WHAT IS WRITING?
This can seem like a silly question, especially to the high school or college student. Writing is obviously the act of recording ideas into writing...
Wait--that used a word in its own definition, something that would cause both Merriam and Webster to throw hands. So what does the noun version of writing mean? In its most basic form, writing is a bunch of symbols. One day, an early human wanted to tell and other human something about one of their oxen, so they drew an picture of an ox with crude plant paints or animal blood. Over time, the ox drawing was simplified to an ox head, and then the Phoenicians flipped it upside down to create the letter A.
Writing is more than just the symbols, though--it's also their arrangement: ________ and _______ have the exact same symbols, but I'd only want to put one of them in my mouth. Writing has rules and conventions for how it works and makes sense.
However, it's also more than just arranging symbols to convey an idea, as that definition could also apply to mathematics (which the SAT has defined as explicitly different from writing). Math is precise and absolute in its formulation and interpretation. Writing is not. It's squishy. It's malleable. It requires interpretation.
So when we talk about writing as a discipline--as in a writing exercise, a creative writing class, or writing advice from a writing website, this is what we're talking about:
Wait--that used a word in its own definition, something that would cause both Merriam and Webster to throw hands. So what does the noun version of writing mean? In its most basic form, writing is a bunch of symbols. One day, an early human wanted to tell and other human something about one of their oxen, so they drew an picture of an ox with crude plant paints or animal blood. Over time, the ox drawing was simplified to an ox head, and then the Phoenicians flipped it upside down to create the letter A.
Writing is more than just the symbols, though--it's also their arrangement: ________ and _______ have the exact same symbols, but I'd only want to put one of them in my mouth. Writing has rules and conventions for how it works and makes sense.
However, it's also more than just arranging symbols to convey an idea, as that definition could also apply to mathematics (which the SAT has defined as explicitly different from writing). Math is precise and absolute in its formulation and interpretation. Writing is not. It's squishy. It's malleable. It requires interpretation.
So when we talk about writing as a discipline--as in a writing exercise, a creative writing class, or writing advice from a writing website, this is what we're talking about:
Writing is the art of sharing ideas by crafting stories and information into structured textual compositions that carry understandable (if not universal) meaning.
A grocery list and a street sign contain written words, but they are not Writing with a capital W. Writing follows dozens of conventions to be intelligible to others and even more to carry significant meaning. Anyone can write, but no just anyone is a writer.
These conventions have been split into five broad categories across this site:
These conventions have been split into five broad categories across this site:
- The WRITING BASICS section covers the nature and classification of writing--it's a rundown of the various types of writing and the elements that they all share
- The STORYTELLING section looks specifically into how to craft a story.
- The INFORMATION section focuses on crafting edifying texts that convey knowledge.
- The RESEARCH section looks at the discipline of research an its use in developing and refining ideas.
- The GRAMMAR AND USAGE section looks at the standard American English conventions that allow a writer to clearly communicate with a reader.
For the past decade, I've taught English in public schools, and I've discovered one thing:
STUDENTS REALLY STRUGGLE WITH WRITING
Not the ideas of writing, mind you. The creativity and passion that fuels most of them is brilliant... but they are undisciplined artists. They paint their canvas with fragment-riddled prose, and examine their work with no idea how to fix common errors. This goes beyond grammar: they take their brilliant characters and plod them through meandering sentences. They suffocate their sharp, inventive arguments under a blanket of rhetorical fallacies and bland tone. Yet the worst sin students commit is apathy: many seem unwilling to search for simple fixes to their issues, accepting their initial mediocrity as just "good enough."
I saw all this and vowed it wouldn't happen on my watch. My students would care about their writing.
So in my first year of teaching, I wrote a little book with everything I thought my kids needed, a single reference source to solve most of their writing issues. Citation examples. Grammar tips. High-level words. I figured if everything was right in front of them, in a black-and-white guide, they would have no excuse to remain mediocre. With the effort roadblock forcibly removed, they would have no other choice but to care.
And it worked well. My students stopped missing deadlines and forgetting to turn in their writing. They started to come it at lunch to workshop their writing with others. They started revising papers, not for a better grade but to make the best writing they could create. They started going well beyond the word count minimums I assignment (in fact, I had to start putting word maximums on my assignments so I'd have time to read everyone's work). Eventually, they pushed me to start a school literary magazine so everyone's writing could be shared and discussed.
But there was a problem: my once-little book started to top 100 pages and the students still found topics they wanted covered. After refining and reprinting every year, I realized: What am I doing? The internet exists, and a website is much easier to distribute and update. So I decided to move my writing guide online. I still print a little book for my students, but it's now a simple handbook to help them through their most common issues. The bulk of their questions are answered here.
This site has pages dedicated to the most common writing questions students face and answers written in clear language. It would be impossible to cover everything, so I've narrowed the site down to what I regularly teach and what I see my own students needing. Some of my first students have matriculated up through middle and high school and are now in college; they've discovered that they need different, more specific information, so I've expanded some articles to cover essential collegiate writing skills as well (such as creating abstracts). Hopefully, you can find exactly what you need here, and if you can't, I've included hyperlinks and embedded video from some great online sources and experts.
I hope you find this site useful in creating your own writing, whether you're crafting a twenty-page research paper or a short haiku to share with some friends. As Nathaniel Hawthorne once put it, "Easy reading is damn hard writing." With any luck, these pages will make that writing a little less difficult.
I saw all this and vowed it wouldn't happen on my watch. My students would care about their writing.
So in my first year of teaching, I wrote a little book with everything I thought my kids needed, a single reference source to solve most of their writing issues. Citation examples. Grammar tips. High-level words. I figured if everything was right in front of them, in a black-and-white guide, they would have no excuse to remain mediocre. With the effort roadblock forcibly removed, they would have no other choice but to care.
And it worked well. My students stopped missing deadlines and forgetting to turn in their writing. They started to come it at lunch to workshop their writing with others. They started revising papers, not for a better grade but to make the best writing they could create. They started going well beyond the word count minimums I assignment (in fact, I had to start putting word maximums on my assignments so I'd have time to read everyone's work). Eventually, they pushed me to start a school literary magazine so everyone's writing could be shared and discussed.
But there was a problem: my once-little book started to top 100 pages and the students still found topics they wanted covered. After refining and reprinting every year, I realized: What am I doing? The internet exists, and a website is much easier to distribute and update. So I decided to move my writing guide online. I still print a little book for my students, but it's now a simple handbook to help them through their most common issues. The bulk of their questions are answered here.
This site has pages dedicated to the most common writing questions students face and answers written in clear language. It would be impossible to cover everything, so I've narrowed the site down to what I regularly teach and what I see my own students needing. Some of my first students have matriculated up through middle and high school and are now in college; they've discovered that they need different, more specific information, so I've expanded some articles to cover essential collegiate writing skills as well (such as creating abstracts). Hopefully, you can find exactly what you need here, and if you can't, I've included hyperlinks and embedded video from some great online sources and experts.
I hope you find this site useful in creating your own writing, whether you're crafting a twenty-page research paper or a short haiku to share with some friends. As Nathaniel Hawthorne once put it, "Easy reading is damn hard writing." With any luck, these pages will make that writing a little less difficult.
Brandon Coon has a Bachelor's degree in English from the University of Northern Colorado and currently works at Frederick High School in Frederick, CO. In his seven years in the classroom, he has taught grades six through twelve and subjects as diverse as advanced English, literacy, drama, tech theatre, world history, yearbook, and computer science. He has sponsored chapters of both the International Thespian Society and Quill and Scroll International Society for High School Journalists and is a member of Sigma Tau Delta. He currently resides in Greeley.