musiclove12

So you made it to your first college English class and your professor assigned you a paper after only twenty minutes. To add to the stress of simply finding your classes and learning how to share a room with someone who sings in their sleep, you now have to panic about how to write a paper that doesn’t follow that 5 paragraph fill-in-the-blanks type of format you know so well. Admittedly, I may not be the best person to ask. I’ve never taken a college English class until now, the second semester of my sophomore year; but, to restore faith in my advice to you, I’ll assure you that I do know how to write a paper. Of all the work I did in high school AP English courses, along with all of the 10 page sociology and Hebrew studies research papers, I learned that serious writing is more than plugging in a plot summary and a character description.

If there’s anything I could tell you to make this paper your best yet, I would tell you to think about what you want to write, then think again. Your first draft is never your best, and you’ll never get that “A” if you write without actual thought or revision. Although I knew my first college-level paper (again, it was actually an AP English paper) was no literary masterpiece, I didn’t expect a rating of 2 on the 1-9 scale, and that was exactly what happened. I know that it’s tempting to follow what you know, but if I could go back to my first serious paper, I would put ten times more thought and effort into it than what I did. Take some time–write down rough notes, read over the book or paper you’re analyzing closely, write with your goal in mind, and re-read and revise your finished paper more times than you think is necessary. If you want to be serious with your writing, it’s going to take more time than ever before.

So, before you completely panic yourself about this new situation, take some time to think about everything. In the end, you’ll find that the English papers become second nature, while the sleep-singing roommate might take some getting used to.