Revisioning Composition Textbooks: Conflicts of Culture, Ideology, and Pedagogy - Essay Example

Revision The of literary works always find it quite important to follow logical processes in coming up withthe final text that the audience can access. The author does the work in drafts with a series of revisions until a final copy of the work is ready for readers. Therefore, revision is very fundamental step if one is to make scholarly essays and in fact any literary work outstanding. It contributes to the clarity of message that the writer or author is trying to communicate to his/her audience (Hoseley 37). During the process of making the first draft of a new work, the writer has a myriad of ideas to put down in writing. Each idea is independent at the time and there is no logical correlation of the available ideas. In ensuring the effective revision of an essay, the writer should ensure that he/she grasps the revision issues in detail in order to avoid leaving the new draft with the initial mistakes again. In the revision, the building up of the introduction strategies, dealing with sentence issues, and the organizing of my paragraphs played a critical role in helping me to come up with a quality essays integrating the best argumentation There is improper organization of the paragraphs in the first draft. The paragraphs are not of equal measure all through. In addition, there is only one transition paragraph that occurs only once within the whole essay. The transition paragraph is very small and it is very outstanding but does not add any value to the work. For instance, “However, there are always two sides to everything. As for child beauty pageant, it also brings its negative impact to young kids. Criticism to this kind of competitions has been rising over the years,” represents one paragraph. The other paragraphs are relatively that this and this shows non-conformity. The last paragraph, which is also the concluding paragraph, is quite short. The paragraph, “In today’s society, child beauty pageants’ tastes seem different… invisibly soured children themselves, their parents, sponsors and the whole society,” does not rhyme with the other paragraphs in terms of structural length. Therefore, to rectify the former mistake, one should ensure that the transition paragraphs are placed at the end of all paragraphs as they also enhance cohesion. The rectification in the last paragraph is to increase the paragraph length to match with the other paragraphs though addition of content to it for proportionality. In the first draft, one can notice various grammatical issues at a glance. The sentences have numerous grammar mistakes ranging from punctuation to the usage of passive voice and short forms of words. For instance, in the first paragraph of the first draft, there is the usage of can’t that is not acceptable in formal writing except where there is dialogue. This is evident in the sentence, “Even though many people like me can’t understand the point of little girls dressing so adult-oriented and compete, there are still about 200 child beauty pageants are hosted per year.” The best remedy to this grammatical mistake is to write all the words that are in short form in their normal structure. In this case, can’t will become cannot. Similarly, passive voice is evident in almost all paragraphs. For instance, “In today’s society, child beauty pageants’ tastes seems different from the old time, their aim has been changed from searching for beauty to making beauty.” The passive voice makes the work look informal and poor masterly of grammar. The best way to deal with passive voice writing it only where it is unavoidable such as where the subject has is not available. The introduction strategy of the essay right from the beginning to the end does not exhibit any cohesion. Introductions are characteristic of summaries, statistics, or even anecdotes that serve to capture the attention of the reader. There should be a topic sentence at the beginning of the work to give direction on what to talk about as the paragraph builds up from scratch. The development of ideas should be logical in the sense that one sentence leads to the next in order to create cohesion. For instance, the first paragraph begins, “Entering the words “child beauty pageant” in the search box and click Google, you will see millions of results that include pictures, reports, news and so on. The little girl who wears a bright yellow sexy swim wear, and is in a blonde wig, showing audience a numb face and pretending to be serious really doesn’t give me the pleasure to enjoy her look.” Therefore, it does not indicate the topic sentence that one is to rely in for the key point. There is no buildup of ideas to build on the first sentence logically. In such a case, the topic sentence could have been, “The words child beauty pageant” display various results in a Google search engine.” Then there should be viable explanations about the results that one can see, to build the topic sentence. For instance, “One of the conspicuous result that is shown is of a little girl wearing a bright yellow sexy swim wear and a blond wig. The girl showed a numb face to the audience that does not give me the pleasure to look at her.” Such an introduction can keep the interest of the reader through flowing thoughts. In conclusion, it is evident that revision is mandatory if one is to ensure that a piece of work is good and captivating to read. According to Gale and Fredric (44), essays that are grammar deficient are boring to read. In addition, the structure of an essay in terms of paragraphs also contributes actively to the interest of the reader to read it. Improper structures imply lack of organization of the ideas therein, though that may not be the case in most cases. However, the halo effect that the structure creates makes the reader see the author as an authority in his/her work. Therefore, people will tend to associate more with content that seems to be well structured and organized right from the beginning to the end. Consequently, all the elements such as grammar, topic sentence and cohesion are required in essays have a great impact on delivery of the message to the reader through making the message clear and also arousing the audience to read and understand the message. Works cited Gale, Xin L, and Fredric G. Gale. (re)visioning Composition Textbooks: Conflicts of Culture, Ideology, and Pedagogy. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1999. Print. Hoseley, Marsha H. Creating Writers in Middle School: The Effect of a Writing Program. ProQuest, 2006. Print. Read More