I read Laura Giovanelli’s “Strong Writers and Writers Don’t Need Revision,” where she expressed her opinion that all writers require revision, whether or not they are first year college students, or professionals working in their field. Revision is not a weakness, and it is not an indicator of a bad writer; revision is writing. It’s part of the entire writing process, not an extension that is added onto a draft only if necessary.

I do agree with Giovanelli’s statements for the most part, although she makes the claim that “effective revising isn’t making changes for the sake of change, but instead making smarter decisions” (105). While I do think that she makes a good point in putting emphasis on “smarter decisions,” part of the process of my personal revisions are all about change. I experiment with my drafts constantly. I change paragraphs around for the hell of it, wanting to see which pieces of the puzzle will better showcase my argument. It’s part of the fun in revisions, and oftentimes you do have to change things around purely for experiment— it leads you to the understanding of making smarter decisions.

I also chose Susan Naomi Bernstein and Elizabeth Lowry’s “The Five-Paragraph Essay Transmits Knowledge.” Within the section, the authors argue that the five-paragraph essay is essentially an example of the “banking method” where information is stored and not used. The banking method doesn’t allow for students to understand, transform, and manipulate the world around them. As well as simply a limiting way to display one’s ideas, a high school student who only has an understanding of the five-paragraph method is going to have a disadvantage in a college-level writing class.

In high school, I took AP Literature, which had a heavy emphasis on timed writes (in order to prepare students for the AP exam in May). My teacher often told us to avoid the typical five-paragraph essay, but within the 40 minutes we had to draft out a fully-fledged argument. So, sometimes the five-paragraph essay was the most effective (and safest) route to go on within such a limited time frame. It’s not to say I had a very difficult time transitioning to college-level writing classes, but it did make it slightly harder.