Blog 14: Thoughts on Drafting

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The due date for the final quick reference guide assignment is approaching quickly. Time goes by when one is having fun blogging and analyzing rhetorical techniques. Despite finishing the first draft of my quick reference guide having read the Student's Guide, my work is far from over. Today, let's discuss the sections of the Student's Guide book that were helpful and not as helpful.

The parts of the book that were helpful in writing in the quick reference guide genre are "Drafting a Thesis Statement", "Writing Paragraphs in PIE", "Writing Introductions", and "Organizing Information". Considering how the thesis is one of the most important parts of the paper or any writing for that matter, explaining how to come up with one is vital. The book provides a list of questions that help determine the composition/characteristics of the thesis such as "Is it interesting?" (Pg. 49, Student's Guide). As a more visual person, I enjoyed the color scheme provided by the book to show how paragraph be developed which is the PIE. This helps the reader see what the formatting of the different types of sentences should be. Another important aspect of the quick reference guide is whether it could hook an audience effectively or not. This is true for almost an form of writing with a general audience. An interested person would have an easier time comprehending what is being discussed than a bored person. Quick reference guides are organized in several ways. The flow of the headers constitute this. If the order of the headers and/or paragraphs do not follow, then the guide loses some of its purpose, to easily inform the general, somewhat educated audience.

The only part that did not provide much help as the other portions of the book is the "Writing Conclusions". Although the conclusion plays an important role in a paper, the information provided seems to fit more so a research paper rather than a quick reference guide although some guidelines do match such as the "look forward" portion. Seeing that five sample quick reference guides did not summarize their ideas in the end, a traditional conclusion is not really needed.

Overall, the book provided many helpful tips to refine my draft, but in order to fully refine a draft, it must be viewed and critiqued through others.