What Is English Composition?
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Approved and verified accurate by the Assistant Dean of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences on July 18, 2025.
English composition refers to the process of creating written works in the English language, typically focusing on structure, clarity, grammar and style.
In academic settings, English composition courses are designed to help students develop effective writing skills through activities such as:
These courses often serve as foundational instruction for college-level writing across disciplines.
There are four basic styles of English composition:
What is English comp in the context of a college education? English comp is a common general education requirement. No matter what your major is or where you choose to attend college, you can generally expect to take at least one course in English composition.
An understanding of English composition is important for everyone, both for their personal and professional life. In your personal life, competence with the English language may help you gain greater enjoyment from reading books, introduce you to different viewpoints, and help you communicate more effectively professionally, as well as with friends and family.
Knowledge of English composition is a cornerstone of communication. In your professional life, you may use written communication skills to coordinate projects with coworkers and liaise with clients. No matter your specific career, written communication skills can be crucial. If you’re a high school teacher, for example, you’ll use communication skills to deliver lectures and write assignments.
English comp courses can teach other soft skills, as well, such as:
Like other institutions of higher education, Grand Canyon University has established general education requirements for all students, which are designed to provide a well-rounded liberal arts foundation to all students, regardless of their chosen major. Among our core general education requirements are English composition classes.
GCU requires two first-year writing courses: English 105 and 106. As we developed these courses, our subject matter experts followed nationally recognized guidelines for effective writing instruction
English 105 and 106 adhere to the recommended outcomes promoted by the Council of Writing Program Administrators (WPA), an important professional organization for teachers of college writing. The first-year writing program at GCU promotes important generalizable skills in written communication (though many principles in English 105 and 106 apply to clear and impactful verbal communication, as well).
One of the first recommendations in the WPA Outcomes Statement for First-Year Composition is that students develop rhetorical knowledge. As noted in the WPA Outcomes Statement, “Writers develop rhetorical knowledge by negotiating purpose, audience, context and conventions as they compose a variety of texts for different situations.”1
Both English 105 and 106 provide students with opportunities to practice rhetorical knowledge in a variety of ways.
The WPA Outcomes Statement for First-Year Composition goes on to note the benefits of English comp education for teaching critical thinking, conceptualization and reading comprehension skills.1 In GCU’s first-year writing courses, you will have plenty of opportunities to practice these critical English composition skills.
English 105 is a writing-intensive course in writing academic prose, including various types of essays, arguments and constructions. In English 105, Grand Canyon University students practice three different types of writing, each with a different purpose and audience. Understanding one’s audience and purpose is an essential foundation for effective writing. When students can identify the audience, context and purpose, they can then identify and apply the appropriate rhetorical strategies that may be most effective for the piece of writing.
For example, an instructor in English 105 may ask students to write a review of a movie, television show or even a social media app for an audience of Christian parents, and to write as if their review will appear in a news source that Christian parents would likely read (such as ChristianityToday.com).
In this situation, a student must take into consideration the concerns of Christian parents if, say, their teenage children want to use the latest social media app. It would be up to the student to recommend (or not recommend) the app for use by teenagers.
The writer also has to decide what mood to create in the review and what tone to strike with the parents. Even further, the student would have to write in a way that fits generally well with other content in the chosen publication. Every publication has its own preferred writing style, and all content published under that brand must adhere to it.
English 106 is a writing-intensive course that explores various types of research writing, with a focus on constructing essays, arguments and research reports based on primary and secondary sources. In this class, students build upon the skills they were taught in English 105. The instructors will guide students to practice important strategies of argumentation: definition, cause and effect and proposal. These types of argumentations can be found in a variety of settings; learning them in English 106 provides students a basis on which to analyze arguments in their civic, personal or professional lives.
Writers can adjust strategies for proposal arguments to fit a particular setting. Most proposal arguments include a discussion about a problem or need, an offer of a solution and a demonstration of how the solution will achieve the desired results.
One of our students might write a proposal that addresses a local issue (perhaps a city-wide ban on e-cigarettes in Phoenix), having opportunities to practice argumentation skills along the way. Then, that same student might write business proposals in future employment that draw upon those argumentation skills.
In both cases, audiences will have to understand the problem or need, the solution and the justification for that solution. A writer might make adjustments based on the audience’s understanding of the problem or need, but the strategies for proposals translate well from academic requirements in English 106 to strong communication in the workplace.
The goal of GCU’s first-year writing program is to help students become more polished and effective written communicators. In the first-year writing program at GCU, we provide students with a variety of opportunities to practice and strengthen important written communication skills that can serve them well during their time at GCU and beyond.
Examine Fundamentals of English Composition
Dive into English literature and language at GCU. Find a liberal arts degree that suits you!
If you have a passion for English composition and a desire to teach others to write effectively, consider applying to the Bachelor of Arts in English for Secondary Education degree at Grand Canyon University. Fill out the form on this page to speak with a university counselor.
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Although English composition refers to the process of creating written works in the English language, it can also refer to college courses. Students may take English comp classes like English composition 1 and 2 in order to fulfill their general education requirements.
English comp 1 is the introductory English composition course that college students take, typically as freshmen. After completing English comp 1, they may then take English comp 2, which offers more advanced material.
In these courses, students may explore topics and concepts such as:
