Having entered the eighth week of the Academic Writing course, my binders have become bulky with the reading materials. This has been one of the most interesting and challenging courses I have taken. Most of the articles of the course material have been a source of knowledge and information and there has been constant learning. To a greater degree, I have understood the meaning of  the ‘Critical’ words namely,’critical thinking’, ‘critical understanding’, ‘critical evaluation’, ‘critical engagement’, and ‘critical review’. The course materials have helped me understand this concept and the necessity to strive to meet the criteria for  postgraduate writing standards- (M. Wallace and L. Polson - Becoming a critical consumer of the literature Part 1, P.4) ,  in my writing. However, I wonder, often, how much of it I have retained and how efficiently will I be able to implement my learning in my writing. Hence practicing writing becomes essential. It should not be hard to squeeze  into my everyday schedule the ten minute freewriting suggested by Peter Elbow (Freewriting) for achieving better writing skills.   I have also downloaded a copy of academic vocabulary from here. I have it as a reference. I want to read it aloud a couple of times to become familiar with the words. This has also helped me identify the usage of these words in the weekly readings we have been assigned with. I find a similarity between writing and art. As with art, there is a stage in my writing process, when it looks uncomfortably garbled, as the sentences have been put down as and when thoughts came to mind, lest I forget them. Thereupon, I move away from my writing and do something entirely different like listening to some fast music, taking a jog or paying my bills. When I come back to my writing, my thoughts are clearer and I feel that a new energy had seeped in and I am able to move blocks of text around to deliver meaningful writing. So often I find the interesting verbs failed to instil interest in the writing (J. Franzen, ‘10 rules of writing  )and I scramble for the dictionary to find a synonym that would better bring out the flavour in the writing. Coming from a creative writing background where one is used to the freedom of writing without being restricted to any particular style, the challenge is to adhere to the different layers of the academic style of writing, namely appearance which includes spelling, grammar and Formatting; writing style that will have proper sentence flow, organization which includes connecting the ideas and providing scholarly content. Even though writing style is only one component of effective writing, it is an important factor that will ensure that the written content is communicated correctly to the audience("Effective Writing at the Graduate Level: Academic Writing Style." Writing Support Centre, University of Western Ontario, n.d.)

Works Cited:

http://101books.net/2011/03/10/jonathan-franzens-10-rules-of-writing/

M. Wallace and L. Polson - Becoming a critical consumer of the literature Part 1, P.4

"Effective Writing at the Graduate Level: Academic Writing Style." Writing Support Centre, University of Western Ontario, n.d.

 Freewriting(Peter Elbow)

Academic Vocabulary Style : http://www.englishcompanion.com/pdfDocs/acvocabulary2.pdf