The Lanham Method in Action

The novel is in the first-person point of view, which lets us into Frankie’s life to see the priorities she has as a student. She is interested in the Loyal Order of the Basset Hounds, an all-male secret society. She finds outs her crush Matthew is a Basset Hound. Frankie feels discriminated against and investigates the group. She steals a book of their history and uses it to take anonymous charge, taking place of their absent leader. Frankie is manipulative through the first person view. I would enjoy hearing the story from another person’s point of view. Were the other Basset Hounds clueless about Frankie’s participation? I think it would be an interesting story, different than the account we have.

Brush Strokes

My Original Blog

Although I consider myself to be a far beyond average writer (as most of us should in this class), there is no denying that many facets of my writing need work. Writing has always been something I naturally picked up. I learned to type when I was five years old. And I swear I could type faster than any other kid in the nation. Rarely have I struggled to write an essay or whip up a poem; class assignments were always easy. I have been destined to become a student of the language since my earliest years.

However I have never been taught grammar, it just wasn’t part of my curriculum in school. Of course I know the basics (noun, verb, adverb), but I don’t have a strong grasp on the other 95%. I have always had a hard time breaking down sentences and assigning the technical terms to each word in the sentence. It only makes sense that if I am going to be teaching the subject, I better learn what a subject actually is (see the play on words? I crack myself up).

One of my favorite English teachers of the past used the term “comma-litterer” for those of us who tend to elaborate, you know, draw things out. I am a comma-litterer. Is it that I have too much to say all the time? Or can I not organize what I want to say into a strong paragraph? Either way, the over usage of commas is detrimental to my writing and an overhaul of my style is needed if I wish to improve.

Another area that has always troubled me has been the structure of my sentences. It goes along with the aforementioned problem, but is different in a way. Sometimes I am unsure whether or not I should end a sentence with a certain word, or if I can’t because of a weird rule. This goes back to the issue of having a strong grasp on the subject and being uneasy in some areas of your writing. I have found that being weary of a topic causes me to change my writing style, and I will start being passive or not make any sense. I just want to know that whatever way I decide to go in my writing I will have made the error-free choice, which sounds like it will come with practice in this course.

I must learn grammar. Well. I need to be able to avoid hearing the “…but you’re an English major” astonishment. I hope to begin to master the sticky grammatical issues of the English language, and I hope this course puts me well on my way.

A Try at Some Brush Strokes

Although I consider myself to be a far beyond average writer, painting murals with my words on a daily basis, there is no denying that many facets of my writing need work. Writing has always been something I naturally picked up. I learned to type when I was five years old. And I swear I could type faster than any other kid in the nation. Rarely have I struggled to write an essay or whip up a poem. Assignments, known by many as impossible and tedious, always came easy to me. I have been destined to become a student of the language since my earliest years.

However I have never been taught grammar, it just wasn’t part of my curriculum in school. Of course I know the basics (noun, verb, adverb), but I don’t have a strong grasp on the other 95%. I have always had a hard time breaking down sentences and assigning the technical terms to each word in the sentence. It only makes sense that if I am going to be teaching the subject, I better learn what a subject actually is (see the play on words? I crack myself up).

One of my favorite English teachers of the past used the term “comma-litterer” for those of us who tend to elaborate, you know, draw things out. I am a comma-litterer. Is it that I have too much to say all the time? Or can I not organize what I want to say into a strong paragraph? Either way, the over usage of commas is detrimental to my writing and an overhaul of my style is needed if I wish to improve.

Another area that has always troubled me has been the structure of my sentences. It goes along with the aforementioned problem, but is different in a way. Sometimes I am unsure whether or not I should end a sentence with a certain word, or if I can’t because of a weird rule. This goes back to the issue of having a strong grasp on the subject and being uneasy in some areas of your writing. I have found that being weary of a topic causes me to change my writing style, and I will start being passive or not make any sense. I just want to know that whatever way I decide to go in my writing I will have made the error-free choice, which sounds like it will come with practice in this course.

I must learn grammar. Well. I need to be able to avoid hearing the “…but you’re an English major” astonishment. I hope to begin to master the sticky grammatical issues of the English language, and I hope this course puts me well on my way.

I didn't find many opportunities to insert some brush strokes, but I did what I could!