Homework Response 1/31

I haven’t had too much experience with workshopping, my first time revising someone else work was last semester when I took English at a community college. I would have to say that in a way I liked having peer workshop because there are students that really try their best to give constructive feedback. In the other hand, there are times when I feel it is just a waste of time, for the simple fact that there are students that do not try to engage in the workshop session.

Editing can be described as a reader correcting the punctuation, grammatical errors, and sentence structure of a particular essay. Also, editing a paper has to do with changing some of the words incorporated in the writing and paying attention to the spelling as well. When it comes to revising a paper most people focus on the organization and the areas where the writer has made really strong and weak points. Revising a paper has to do with asking questions like having a conversation with the writer. Based on the reading we had to do, its not necessary to do both of this things in a workshop session while reading a paper. The best one to do is revise, try to give your opinion about the things that should be added to the paper or focus on the structure of the paper; the editing can be done by the writer because the paper belongs to them.

The biggest concern that I have about peer workshops is if the rest of the class is going to participate in the revision of each others papers and if they will give useful feedback instead of just playing around and not caring about helping others. I tend to be a “straight up” person like most people say, therefore, I tell others the truth and what I really think about something so I am concern about people getting upset by the certain feedback I will provide.

Straub’s article suggests to provide comments to the writer as we talk to others while having a face-to-face conversation, “Sound like you normally sound when you are speaking with a friend or acquaintance” (Straub, ed). I am planning on providing comments that will not sound as if a really professional person is revising the paper, instead the writer will notice that my comments will be directly towards him/her. Another suggested made is not to keep urself from telling the person what you really think about their writing, its better to help by telling what needs improvement in their paper and addressing the weak and strong points instead of letting the person turn in a bad paper, and that is what Scrub means when he says, “ But friends don’t let friends think their writing is the best thing since The Great Gatsby and they don’t lead them to think that all is fine and well when its not” (Straub, ed). I will implement the suggestions made in the Straub’s article by provide honest comments that will hopefully help others improve their paper if it needs to be improved; I am not planning on criticising anyones paper I will just give constructive feedback.