New Fall, New Semester

It is THAT time of year, folks! Fall semester! Whether this is your freshman year, your senior year, or your first year in graduate school, you are going to be doing lots and lots of writing. Maybe you're taking English 101 for the first time, and you're not exactly how college writing will be different from high school. Maybe you're taking your upper-division writing course in your major, and you have no idea how in the world you're going to write a 30-page paper. Heck! Maybe it's been a few years since you've been back to school, and you just want to get back into the swing of being a student! No matter what stage you're at, I'm here to help!

Here's my best piece of advice: Make a writing appointment as soon as you get the prompt.

One of the biggest misconception about Writing Centers and Writing Tutors is that you cannot make appointments until you've finished writing your paper. This is FALSE.

The best time to meet with a tutor is at the start of the writing process to ensure that you understand what your professor or teacher is asking of you. You don't want to meet with a Writing Tutor the day before your paper is due only to find out that you wrote a reflection essay instead of a critical analysis. Doesn't sound like too big of a deal, but it can dock you some serious points!

Once you clearly understand what kind of writing your professor is asking of you, you and your Writing Tutor can create a plan of attack. If your assignment requires research, you can work together to identify a solid set of research questions that can provide you more guidance during your time in a brick-and-mortar or online library. If you've already done the research, or your assignment doesn't require any, you and your tutor can work on developing a tentative thesis statement.

All assignments have some form of a thesis statement: that is, a one- to two-sentence representation of your entire paper.

This is the anchor for your paper; all points in your paper should somehow connect back to the thesis statement. In other words: it's super duper important! Once you figure out a tentative thesis statement, you can start identifying aspects of your argument or paper, and then develop an outline, then write your first draft, then revise your first draft, etc., etc.

TLDR;? Meet with a writing tutor early in your writing process. It'll help. A lot.

Want to schedule an appointment now? Click here. Happy writing!