Professional Student
Total number of words _575__________ __904______
Total number of sentences ____25_______ ___51_____
Longest sentence (in # of words) ___65________ ___35_____
Shortest sentence (in # of words) ___5________ ___3_____
Average sentence length ____23_______ ___12_____
Number of sentences w/ more than
10 words over the average length ____4_______ ___10_____
Percentage of sentences w/ more
than 10 words over the average _____16%______ __20%______
Number of sentences w/ more than
5 words below the average ______4_____ ___3_____
Percentage of sentences w/ more than
5 words below the average ___16%________ __6%______
Paragraph Length
Longest Paragraph (in # of sentences) ____4_______ ___10_____
Shortest Paragraph (in # of sentences) __1_________ ____3____
Average Paragraph (in # of sentences) ___3________ ____6.5____I have to say, I was laughing the whole time I was coming up with my stats, because I realized how much of an amateur writer I am. I have so many more words and sentences than the professional writer, many are unnecessary, and my article is less concise because of this. It put into perspective how many useless, unimportant things I put into my writing. I love the professional's writing, in that it gets straight to the point. There is no fluff, just good, clear writing. This was a wake up call for me, in that I must be a more concise writer. I must practice the ways of clear, good writing, just like the Karate Kid practiced the wax on wax off move. I, like him, am a young untrained "Grasshoppa"... but with practice, the "Grasshoppa" can become the "Masta".
2 comments:
I think that this exercise was probably one of the most helpful things that any of us could have done in revising our opinion editorial because it showed us what it is we needed to keep and what it is we can get rid of.
I agree. This assignment made me realize that my paper needs to be much more personal then I made it.
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