I am so proud to see you grow as writers this semester. This growth is demonstrated not only by the words you place on the page but the thoughts that form through, in, and out of those words. I hope you are coming to see that reflection and wonder are as much (may be more) an essential part of writing as revision and writing. Yes, careful crafting of language is important to writers but so is thinking and feeling and sharing. I hope you are coming to believe that spending time just thinking about an idea and sharing your thoughts in written form can help your ideas grow and take shape in exciting and interesting ways.
I am so excited to see your growth as writers evidenced by your writing as well as your thinking about writing. You are planning and preparing before you write. You are brainstorming and researching before you write. You may not know it, you may not believe it, but you are becoming writers. Scratch that. You are writers. You write and your words make us, your readers, think and feel. You are writers. Never forget it. Put it on a post-it by your computer as you prepare your final paper for our class. You have an audience interested and excited to read what you have written. You are a writer.
This transformation to writer is even more remarkable because you did not sign up for a writing class. I do not know what you expected from our class, other than some really fun talk about zombies and superheroes, but I am sure it did not include becoming a writer. I know many of you were reluctant writers when we embarked on this journey together. But even so you have each written hundreds of words, thousands of words, and you are writers.
You are writers because you write. You are writers because you think about writing. You are writers because you recognize that good writing is part art and part craft and part perseverance and part practice. You are writers because you know that the proportions of art-craft-perseverance-practice must vary according to your purpose and preparation but you have learned all that this semester and I am so proud of you and I believe in you. Now go forth and write.
