Hauman 1

Nicholas Hauman

English 102-09

Prof. Newport

23 January 2017

In a Nutshell

I recall from the eighth grade at a catholic institution our eighth grade farewell paper.

This paper was designed to be a recap of our entire experience at our school from all aspects.

Whoever wrote the best paper that the teacher and principal agreed on would read it aloud at

graduation. At this time, I was the most developed writer in my English class. I specifically

remember the teacher almost assuming (along with the rest of the class) that I would be the

winner of this competition. My main problem with this was my intense anxiety of speaking in

front of my family. Typically, I like to keep my work and school life separate from family and

friends. The fact that my home family and extended family would all attend was gut-wrenching. I

knew that while I could write an exemplary paper, I could not do the speech. I asked my teacher

if there was a way that another student could read it for me, but she said that there was no way

she would allow someone else to take credit for another students work, even with consent.

Realizing my imminent doom, I calculated the rubric, realizing that I could still make a paper

that would allow me to keep my grade at an A in her class, while also allowing me to not be

picked to read aloud. So, I purposefully wrote a sub-par paper to suffice for a good grade, but

hold me back from speaking in front of the crowd to my teachers disappointment. Looking back

at this now it was all very juvenile, but I cannot say I regret my decision as I am still afraid of

displaying my schoolwork in a public forum.

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Typically, I prefer a blend with most things in life. This being said I have had experience

in all spectrums of writing. I have worked greatly with poetry and I admire the limitless that

modern literature has allowed poetry to develop into. At the bottom line, I prefer whichever form

conveys the point I am trying to address in the easiest way for those reading it to fully understand

my thoughts on the matter. If the topic is one of great complexity, I prefer poetry. I typically use

poetry to address a broader point, something that is not exactly finite. I find this to be most

effective because of the freedom we have to use the form of the material to be at our aid. It

diversifies what I have to say with infinite possibilities, similar to that of a painter. On the

contrary, for a simple yes or no question that must have a solid explanation behind it I prefer a

more structural procedure. This is to best convey my answer in a straightforward context. I find

this to be most effective in a scenario that involves research, and dealing with facts and figures

that must be displayed in a clearer context. While I agree that both methods can be

interchangeable and often can fall into a grey area that either both or neither can be perfect to

convey a message, I would love to write poetry more so than papers. I believe that I prefer poems

more because of their limitlessness and how it allows me to say whatever I wish to say with such

simplicity. The only downside that I see to poetry is how some may misread it, and forget the

subject at hand as a whole.

In writing, my mechanical issues deal mainly with wording and sentence structure. In

high school, I was known by English teachers for my notorious run-on sentences. I believe that I

do this simply because it is the easiest way for my brain to expose all of my thoughts. From this I

am often left with lengthy sentences that do not effectively communicate my point of view for

the reader. From correcting this I am often left with words that do not hit the mark that I
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actually mean. So from this, I am often left over-explaining or over-simplifying something to the

point in which it becomes repetitive.

One of my biggest strengths in writing papers is the speed in which I can write. For me,

even as a young child, I have always loved English. I found myself making up stories as a young

kid and writing some of the best fictional stories in my classes growing up. I believe my love of

the subject started from memories of my father reading to me at a young age. Even to this very

day he still reads to my little brother, and I saved all of the childrens books he read to me in my

early childhood. From this, I have found that my favorite class is English. Personally, English is

still my favorite subject because I love to write papers exponentially more than fill out

worksheets and do math assignments.

My main issue that I need to address is procrastination. I feel that my best hours of

operation when writing papers tends to be when I am against the wall. For instance, I am writing

this paper at 11:37 P.M. at the moment. I feel the reason why I do this is because my thoughts

tend to wander after a long day. I usually save my papers for last when doing homework because

I am confident in my writing ability and believe that I can say the most when I am being held to

a time crunch. Also, I believe that when the day is over, I have had time to collect my thoughts

and refine them into a way that I can communicate them most effectively. Due to my

procrastination however, I tend to skip either steps in instruction, or miss grammatical errors as

discussed above. I hope that by the end of the semester that I am better able to keep my ability to

write well while doing so in a way that does not put me against a rock and a hard place to finish

it, thus making me more able to correct any error. Along with this I hope to work on making

what I have to say in papers shorter, more precise, and more understandable to all audiences who

are observing my work.

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I absolutely love to debate and argue my point in a non-violent scholarly manner. I credit

my success in this mainly to my ability to stand my ground and my passion. I remember that my

freshman year of high school I loved researching for the school debate team much more than

actually competing, yet this experience sparked a fire within me to have my voice heard. I

mainly argue in politics, specifically in the social wellness realm. While I prefer my position on

many controversial ideals to be private, my colleagues know me for my fierce passion for issues

in the world that I believe are wrong or need reform. My main drawback to this is that I often am

not the best all-around spokesperson for other issues that I do not have solid information on that

do not catch my interest. If I am not passionate about something, I have a lack of effort to try to

gain a passion for it. On the contrary, if I do have a passion for something, nothing can stop me

from proving that my thoughts are undoubtedly correct.

1233 words total.