days to come up with an idea that I am happy with for the

writing, although sometimes it only takes a day or so before I have a solid idea that I might want

to write about. This step is where procrastination creeps in the most and I am forced to admit that

my process is flawed in this way which sometimes leads me to submit assignments barely on

time or several weeks late, take this project for example. I let procrastination get the best of me
and my grade will suffer as a result. The question becomes how this problem can be stopped

before getting out of hand.

My third step is the shortest and is less like a step and more like something I just

do alongside many of the other steps. This is listening to music while I write or brainstorm.

Particularly music that I have heard before. Having something familiar in the background helps

me drown out thoughts that might cause me to become a side tract from writing such as checking

my phone for the latest social media post or simply getting stuck on my word and getting lost in

thought. This is particularly helpful in the first draft form of my essays or writing projects.

The fourth step in my process varies based on the assignment. In some cases, it is

required that I write an outline in my essays. Many times the outlines go unused or barely used

because I find it much more efficient to simply draw directly from my mind and refine the details

later when I have more time. And since then my free written draft has become my outline. I can

move things around and fit the people together when they are in a more developed form than just

a few sentences and I find it much easier to organize my thoughts this way.

My modern writing process began in ninth grade in my freshman English class

with the first essay assignment my teacher gave the class. It forced me to think about writing

differently than I had before. This is not to say that I did not have one before this but that the one

referenced in this article begins at that time. This being the first large writing assignment that I

got in high school naturally I took some time to consider how I would approach it as a result I

often found myself falling behind the small milestones that the teacher set because I could not

imagine thinking of an idea so quickly like many of the other kids, did because it is important to

my that I believe in what I am writing and that it means something to me to ensure that I put the

most amount of energy and knowledge that I can towards it.

 The second part of my process came from many larger and more important

projects down that line when I realized I needed more time to think of a high-quality idea and be

able to execute it in a way that I could be happy in the end. This became particularly useful in

the high-level English classes when I needed just a few more days to finish the brainstorming

process under less pressure. I consider the prompt and think about it for a few days. Albeit a

habit that often leads to trouble with procrastination if allowed too much time to pass. However,

I still stand by this part of my process because I have come up with some of my best writing

ideas in high school by writing and brainstorming for a few days instead of jumping in right from

the start.

The third part of my process roots back to when I was just a kid, maybe a few

years only and I listened to the same albums on repeat for hours. I developed a real love for

music. Fast forward to high school I discovered that listening to music during my writing helped

me focus much better than if I didn't have music to play. Normally I am very easily distracted

which causes writing to not get done at the right time if at all in some cases. However, when I am

listening to music it gives my brain something other than what I'm doing which may seem

counterintuitive to some but for me, it makes it easier for me to focus on what I don't want to

focus on instead of all the tiny things that distract me otherwise. By not trying to focus on the

writing as much with music it becomes so much easier to drown out the small details and sounds

or the urge to check my phone.

The last step is somewhat a consequence of the two steps. While some

assignments such as this one require an outline, they are not massively helpful for simple essays

and small lists will go further than an entire worksheet of an outline. Ninth grade was also the

first time that I was expected to write a good outline on day one of the projects. It became more
stressful than it was worth and ended up spending far too much time to write it than it was worth.

Letting my writing flow freely and moving things around later was much more productive

because I can get all of my ideas out in a somewhat unorganized way and I can refine them later

on if I feel like I need to. This habit is also partly from writing AP English essays in the last two

years.

Source number one talks about how listening to music while writing and working

can be horrible. I trust it because it was written by people with doctoral degrees from colleges

and it's a research example. These people have degrees in psychology and work for a fairly large

university. They wrote and executed a study to test the effect that listening to music could have

on the brain's ability to focus or create complete sentences and words, as well as how much

editing was required in a paper with listening vs not listening to music. I found that for those

essays where the person listened to music more words were deleted in the editing process than

those that didn't listen to any music. Overall the essays of those who did not listen to music used

more advanced vocabulary than the ones who did.

Source two talks about the importance of planning as an essay. I trust it partly

because I found it on google scholar and because a reputable organization posted it. They talk

about how planning an essay will allow a person to get ideas out and organize them before

jumping onto a paper and they give several other examples of why one should plan an essay

rather than just writing it with no plan.

The third source is about procrastination and how detrimental it is. I trust the

sources because it was published by doctorates in psychology. Procrastination along with several

other things about work ethic is heavily rooted in the psychology of an individual or group. This

makes the qualifications of these individuals relevant to this essay and the context it being out in.
It states that procrastination can lead to higher rates of depression and anxiety, leading to poorer

sleep, more stress, and simply a generally less happy life than those who do not procrastinate.

The biggest problem with procrastination however is that it decreases the chance of optimal

performance. This means that students are losing the opportunity to perform at their best because

they are consciously postponing the completion of tasks that need to be done. The article

specifically mentions the college setting in its observations.

I think my process is very flawed and has a long way to go especially after

reading all the sources about how every one of my steps has something about it that isn't quite

right.

Starting with the first one. I knew before that listening to music while I studied wasn't the

best thing for me but admittedly I ignored most of the claims thinking that it couldn't possibly

have that much of an effect. I learned through this research that it does have a huge impact. I

don't think I will completely get rid of my music while studying, however, I will reduce the

amount of time that I do because I now understand the true impact that it is having on my

academic life.

Secondly the essay planning. The article I read simply did not provide the evidence to

convince me that planning my essay would be better for me than writing a rough draft out of my

head or only creating a small list. Therefore I will not be changing this part of my process. I

think that the way I am currently doing it is working out just fine.

The third source was the most shocking. While I knew that procrastinating was a bad

thing. I had no idea that it had this large of an impact on a person's life. The article is very

relevant because it is referring to the undergraduate population of college students. They studied

multiple aspects of the phenomenon and none of them came back any good. I will be trying my
best to change in the future however procrastination is one of the most notoriously difficult

things to change as it is extremely easy to fall into and build a habit of it.

Overall I learned that there are a lot of things about my process that should change just

for the benefit of my academic performance and skills, some of them will be easier than others,

and some more important than others.

 Sources:

1. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0747563200000431

2. https://qldwriters.org.au/2019/01/15/why-plan-5-reasons-why-planning-will-benefit-your

-writing-life/

3. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13803395.2010.518597