Week 15: About the Writing

I liked that the writing had a lot of flexibility. There were a lot of options for both the story retelling and the essay, which I really appreciated. If there hadn't been, I might have been bored or annoyed with writing in the same style over and over again.

I chose the Storybook rather than the Portfolio. I do wish I had chosen the Portfolio, simply because I overestimated how much time I had in my schedule. I think the three things that should be emphasized on whether someone should pick a Storybook or a Portfolio are time, creativity, and writing style. If you have lots of time in your schedule, either one is fine. If you don't, go with the Portfolio. If you're the type of person whose creative juices flow at a pretty steady pace, either one is fine. However, if you're the type of person who works on bouts of inspiration when writing creative stories, you should probably go with the Portfolio. If you like writing long stories, go with the Storybook. If you like short stories with conclusions, go with the Portfolio. And take all three factors into account and measure the weight each holds in your life accordingly.

I think that the blog commenting is good as it is. As for the Storybook/Portfolio commenting, I think that that's it's fine as it is. One thing I would add is requiring the commenters to address one particular weakness they saw within the Storybook/Portfolio. I know it's not particularly nice or heartening, but I think that it would be extremely helpful, since then the writer of the Storybook/Portfolio knows exactly what they should work on.

On that note, I found the comments with constructive criticism to be the most helpful. Yes, I would have liked to have seen that my storybook was perfect, but these comments allowed me to change things and work on weaknesses. And what was nice was that I could see how my Storybook looked through a fresh and unbiased pair of eyes.

Yes, I do think this class helped my writing, and I'm not just saying that for brownie points. At the beginning of the semester, it took me the entire day to write a retelling. By the end of the semester, I could write a retelling in about twenty minutes.

Well, my dream is to write a fantasy novel, so I hope that I'll accomplish that in the future. Besides that, I'm not really sure. Medical school isn't really about fictional writing (that is, if I get in), so I'll probably write the occasional essay or two. So to my main job: a little. To my dream: a whole lot.

Like I said in my "About the Reading" post: start early. Work ahead. You'll be grateful you did.