Thlog3

This week I learned about a bunch of things but first I wanted to touch on the idea of rereading my work and looking for mistakes.  Usually when revisiting my work I just skim it but since I’ve been scrutinizing my work, especially in what I wrote in my rough draft, I found mistakes that if I had left them they would have made me look very, very uneducated and sad.  This also helped me because as I re-read what I wrote, I thought of more ideas that I could include and add to my argument or statement.  This has helped me in my writing because I no longer look dumb because I let a silly mistake slide.  Another thing I learned about this week was how useful of a tool dashes can be.  We learned about hyphens, and why we use them, but to me the dashes seem more important.  Dashes allow the writer to insert information when they don't want the info to be too separate by using parenthesis or confuse the reader with a plethora of commas.  Another bit of information I learned this week, quite possibly the most important, is the technique of building a good argument.  A good argument is persuasive.  It has evidence that supports its claim as to why it’s valid and why it is correct.  An example if a bad argument is one I encountered earlier this evening.  A friend of mine came up to me and was like “Hey Gary let’s go to this concert this sunday night.”  This friend of mine didn’t give any other reason as to why I should go besides the “you’ll have fun” aspect.  They failed to address the negatives of me going to the concert, like not doing my homework and not getting sleep, therefore making the argument weaker..  Although this was a bad argument because said friend didn’t address all the aspects of me going to the concert, for some reason I went and am now writing this at 1am on a sunday night.  As you can tell I’m stoked.  Another thing I learned this week that applies directly to me was the rejection of the “one shot shebang” angle when writing an important paper.  I’ll admit it, I sat down and wrote my first draft in one sitting.  Did the process suck? Yes. I recommend not doing the one shot shebag because it makes writing so much harder than it needs to be.  I sat down, straining, trying to think of what I wanted to say which only stressed me out.  The one shot shebang was a technique I used mainly because I didn’t have time because I procrastinated and had to do it then and now.  I probably won’t do this again.  Lastly, I wanted to discuss the working vs final thesis statement.  This concept has been a part of my writing for a while now, but I never identified it as a step in the creation of my final piece because when I altered my thesis statement, I kinda felt like I was cheating and tailoring my statement to fit what I wrote and thought about.  I now realize this is helpful because it helps my paper actually make sense which is kinda cool.