In high school, I used MLA format for all of my English essays. However, the only citations we would have to make were for the books that our essay were about. In English 110, I learned how to cite a variety of different sources in MLA format, including online articles, short stories, TED talks, videos, images, and podcasts. I also learned how to introduce a quote in such a way that an in-text citation may not be necessary, by making it clear who was saying each quote. For example, when writing about Julie Beck’s argument, I wrote “according to Beck,” or “Beck warns” before I included her own ideas. Since her essay was published online, there was no need to include a page number and I had successfully referenced her within my text.
The most useful strategy that I utilized to correct sentence errors was reading my draft out loud. Reading out loud demonstrated how each sentence would sound to an outside reader, and often helped me catch typographical errors. The flow of my essay became more clear when read out loud, and I was able to edit it so that it sounded more fluid.
