As I mentioned in a prior blog, “each week in Professor McCoy’s English 203 class we are often divided into smaller discussion groups to confer on various questions and activities.” In addition, I stated how I “thoroughly enjoy being with these smaller groups” because I am granted the opportunity of conversing with my peers about various materials. More often than not, I walk out of class with my head in a swirl of thoughts due to these small group discussions. I find myself amazed by the amount of material and knowledge we share with one another.
Therefore, I have come to realize that, due to the amount of knowledge shared, I have difficulty deciding what to write and how to write a blog post or an essay that incorporates everything we discussed in class. In other words, I have difficulty “narrowing it down.”
In class today, we were, once again, divided into our smaller groups where we spent quite some time discussing our “through lines” for our final reflection essays. Shortly after, we were advised by Professor McCoy to share our through lines among our peers in our group. Thus, each member of my group read aloud their three through lines and expressed their interest in each. One through line that stood out to me, was one that Kat had shared with our group. Kat stated that she noticed there was a “struggle of taking an abundance of ideas and thoughts and narrowing them down into a concrete and effective argument.” As a group, we expressed how we all found ourselves struggling with the concept of “focusing in and narrowing down” our own ideas and thoughts.
After discussing this struggle with my peers, I came to the realization that the act of “narrowing it down” is an important practice that develops as one continues to advance in their writing skills.
After coming to this realization, I decided to look through and re-read some of my old blog posts. I noticed that in my first blog post I attempted to incorporate everything we had discussed in the first two months of the semester into one tiny blog post. While re-reading this post, I observed that my thoughts were everywhere and I attempted to focus on too many thoughts. Thus, I had hindered my ability to give thorough explanations on my interpretations and provide textual evidence as support. I continued to read through more of my blog posts and as I came to the more recent ones, I noticed that I have evolved as a writer. The more I practiced and advanced my writing abilities, the more I learned how to “focus in” and “narrow down” my thoughts and ideas.
The process of “narrowing it down” allows writers to become more effective in their writing. In my opinion, the ability to focus in and truly explain your interpretations and findings enables readers to grasp a deeper understanding of one’s writing.