English 12: Creative Writing - Jordan Curtis
Jordan Curtis
Professors Cindy Chavez and Michael Barba
English 12
7 May 2018
Reflection Paper
I have grown in many aspects as a writer over the course of this class. When I entered I focused only on fiction and nothing else. However, every session of class led me to discovering new quirks of the distinct aspects of writing. I found a passion for writing creative non-fiction pieces that I never knew I had. Even now I still find nuances that I like about my writing and how I want my style to be. Without this class I would’ve never unearthed these tiny bits of knowledge that have led to my growth.
The guidance of my instructors has also provided clarity in how I can space out my writing, avoid procrastination and improve the effectiveness of my diction. I rely on adverbs and adjectives in my writing, but with guidance my choice of words has improved over the semester, though I still find myself using more adverbs and adjectives than I would prefer. My creativity has also improved ten-fold. I have my preferred genre and style, but my spectrum of comfortability in writing has broadened to the point that I feel I can write about stuff other than just nitty-gritty, dark and realistic things. I have confidence that I can write a slice-of-life romantic comedy and it won’t turn out to be a cliché cut-and-paste novel that everyone has read a thousand times over their life.
The journals played a big part in this growth of mine, as everyday that I had to complete one I tried as best as I could to differentiate my style. Some days I would focus on fiction, others I would try a non-fiction approach and others I would jot down backstories of characters from a story I plan to write. By shaking things up like that it helped to expand my writing prowess. The journals weren’t the only assignments that helped me broaden my abilities, the various free-writes, homework and readings of my peers’ works also aided in my enlightenment. With each free-write I found myself having to explore an aspect or genre of writing that I might not be familiar or comfortable with. This in turned opened my eyes to what I wasn’t allowing myself to write, which then made me want to try writing that style further. This was the same for the homework assignments and reviewing classmates’ work. Each piece of homework pushed me to expand my horizons as much as possible, while reviewing the work of my peers allowed me to see how our styles differed.
While I reviewed my peers’ work and was able to learn from that, I was also able to learn from my peers directly. Some of the best advice I’ve ever received was from the people whom I worked with while workshopping our pieces. Without the received feedback it would’ve been much more difficult for me to bring out the full potential of my works. Whether it was simple grammar errors being corrected, a scene being changed, dialog being made longer or shorter and even excluding unneeded characters, it all helped. I appreciate everything that I’ve received from this class as I recognize that it has made me that much stronger of a writer.
Professors Cindy Chavez and Michael Barba
English 12
7 May 2018
Reflection Paper
I have grown in many aspects as a writer over the course of this class. When I entered I focused only on fiction and nothing else. However, every session of class led me to discovering new quirks of the distinct aspects of writing. I found a passion for writing creative non-fiction pieces that I never knew I had. Even now I still find nuances that I like about my writing and how I want my style to be. Without this class I would’ve never unearthed these tiny bits of knowledge that have led to my growth.
The guidance of my instructors has also provided clarity in how I can space out my writing, avoid procrastination and improve the effectiveness of my diction. I rely on adverbs and adjectives in my writing, but with guidance my choice of words has improved over the semester, though I still find myself using more adverbs and adjectives than I would prefer. My creativity has also improved ten-fold. I have my preferred genre and style, but my spectrum of comfortability in writing has broadened to the point that I feel I can write about stuff other than just nitty-gritty, dark and realistic things. I have confidence that I can write a slice-of-life romantic comedy and it won’t turn out to be a cliché cut-and-paste novel that everyone has read a thousand times over their life.
The journals played a big part in this growth of mine, as everyday that I had to complete one I tried as best as I could to differentiate my style. Some days I would focus on fiction, others I would try a non-fiction approach and others I would jot down backstories of characters from a story I plan to write. By shaking things up like that it helped to expand my writing prowess. The journals weren’t the only assignments that helped me broaden my abilities, the various free-writes, homework and readings of my peers’ works also aided in my enlightenment. With each free-write I found myself having to explore an aspect or genre of writing that I might not be familiar or comfortable with. This in turned opened my eyes to what I wasn’t allowing myself to write, which then made me want to try writing that style further. This was the same for the homework assignments and reviewing classmates’ work. Each piece of homework pushed me to expand my horizons as much as possible, while reviewing the work of my peers allowed me to see how our styles differed.
While I reviewed my peers’ work and was able to learn from that, I was also able to learn from my peers directly. Some of the best advice I’ve ever received was from the people whom I worked with while workshopping our pieces. Without the received feedback it would’ve been much more difficult for me to bring out the full potential of my works. Whether it was simple grammar errors being corrected, a scene being changed, dialog being made longer or shorter and even excluding unneeded characters, it all helped. I appreciate everything that I’ve received from this class as I recognize that it has made me that much stronger of a writer.
