Blog Post #8

Linguistic Accuracy

During my own writing process, I focus on linguistic accuracy throughout the course of my writing. I begin to write, focusing on getting my thoughts on paper. Once I have completed several sentences or a paragraph, I usually re-read my work, checking that the content flows, makes sense, and is focused. As I read, I edit the linguistic errors I find and revise the content at the same time. I do this constantly throughout my work, and upon completion, I proofread, make last minute corrections, and then submit my work. I do not usually have much to change during my final proofread since I have caught the majority of the errors during previous read-throughs. I acquired most of my grammatical knowledge in late elementary school and continued to grow and develop that knowledge throughout the later years of my schooling. I had a very firm foundation in grammar, including lessons on sentence structure and parts of speech.

Effectiveness of this Approach

While academically, I am not sure if my approach is sound, it has worked very well for me. I believe that it has saved me considerable time in editing and revising since I catch errors as I go. I am able to see that a sentence does not work or fit with the text that I am writing and revise, edit, or eliminate it before the problem starts to affect the rest of the piece. 

Teaching Writing

I do not have experience teaching writing, though if I do teach a writing class, I imagine that the most difficult part of giving students feedback on language errors would be in deciding what to mark on their papers. I know in my foreign language studies, having this kind of feedback has been helpful, allowing me to avoid the same mistake the next time. However, since English is a more opaque language, it leaves more room for language errors, especially in spelling. It will be hard to determine a good balance - marking errors to help the student avoid future mistakes versus marking so many that it becomes overwhelming and discouraging. 

L2 Learners and Editing

Seeing language errors can be difficult in L2 learning. For this reason, in the editing process, I would encourage students to look for one type of error at a time. I would guide students in subject-verb agreement, tense/aspect, plural/singular, etc., one at a time, so that students can focus on specific issues instead of an overwhelming and seemingly infinite number of possible errors. While this is not congruent with my writing process, I have the benefit of native speaker intuition guiding my writing. With a sense of what sounds "right" and what doesn't, the editing process for me will be different than it will be for my students.

Regardless, it will be a difficult but satisfying journey into guiding my students into writers who are proud of their work and feel accomplished and proficient as L2 writers.