What suggestions would you give to an Indian high school student to improve his English writing skills?

Haha. Well firstly she is 17 years old as I remember (go read her b...

When I was in class 9, I was an idjit who loved gloating about how amazing his self-proclaimed English language skills were. Well, they were indeed better than the lot, but if you go snoop around posts from 2008-09 on my Facebook profile, you'll know what I am talking about. But then this person came along and helped me improve my grammar, punctuation, vocabulary, writing skills, and everything else - remarkably. Thank you unnamed person for everything you did! Here are some rules that I believe have helped me improve my language skills over the years - Read. Go read any random book you can lay your hands on. Start with the basics. Have you read Harry Potter yet? Go read it now. Do not expect yourself to start reading "War and Peace" in a few weeks. Get some books by Jeffery Archer, Dan Brown, Sidney Sheldon or P.G. Wodehouse and read them. Smartasses will tell you they are trash novels and persuade you into reading Mein Kampf or The Republic - pay no heed to them. Believe me, because I was once in your situation and it's Jeffery Archer that got me through it. The longest novel I have read thus far in my life is "As The Crow Flies" by Archer and it still ranks number one in my all time bests (perhaps for sentimental reasons but nonetheless). Read at least two or more (if you can, without compromising on your academics and other activities) books a month. Read fiction for now, non-fiction can be difficult to get along with at first. Do not rote meanings. Don't underline difficult words and then cram their meanings expecting it to enhance your vocab. Instead try to decipher the meaning from the context first, then look up the meaning and just move on. My high school teacher told me this once - "When you find a new word, look up its meaning. Then share it with three people in three different contexts. And the word is yours forever." Do not compare yourself. Actually do compare yourself but keep this in your mind first - those who are evidently inferior* to you should not matter to you (for now) and those who are better than you should not intimidate you. Once you achieve a level that you aimed for, don't get complacent, push yourself further. (*I said they should not matter, but you'll see you learn better when you start teaching people, so try giving a hand to those in need.) Write. Write random articles or if you are in your school debate team, write your own speech and don't depend on your teacher. If you are into poetry, write some! That's how I developed my writing. I have written some senseless aa-bb rhyme scheme poetry in school (and they actually published it in the school magazine). Now that you have Quora, write here! Answer questions and post your articles on a blog and other users will be happy to help you with your grammar, formatting, punctuation and will even give you tips on how to better present your ideas. Always be clear, concise and coherent. Don't take things too seriously. Relax. Kick back your feet and have fun. Life is not a race. Varsha is clearly a better writer, yet. ;) You'll learn on your own as you grow up. Till class 12 all I had ever read was some Archer and some Dan Brown. But soon as I came to college I realized that I should probably start exploring other difficult genres as well - and so I did! It took me 5 years to get from Angels and Demons to my first non-fiction. But I got there. Know the difference between your shit and you're shit. Work on your grammar. A well formatted and accurately grammar-ed article is always pleasing. Language is a tool, not a protocol. You don't have to follow grammar all the fucking time. Make up your own words (see how I wrote grammared above?). But don't do that in your school exams. :P Here's a tip - Since you are still in school you probably still have to write one letter + one article in the section B of your English exam? Or has the CCE system done away with it? I hope not. Anyway, follow this map whenever you start writing an article/letter for your exam - (made this in 2 minutes in MS Paint, wonderful artwork, no?) Under each header write down the points that you want to write in it and then just string them together. All you need is four paragraphs and if you follow this pattern (Problem -> Ref -> Sol -> Conclusion) there's no way you won't get a 9/10. I told you about writing concision and coherence in point 5 above? Follow that. Instead of writing 10 lines articulating 10 different problems, write them all together in one line. It makes you sound confident. In the beginning make this map at the back of your notebook or on a rough page and then once you are experienced enough you'll start thinking like this on your own. Also! Always ask for help. Irritate the fuck out of your elder siblings and teachers and ask questions. Asking for help does not make you look stupid. It makes you look earnest and determined. I hope this helps you. EDIT: Another tip that just hit me: To sound verbose online, Google is your friend. Every time I use a particularly difficult word I look up its meaning online first. When I am bored of using everyday words I look up synonyms. I am no writer, I sound like I am (do I?) because I cheat this way. However, to use "heavier" words you should know the precise context they are used in first. You don't want to screw up trying to sound smart, do you? For that, you have to read. a lot.

I learned to read books at a very early age (7ish) -  I would finish one Enid Blyton novel every evening before I went to sleep - There was no choice - The library would take 2 rupees per book per day and it was imperative to complete it so as to not "waste" the money. At the dining table the three of us siblings and even Mom would be eating with one hand while reading with the other - a habit which we still have. The more you read, the more comfortable you get with language. The key for me, and what I would advise the gentle reader (or writer), is to keep perfect alignment between thought, speech and written word. You should strive to think articulately, and speak articulately and that makes writing much easier, because you get so much time to polish what you wrote. You can write like Dawkins if you try hard, but if you think and speak like Dawkins, the writing part is fairly simple! Writing as one would speak, is a style followed by many authors and it captivates the reader. Look at the "Local tea party" blog guy - extremely well written, but pure Bangalore slang. Take Maddox of http://maddox.xmission.com - Such brilliant irreverence that overflows with awesomeness. Developing a style of ones own is very very hard, it won't come easily unless you make a career of writing. Instead, what I have learned to do is consciously imitate the styles of authors whom I admire - Alistair McLean, Frederick Forsyth and even Conan Doyle (I wrote a Holmes story) A good author is one who sets up a craving as you read, you anticipate the words that are yet to come and get gratified as your expectations get fulfilled. There are two kinds of writing What you write for yourself alone - 90% of the time, this is the kind of stuff that you see in a diary or livejournal  and it is unlikely to appeal to most people unless they are very similar to you in their thought process. What you write for others - This is the tough kind of writing, because it needs a true measure of skill. It lets you improve with feedback. I would suggest that you always write for an audience - Writing, in my book (pun not intended) is more communication than self expression. You need to be able to induce mental states in the reader at will : Therein lies the power of the author. You must write in an arena that is critical - blogs and facebook notes only get positive feedback usually. If you take your stuff to a place like http://everything2.com you learn much more, because the community demands quality and is not going to mollycoddle you. You will learn to take criticism and mentoring in equal measure until you write decent stuff. After your first dozen writeups get downvoted into oblivion, you start writing good stuff with more care and quality. Do not pooh-pooh perfect grammar and punctuation - that is like a woodworker who is happy with the joinery but ignores the sanding and finishing. A simple spell check can help, and most of the time even the grammar check is quite smart and gives germane suggestions. Learn to revise and rewrite parts that don't scan well. When I wrote my best piece of writing (the Sherlock Holmes story), I wrote the whole thing (some 6000 words) in one night, and was really eager to post it, but I was patient and re-read it umpteen times, and had it reviewed and proofed by various folks (including someone who was truly British) so that I could smooth over the rough and silly parts. Revise, revise, revise - don't be scared of the backspace key. You can redo it better, always! Don't be afraid of big words, learn them and use them with confidence. Take on challenges : For example (completely on the fly here) I try at this point to churn out ad hoc, a paragraph in which you will not find a particular non-consonant at all. This is a task I do again and again to train my composition skills!   Try writing without E like above, or write a limerick, write a rhyming metric verse, write some sort of wordplay stuff. Words are your playground!

I just requested the lady mentioned in the question to answer this question. While we are waiting for her answer, I would like to share my thoughts on the question. The worst thing that you can do to your writing (or any other skill) is to bench mark yourself against a person you don't have access to. By that I mean that you can see the finished product but not the work that has gone behind it. For example, you may like her posts, but you have no idea of the hard work that she might have put into it. She might be writing and re-writing a single post several times before she actually posts it. She might have been writing essays and other things since her childhood. In short what I am saying is that you have no idea of the hard work and the time a particular person has invested in producing the final outcome. It might not seem as hard work to the person who is doing it because they love doing it. I am reminded of a famous violinist Itzhak Periman - A fan came up to him an said,", “You know Mr. Perlman, I would give my whole life to be able to play the violin like you did tonight”. Perlman smiled once more and said,”I have”. The point here is that nothing can beat good old hard work and practice. So if you want to be a writer - just start writing. Post your work and let others review it. Try to improve each day. Join writing groups, try to answer one question everyday on Quora or blog something every day - whatever rings your bell! The only person you should benchmark yourself against is the guy in the mirror! Try to beat that guy everyday. Lets try to discuss a few specifics of what makes a good piece of writing and how can you improve on them: Thought - This relates to the central theme of your writing, if you have a great thought, it is easier for people to like it. How do you improve the quality of that? By exposing yourself to the thoughts of others! That can be through reading, travelling, meeting new people etc. Style - This is the icing on the cake and in one aspect that you can never be like Varsha or any other person on this earth! You will have to develop your own style of writing and that will only come through practice. some people are witty, some are sarcastic, some emotive etc. You will have to find out whats your style. Structure- This will depend on what exactly are you writing - an FB status update, a poem, a tweet, a story, an answer on Quora. Different mediums will have different constraints and advantages. It is up to you to decide which one aligns to your strengths To wrap it up, I would say that practice, feedback and reading are the three most important tools that you can use to improve your writing. On a different note, please don't measure the successes or the quality of your writing or your life, for that matter, by the number of likes or followers. If that was truly an indicator of the quality of work, then Justic Bieber would be the world's greatest musician.

That is one question I would love to answer! I was horrendous in english in my mid teens and was so damn stupid that could not even muster up a decent reply to any question. To begin with, I would suggest to develop a passion for the language. As in read, write, explore and think over them. LET YOURSELF LOOSE. Try being witty, humorous and intelligent. At the same time get yourself indulged in epic classics and fiction where there is no limit for imaginations and eventually you will find yourself sink in the panorama of vistas. English is not something you master because you want to improve. You need to LOVE and LIVE it. English without imagination would be like Mathematics without formulas. At the end of the day, just enjoy reading, writing and envisaging them as you proceed! There you are struting around in the colours of the language.!!

As everyone has already said, reading, writing etc would help one in cultivating one's general writing and/or speaking skills with the English language. I would like to mention another aspect here, that would go a long way in helping one with any language in general. Try to appreciate the various nuances and forms present in the language, try to compare and contrast them with the form that would be present in the language you are most comfortable with. You need not pay much attention to ornamental words because they might be unique to a particular language only and also because at the end of the day, you would have to remember their meaning or their appropriate usage, and that isn't the point of mastering a language, in my opinion. I'm not saying that not knowing good words is not important; English is such a beautiful language primarily because of the amount of root words it has picked up over the years, and that meaning and the development of new words takes place in a vertical fashion, as well as giving value to spatial and temporal aspects. However if you want to have real command over the language, then you need to know the basics in and out. If it is not your first language, then the best way to do so is comparison and contrast with the one that is. You would start to understand how certain metaphysical elements and abstract ideas are portrayed in that language, start making out the thin line between word and meaning that we take for granted. Try to understand why things work the way they do. Once you start understanding the structure that the language possesses would you have truly mastered the language, till a basic level at least. A good way to know when this happens is when you start feeling uneasy whenever you read, write, hear or speak incorrect English. This thing inside you would start wriggling and itching :P I want to write more but I guess I have strayed off topic here, a bit. I just wanted to share with everyone that language should not be treated as a tool, but an enigma.

To improve your english language skill you can surely try following acts. It worked for me. I am also in the I just hope this helps you. Read everything & anything in english. Try to comprehend it into english only. Please don't try to do it your normal language. Watch BBC for knowing the international english. This will help you in two ways english as well as knowledge. Read reader's digest for each month. You can read it while travelling. Read good newspaper The Hindu or The times of India can be a good choice. Watch a good english serial. I watched friends/desparate housewives. Try to listen their words. Prefarably use headphones for better learning. Try to speak in english with everyone. Sometimes "they" will make fun of yours but its your call to learn the language. If someone doesn't understand the english e.g. milkman/dhobi etc. help them to learn something. Teaching is learning once again. Even when you think you must try it in english. And most important point be yourself. Ideals are OK but you should be what you are.

Go do what you want. You'll pick up the english along the way.