At First You Don't Succeed, Shutup and Keep Writing.

“There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.” 

― Ernest Hemingway

Teachers are cruel with grading, correcting, and editing; they have no remorse or mercy when telling students that their writing needs much more work and just isn’t sufficient. It’s hard to be a young adolescent writer without making a lot of mistakes and errors. I know first hand what it feels like to get back essays that just suck when you thought they were so good. It becomes very discouraging to write freely when a writer is not familiar with common rules. However, there is light in the dark for the students who can’t help mistakes. Often it is easy to make small or large writing errors that seem unimportant or minor, yet there are many ways to improve easily by learning from my horrible and silly mistakes .

Capitalization is a very vital part of a student’s writing. It is the difference between an important date, time, place, or person and something that is more common and doesn’t require emphasis. For example when I mistakenly wrote, “any form of shakespeare.” (Williams, Macbeth Act 1, Scene 3) Here there is an error of common capitalization. Since Shakespeare was an author it should never be lower-case and should always be capital s. A name of a person regardless if they have written many works should always be capitalized properly. Also I unknowingly said in my writing, ”Heavy Metal and Hip-Hop hold the places.” (Williams, Vocabulary Depths in Music Genres) Heavy metal and hip-hop are simply genres of music. They aren’t song titles nor are they artist names, which means they don’t need to be capitalized.

Using commas correctly when connecting conjunctions is also vital grammar knowledge. For example, another error I wrote, “his effort but overall it was helpful.” (Williams, Mac-Cast Mac-Flection) The word but is a conjunction that is connecting one clause to another so it would need a comma before it to fully connect the clauses. Two independent clauses can’t be connected by a conjunction alone because there must be a comma to introduce the other clause. Also this I wrote, “his wife’s death and there is nothing.” Another case of a conjunction not having a comma before it. Without the comma the conjunction cannot connect the two independent clauses correctly.

Lastly, there are certain terms and phrases in good writing that shouldn’t be used because they sound too general and don’t concisely portray thinking. For example, in one of my pieces I said, “which makes a lot of sense.” (Williams, Vocabulary Depth in Music Genres) ‘A lot’ is a term that isn’t specific or good enough for clear and concise writing. ‘A lot’ shouldn't be used in writing unless it is used to quote someone or refer to something. Again I make the same silly mistake of using this phrase, “Sarah Koenig’s Serial has a lot of factors.” (Williams, Aspects of Serial) This phrase ‘a lot’ isn’t a specific and concise word for good writing and should be replaced with a word or phrase that suits a more clear and precise piece of writing. 
In conclusion, writing can be intimidating and difficult at the high school level. However, it is  important to learn from others’ mistakes as well as your own. There are many things young writers  that may seem minor or insignificant, yet they may have a large affect on your writing and the product. Even when writing becomes burdensome at times it should become a way for writers to  learn from simple mistakes and produce better work the next time around. I've been through a lot of revised works and harsh comments from teachers, but I still write. I may not be great, but I can  always get better. It's why you shouldn't stop writing and you should learn from your mistakes.