<p>I am homeschooled, don't write very often, and recently I started doing so again. I'm not very good at writing essays, papers, analyses and so on, though I keep a journal and do a lot of creative writing. I know practise makes perfect, but I've no idea where to get started.</p>
<p>Can anyone recommend some good websites/books that will provide some guidelines as to how to write better essays?</p>
<p>Cheers :).</p>
<p>Take AP English Language Composition</p>
<p>^That won’t help if she’s homeschooled.</p>
<p>Join some writing forums and have your writing evaluated.</p>
<p>Do you have any friends in regular school who do well at writing essays? Do you know any English teachers? If so, choose a few easy topics to write about and let them give you feedback.</p>
<p>Not currently, but I might soon (I’m moving house next month). I think you can take APs even if you’re homeschooled, but I can’t do any till next year, and so there’d be no point starting now.</p>
<p>Yes, you can take them, but you might epically fail. (No offense.) Unless your parents/tutor/teacher knows what they’re talking about… AP English lang. might kill you.</p>
<p>Do you get what I’m saying? Or no?</p>
<p>You could take an online course in English that does a lot of writing. Then you get a teacher to personally go over your essays and you get graded on it.</p>
<p>Yeah, I get what you’re saying… hmm, how tough is the AP English Language? I haven’t got my SAT results back yet, but I was only making a couple of errors on practise tests, so I don’t think I need more critical-reading practise. It’s just essays I have a lot of trouble with.</p>
<p>Is there any particular writing forum you would recommend? I think I might try that first.</p>
<p>I was on a great one… but I can’t remember the name.</p>
<p>But if you just google writing forum… A bunch of great forums come up. You cna kind of scan through a see which is the best.</p>
<p>[Essays</a> - Writing Forums](<a href=“Essays | Creative Writing Forums - Writing Help, Writing Workshops, & Writing Community”>Essays | Creative Writing Forums - Writing Help, Writing Workshops, & Writing Community) -Essay Portion of Writing Forums… I think that was the forum I was on. You have to have posts in order to receive feedback though… I think they also have tips?</p>
<p>[Category</a> & forums listing - Writer’s Digest](<a href=“http://forum.writersdigest.com/category-view.asp]Category”>http://forum.writersdigest.com/category-view.asp) Looks like it might be a good one?</p>
<p>The thing you have to deal with though is that most writing forums are for creative writing… but still they have really good tips in a lot of them.</p>
<p>Thanks :). The second one, especially, looks like a pretty good forum.</p>
<p>out of pure curiosity…
why are you homeschooled?
was it a parent’s decision…have you always been homeschooled? PM me! or just post it here.</p>
<p>My older siblings were all homeschooled (due to the fact that the schools in our area weren’t very good) and my mum decided to do the same for me. I don’t mind it too much, seeing as I got to do some stuff, like A-levels, early :). Getting teacher recommendations for college is proving to be a real pain, though. And socializing isn’t half as easy as it would be if I were at school.</p>
<p>In my opinion, AP Eng Lang (or any other class) doesn’t turn you into a good writer. Some writer somewhere said once about education and writing that he knew if he wasn’t already a writer, college wouldn’t turn him into one. Read good writing. Practice and develop your skill. Etc cetera.</p>
<p>The only way to write better is to write more and to read voraciously. Read a book; then try to write a short story (or mini-essay) that emulates the author’s style. Synthesize their styles to form your own. Write again and again and again until you begin to find your voice. It may be different than your speaking voice – mine is. But you’ll notice a certain rhythm develop in your writing, and from that point on you’ll just need to refine that ability.</p>
<p>^ Doesn’t work always. Each ‘teacher’ or ‘reader’ has a different opinion and perspective.</p>
<p>For example, every year until this year I had never received below an A- on an essay, this year my highest grade on an essay was a B-. (Most of the time they were Ds. o.O)</p>
<p>You just have to know what specifically the reader is looking for. Style? Grammar? Structure?</p>
<p>…I don’t care about writing to please the teacher. I’m talking about how to develop as a REAL writer. School papers are ********.</p>
<p>I have no help as far as REAL writing but if you are talking about papers it’s pretty simple.</p>
<p>Start out with an outline and fill in your details, just make sure to use proper grammar and punctuation.</p>
<p>Basic Outline:</p>
<p>Introduction - Briefly explain your main idea (thesis statement) and your supporting details.</p>
<p>Body Paragraphs (minimum 3) - Each paraghraph delves deeper into your supporting details of your main idea.</p>
<p>Conclusion - Wrap everything up, be certain to repeat your theses and conclude with your final opinion.</p>
<p>I am also home schooled, I have received almost all As and only one B using this method and all of my english classes have been taken online and my papers graded by a teacher. IMHO you should have learned this in middle school and written at least 1 paper in each subject (excluding math) and at least 3 - 6 per semester in English. </p>
<p>I hope this makes sense, I am writing this way too late…</p>
<p>Three of the very best books on writing:
Payne, The Lively Art of Writing
Zinsser, On Writing Well
Strunk & White, Elements of Style</p>
<p>^ Yeah, “Elements of Style” is a must-have in any writer’s library. There’s also another book called “Write for College”, which I think is an indispensable writing tool as well.</p>