Learning from rejections

[rwijanarko]

Hi,

I have my third rejection yesterday and now my account is suspended. I know I cannot submit anything anymore, but I still want to learn much through my mistakes. Thank God this forum uses a different account.

The article subject is "Connection: A Logical Stimulation Card Game". The rejection message: "We do not accept content with grammar errors".

It was a revised version of the first submission with the same rejection message. I have found some basic mistakes such as proverbs, conjunctions, and prepositions. I did not do any revising on the structure. I was very confidence when i submit it, forgetting that I already have two rejected articles.

My questions:
> Did i fail on the grammar basics or on the higher level (paragraph structure or similar to it)?
> If an article is failed on grammar, do the editor even look at the overall content (writing focus, logic, continuation, etc)?

English is not my native language, so I have to work twice harder to finish an article. Hey, it's a learning process, so be it. I might not have the standard to write for CC yet, but I'm willing to learn for an improvement.

Thanks in advance for your response.

Regards,
Riswan

[Ed]

Articles that contain grammar errors are immediately rejected. Constant Content has one of the highest standards for article acceptance of any content site on the web, so all authors must be able to correctly use grammar, punctuation, an all other elements of writing. Writers who write for Constant Content must also be able to proofread their own work. We only accept work from writers who can consistently submit high-quality, error-free work.

Thank you,
Ed

[BarryDavidson]

I would suggest that you find a writing group to help you with your language barrier. There are some groups which will do a 'line by line' which points out areas which need improvement. Example:

"I have [had] my third rejection yesterday and now my account is suspended. I know I cannot submit anything [consider deleting anything] anymore, but I still want to learn much through my mistakes." {I would recommend rewording the last part of the second sentence. Something like, "but I still have much to learn through my mistakes" or "but I still have much to learn. Recognizing the mistakes I'm making is the first step."}

"It was a revised version of the first submission with the same rejection message. I have found some basic mistakes such as proverbs, conjunctions, and prepositions. I did not do any revising on the structure. I was very confidence [confident] when i submit [submitted] it, forgetting that I already have [had] two rejected articles." {The reason for the 'had' suggestion at the end there is because the sentence starts out in the past tense.}

Your spelling was actually pretty good. There are a few other rough places in your initial post, but I was merely providing an example. I also hope that you don't take offense. Skilled writers are few and far between no matter what publishers say.

[rwijanarko]

Back to the basics then. I will do my homework for a better proofreading methods and aids. Thanks for the response, Ed.

For Barry:

Thanks for the proofreading. You have made it clear for me of my mistakes. If I were Ed, I won't go any further either.

I use my English mostly for daily conversations where grammatical errors are often omitted. I haven't had any formal writing experience either. Looking at these facts, I would take no offense at all. I will look for the writing groups you mentioned. You might as well see the more of me wandering around this forum :)

Learning and learning....


*It took me 30 minutes to proofread this reply, and yet still lack of confidence :D

[BarryDavidson]

Very true. The spoken word is quite different from the written.

There are several online sources for books of 'style' and yet none really cover the actual style as far as I'm aware. They are extremely helpful in that they can help a writer to understand sentence structure, grammar, and punctuation better. Of course, until you jump in and start writing it's all moot. It's much like reading a book on riding a bicycle. Until you've actually ridden one, it's all theory and supposition.

As for formal writing experience... Mine has been on the grindstone. Once I finally got up the nerve to do it (which included my wife badgering me to submit my old writing on a writer's website), I had no idea of what was involved. Up until that point (a little over four years ago), I mostly wrote in chat rooms and forums. It takes time, but you'll get it if you keep at it.

[geniuswaitress]

A trick I've found that can help for people who have problems with structure is to read your work out loud. Sometimes you can hear the errors that you don't see.