Stage 1-a: The Essence of a Sentence – “Introduction”
As I will remind you elsewhere (sorry to nag, but it’s vitally important), your learning will benefit greatly if you read and study my system — all three “stages” — in their sequential order.
So start here, then work your way through all the Stage 1 posts, in order (first 1-a, then 1-b, etc.). Then do likewise for Stages 2 and 3.
Each post sets up the next post. If you truly want to learn my system and, thereby transform your writing, you have a lot of (hopefully enjoyable and worthwhile) reading ahead of you. So read these posts in order and save yourself some time.
We are about to embark on a new way of thinking about some pretty old realities. Well, the “rules of grammar” are always evolving, but the main plan, as we know and regularly see it, has stayed pretty stable for the last hundred years or so, maybe two hundred, depending on what you count.
And now, we are going to interpret this fairly stable plan of English grammar into a fresh, new system of writing and thinking, a system that will shine a new light on how you understand and use language in your daily life. That’s promising a lot, but I’ve seen the results of this system so frequently and astoundingly that I will make that promise — and keep it.
I hope you are as excited to learn this new way of thinking about the sentences you write as I am to guide you into this new and practical understanding of your own language. As language shapes up meaning, it becomes more than a tool of conveyance — it becomes the lens, or should I say, filter — through which we see and interpret “the world.” And by “the world,” I mean our own, personal world, the one we perceive and make sense of — through language.
Therefore, the better we understand language, especially at the practical level, the sharper our lens and clearer our filter — as we take in and interpret our world. Of course, in parallel, our writing (what we have to say and how we say it) will likewise sharpen and clarify, as our practical understanding of language develops in the fertile ground of the “activated” writing system I will now present to you.
Reader-student, I call you such a name in high regard. Throughout my career, I have taken a strong (and not always appreciated) stand against the idea that “considering our present times and culture, we can’t expect our students to become great writers from just one writing class.” Instead, I’ve made a point to see to it that my students did exactly that.
Now, it’s your turn — yes, right here — at Up-Words.com. Your new writing self, awaits.
Read these posts thoughtfully, practice with every daily opportunity you encounter (or create!), and . . . hold on tight!