Surviving Freshman Composition

by Timothy W. Hooker

Happy News Citizen Journalist

You've seen them. They fill your mailbox everyday. They bristle with bright shiny faces of little kids in crisp new clothes carrying brand-new lunchboxes and state-of-the-art backpacks. They're "Back to School" sales flyers. And, everyone in them is deliriously happy.

But, I know the truth. Fall semester is just around the corner and, with it, comes a wide array of emotions. I'm usually privy to two -- anxiety and dread. Why? I teach college-level English.

In social situations, when I tell people what I do, they often take a step backwards and I can hear a slight sucking sound as they inhale. They look furtively to the ground and then away. And, then, they start making excuses.

"Well, I guess I'll have to watch what I say around you..wouldn't want to be corrected."

"You can forget about me ever emailing you; you'd probably end up correcting it and sending it back."

And, then I have to do damage control, trying to convince them grammarians are not the spawn of Satan, literature is not necessarily boring, and writing can actually be good for you. The downside is I only have about 10 seconds to convince them; after that, their minds are somewhere else.

Luckily, I have 15 weeks to convince my students. The flipside to that, however, is they are trying to convince me to give them a good grade. And, that's where the anxiety and dread come in. So, in the interest of alleviating fear and keeping panic attacks at bay, I offer a few pointers for surviving Freshman Composition.

1. It's not about writing; it's about thinking.

I don't care if the syllabus says "Writing 101." Freshman Composition is really "Thinking 101." Except for religious experiences too intense to describe in words, if we can think it, we must attach a word to it. It's just the way our brains are wired. Thus, the orderly progression of thoughts will create an orderly progression of words. Once you get your thinking straight, the words will come out effortlessly.

2. What you learn around the class will be as important as what you learn in the class.

Let's be honest; in high school, if you showed up, you won. But in college, you're considered an adult. That means you, and only you, will determine your fate. You must get yourself out of bed and to class on time (time management). You must plan ahead and then work the plan to get assignments in on time (resource management). You must learn to say "no" to temptations that can divert You from your goal (personal discipline.)

3. Color within the lines.

All the greats in any field have to first prove they can play within the rules before they are allowed to break them.

Picasso had to prove himself as a traditional artist before the art community would accept 3 noses on 5 elbows as a self portrait. And, regardless of whether you like it, you're not there yet. That means you can't single-handedly rewrite the rules for the proper use of the semi-colon. It means a 600 word assignment means 600 words; you're just not cool enough yet to get away with 300 words. And, don't even start down the road of trying to flirt your way to an "A."

4. All writing is rewriting.

It doesn't matter who you are or how many Pulitzers or Nobels or Oscars you've wracked up. If you are a writer, you're also a re-writer. If you don't believe me, hand your essay to a friend and ask them to read it out loud to you. You will cringe.

5. Surviving is winning.

Rarely, if ever, do I have to flunk someone. They usually do it themselves. Unless you have a learning disability that simply puts you outside the boundaries of what the class can provide, you can do this. In fact, I believe you can have pretty much anything you want in this life, if you want it badly enough. Chances are, if you complete the assignments on time and show up to class regularly, you'll probably get a pretty good grade. The folks who flunk are the ones who don't turn in their assignments and stop coming. Grammatical errors can be fixed; your college will have, somewhere, a room full of tutors just itching to help you learn to help yourself. Deadlines can be worked around, as long as it's not the 20th time this semester that grandma's died from choking on the computer disk that she ate that contained your masterpiece. And, remember, teachers are humans, too; we may be stuffy, but we're not stupid. Just give yourself a chance. I bet you can do better in Freshman Composition than you think you can.

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Tim Hooker is a citizen journalist, creative writer, and teacher in Cleveland, Tennessee. For more info, visit www.timhooker.com.

This story was produced by a Happynews Citizen Journalist.

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