In his excellent article “What is academic writing?” » L. Lennie Irvin walks readers through how to write an essay. He starts with an introduction to explain the task of academic writing to us, and here in the 2nd body paragraph he gives us the secret. And he tells us that's the secret. He said, “So here’s the secret. Your success in academic writing depends on your understanding of what you are doing as you write and then how you approach the writing task. And this idea of ​​understanding what we're doing as we write is going to inform a lot of the information in the article. We need to understand what we are doing to do it well. So when we turn to the next page, page 4, Irvin is going to address the myths about writing, and the myths are really interesting. Many of us believe these myths about how to write an essay as if they were true, so let's look at each of these myths one by one. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an original essayMyth number 1 is the paint-by-numbers myth. Some of you may not be very familiar with painting by numbers. Painting by numbers is something we do when we are told specifically where each color goes. Most of us would paint the sky blue, the grass green, and a tree brown. And that's basically what paint by numbers is where someone tells us exactly what to do and for something like the sky, grass and a tree, it's pretty easy to figure out. So Irvin goes on to say that painting by numbers for an essay is actually a myth, and he says here that "some writers believe they must complete certain steps in a particular order." He talks about painting by numbers to indicate that there is in fact a specific way to write an essay in terms. Next we need to do to hang. Then we have to do the thesis. And that's actually not true. The writing is actually recursive and that's what he's trying to say. We need to forget the idea that there is one way, one way, one linear path to get there, because that's simply not true. The next myth he addresses is myth number 2, which is that writers only begin to write the essay. when they have understood everything, and this is a huge myth because writing, in fact, leads to understanding everything. Most of us have ideas when we write, and more. Irvin says here: “Writers discover much of what they want to write as they write it. He goes on to say, “you can come back to sort things out.” This is why the writing is actually recursive. Myths number 1 and number 2 are therefore linked. It's rare that we sit down and have everything explode from start to finish. This is actually a myth. Then we move on to myth number 3, which is a perfect build from myth number 2 and is a perfect first draft. There is no such thing. Non-writers have this idea that people sit down at the keyboard and the words flow from the writer's fingertips, and everything is perfect, and the grammar is perfect, and everything is wonderful. This is simply not true. Of course, sometimes grammar is better. Irvin goes on to say that we focus too much on the "impossible task" of making first drafts perfect, or that when we turn the page, we spend too little time and don't make them good enough. before people read them. It's a very delicate balance. Your work should be understandable enough that someone can read it and help you give.