Expect When You’re Expecting: What to Expect in a College Writing Course

You love Writing, Mathematics, and Science. You are undecided. You do not know which college course you are going to take. Will you take a Writing course such as Literature or Creative Writing? Or Electronic and Communications Engineering? Or Physics?

Here’s what you have to consider. Pick the course that is really close to your heart. If writing is your passion, then without any hesitation, choose a college writing course.

 
In case you decided to take a writing course, here are the things you have to expect:

• Usually, writing courses in colleges have two main types- expository writing and research paper composition. In the first type, you will be required to write five various types of essays including comparison/contrast, causal analysis, and more. In the second type, students have to write a 2 research papers due before midterm and a week before finals.
• There are some colleges which require students enrolled in writing courses to write 5-6 essays a week. This is a form of training for the students to enhance and improve their writing skills.
• Attendance is very important. If in highschool, you have made 2 or 3 absences, college is totally different. Missing more than 3 classes will definitely affect your grade and performance.

Expect that in a writing course, you will eat essays for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. And if you can’t take this, perhaps Physics or ECE is the right course for you.

Learn How to Motivate Students to Write

Sometimes, all students need is motivation.

Students have the skills, talent, and resources. However, despite these, they still find it hard to write. Why? It is not because there is no information available but simply because they lack motivation.

Lou Holtz said, “Ability is what you’re capable of doing. MOTIVATION determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it.”

Motivation, thus, plays an important role in our lives. Ability is useless if you are not motivated to use your own ability. Let’s say that you are good in writing but you are not motivated to write; definitely you would not achieve anything.

Hence, it is important for the professors to motivate their students and students, on the other hand, must open themselves and be motivated.

Here are some ways on how to motivate students to write.

• Talk to your students and determine why they are not motivated. There are various reasons why students are not motivated. Some of them have personal and family problems, lack self-confidence, or have a learning disability and the like. Spend time with your students and see how you can help them.

• Give incentives/rewards. Students want to be recognized for a job well done. If you will reward your student for writing an excellent sample essay, then he or she will definitely appreciate it and as a result, he will work harder. Likewise, you can give simple gifts such as chocolates, candies or grade incentives.
• Be enthusiastic.  Make your writing class lively and not boring. If you really want to motivate your students, you should be motivated as well. As the professor, you should be the first one to be motivated and excited about writing and other activities because this will catch the student’s attention.
  
  

Tips On Writing A College Transfer Essay

Transferring to a college means a big adjustment. You will be meeting new professors, new classmates. You have to adjust to the new environment, new facilities, and new rules and regulations. There will be new things to face. What more if the school requires you to submit a college transfer essay?

There are some colleges which require students to submit a college transfer essay aside from their academic records. Some perceive that this essay is just for formality sake but if we will deeply look at it, it is actually an opportunity for the students to tell the reasons for transferring and for choosing the college.
In writing a college transfer essay, it is important that you give specific and concrete reasons for transferring. There are many reasons why students transfer colleges and some of the most common causes include financial reasons, family obligations, and change in majors. You have to state in your essay the valid reason(s) for transferring. Do not include reasons such as you just miss your girlfriend/boyfriend or your professors are boring.  If you do not have any valid reason, the college may not accept you.

It is also important that you pay respect to your current college. Do not try to destroy the reputation of your present college. If, however, there have been terrible things that happened to you there, write it pleasantly, not in a way that you are already badmouthing your college.

When you are writing a college transfer essay, write as if you are writing a sample essay. Observe style, structure, and tone. Though this is not graded, your essay represents who you are and how you write. If your essay is full of errors, misspellings, and other mistakes, the college you want to transfer to might hesitate to accept you.

Writing a college transfer essay should not be a burden to you. Just follow the aforementioned tips and you will never get lost. Good luck!

Tried and Tested Formula for Improving Essay Writing Skills

A = πr2
C = πd
V = (Ah)/3
D = m/V
A = (h(a + b))/2
TF = 9/5 TC + 32
F = Gm1m2/r^2
Fnet = m(Δv/Δt)

Do you remember these formulas? If you are good at Math or Science, you definitely love these. However, if you do not excel in these subjects, you will be having a hard time dealing with them. But formulas are actually not limited to numbers, parentheses, and mathematical symbols; formulas also meant tips and tried and tested actions. A good example would be the tried and tested formulas for improving essay writing skills.

• Write in the active voice. Readers are more interested to read essay samples when they are written in active voice. The latter means that the subject of the sentence performs or does the action. The sentence would be like this- Amy catches the ball. Writing in the active voice will make your essay simple, clear, easy to read, and clear. 
  
  
  
• Write a strong introduction. The start of your essay should be good and impressive. It is your bait to the readers. If it is poorly written, do not expect that the readers will bother to see the rest of your essay. Get the introduction right!
  
• Write and ask for a second opinion. Use your skills and translate your ideas into words, paragraphs, and sentences. After finishing it, it would be better to let someone read it and have his or her feedbacks about it. Be open to criticisms- positive or negative. This tip will definitely help you improve your writing skills and make your essays flawless.
  

There’s no perfect formula for essay writing but as what Sam Ewing has said, “Success has a simple formula: do your best, and people may like it.” If writing is really your passion, simply do your best and you will definitely succeed.

What's Your Ending? Write A Good Essay Conclusion!

Everybody loves a good and happy ending, may it be in fairy tales, stories, films, and even in reality. Try asking your friend about his or her favorite part in the story and more often than not, he or she would say it is the ending. This just means that the ending is the part that leaves a mark or an impression to the readers or viewers and it has to be good or else, people might give bad remarks about the story or the film.

An ending is like a conclusion. It ends a piece with a “bang” or a “boom”. It summarizes or recaps the whole thing in a very interesting and refreshing way. It should not bore but excite people. These are the things you have to remember if you want to write a good essay conclusion.


To write a good essay conclusion, you have to build a sense of closure. You can definitely do this by connecting your conclusion to your introduction. You have to show to your readers that there is coherence and symmetry in your essay. You have to “echo” in your conclusion what you have stated in your introduction.

However, there are some essays which prefer to leave the readers hanging. This means you leave to them the ending. This can be done by ending your essay with a call to do something or take action. For example, you are writing about global warming. You can conclude your essay by asking the readers what could they do to help our environment or simply challenge them.

Writing conclusion is not merely summarize your essay. It has to be interesting and exciting. Avoid phrases such as “in summary”or “in conclusion”. Think out of the box and be more creative. There are different ways how to make a good conclusion and what has been mentioned above are just a few of them.

Rise And Write Under Pressure

What do you usually do when you are under pressure? Do you panic or get confused? Do you become more hot-tempered or just keep silent? People have different ways in doing things when under pressure. For some, working in such circumstance makes their lives more difficult; but for others, this becomes an opportunity to bring out the best in themselves especially when they have to write.

Writing is not a simple task and it becomes complex when you have to do it in a very limited time. Students often experience this in class. However, there are still some who can’t master the art of writing an essay when under pressure. Hence, if you want to improve your writing and timing skills, here are quick tips to guide you.

• Manage your time wisely
  As soon as you receive the questionnaire, read the question carefully. Once you have understood it, make a plan or an outline of what you are going to do. Let’s say you are given an hour to write your essay. In your outline/plan, specify how many minutes will be allotted in making a draft, in revising it, and writing your final essay.
  
  
• Answer properly
  Do this by being responsive to the question. The reason why students fail to pass an essay exam is their tendency to beat around the bush. They put unnecessary words, detail, or information rather than providing the answer(s) to the question.
  
  
• Organize your ideas and write them down. If you already have the answer to the question, you can easily write your essay. Collect your thoughts and ideas and organize them. Write simply and sensibly in order to finish your paper on time.

Every time you take an essay exam, just remember these tips and you are assured of a “Pass” and even greater than that. Just what like Kobe Bryant said, “Everything negative-pressure, challenges- is all an opportunity for me to rise.”