<p>Just remember that there are many other people in your situation. There are internationals and there are people who just don't consider themselves writing people. You're not alone. The purpose of the writing seminar is to help you so that you can write well in your other courses and later on in life. Also remember that the seminars are very small, so you get a lot of personal attention and you can always ask the professor for additional help outside of class. I'm sure you'll be fine.</p>
<p>the grades in the writing seminars are really given in context of how much improvement you show. the professors understand non-native english speakers won't be able to write as well as native english speakers.</p>
<p>So you should pretend to be a bad writer at first...
j/k :p</p>
<p>yup. the best writers have it the worst cuz the professors go crazy on their papers</p>
<p>
[quote]
the best writers have it the worst cuz the professors go crazy on their papers
[/quote]
WHAT!?!? That doesn't seem to make sense. If you're a strong writer, why would professors target your work and criticize you the most? What if you go to their office hours a lot and ask for help? Does that help your grade?</p>
<p>How do people who describe themselves as "strong writers" or "writing people" find the seminars? If you're used to doing a lot of writing, critical analysis, comparing and contrasting of different points of view etc. do you think the writing seminar will be relatively easy? Today someone else just mentioned that the writing seminars sounds "challenging"... what's so hard about it?</p>
<p>"You write 4 papers" - is that four full complete papers, not counting the drafts you have to go through, or do you write a draft (Paper 1), a second draft (Paper 2) a short paper (Paper 3) and a long paper (Paper 4)?</p>
<p>you write four seperate papers. and at least one draft for each paper. in most cases your draft doesn't look anything like your final paper b/c you have to rewrite so much of it. for many people the writing seminar is like 8 papers (4 drafts, 4 final copies) and usually at least one predraft exercise for each paper (could be another page of writing). and then the reading.<br>
in my seminar the first paper was 6-8 pages
2nd was 8-10 pages
3rd was 12-16 (the research paper)
and the 4th was 4-5 pages</p>
<p>the seminar is work for everyone. the writing program has a very clear concept of how people should write and they make you follow their form</p>
<p>I guess the professors expect more from the "strong writers"
I'll really consider being bad on purpose then... >.<
...not that I'm that good to begin with...I probably won't have to pretend. My high school was very writing-based. I had to write a paper every week, so hopefully it'll be ok...</p>
<p>So how do you purposely write a bad essay? And won't that lower your overall grade for the course? And how can they "expect more" from strong writers, if they don't know you, have never met you and haven't seen a single piece of your work? It's not like they start the course by asking, "Okay everyone, who here is a strong writer? Put your hand up, now! Don't be shy!" :D</p>
<p>Well if your first essay is good, then they will know to look out for you after that and grade you harshly for the subsequent essays. </p>
<p>I don't know how to purposely write bad essays...I mean, the best essays I've written have been done in one sitting, the night before. It must be that direct flow that makes it good...so, following that logic...if I overthink it and work on it a lot, it'll be bad...</p>
<p>You guys surprise me... purposely doing bad in college? That's a new one...</p>
<p>im such a bad writer.</p>
<p>im scurred.</p>
<p>
[quote]
How do people who describe themselves as "strong writers" or "writing people" find the seminars?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>My guess: merely annoying.</p>
<p>I was a much-better-than-average writer coming out of high school, and mostly because of my editing talents. I just found the writing seminar really annoying and time-consuming. It was difficult to deal with, not difficult as in challenging. None of the writing tips were new to me, and the drafting process in particular seemed overbearing. In other words, when your professor asks for a first draft, he is really asking for a final draft. Then, he will give you suggestions, which usually involve restructuring the entire essay. The trouble is, I see NO reason to mess with the structure after the outlining stage, and to be forced to do so <em>really</em> bothers me. And it's time-consuming. Changing the order of points fundamentally changes the way in which you must express ideas. I do that step first for a reason... restructuring a paper is not unlike rewriting it from scratch. And I had to do it often. And not always because I agreed with my professor that it was even an improvement.</p>
<p>I do feel the grading is effort-based rather than skill-based (and this is the only Princeton class where this is true)... because I wrote very good papers, and got marked down instead for the quality of my drafts. (I was very reluctant to put time into them, knowing that time would be wasted when I had to rewrite the entire thing in a different structure.)</p>
<p>Also, as an engineering/science major, I thought that the purported emphasis on writing for "different types of classes" was a joke. In theory you're supposed to have a compare and contrast paper, a research paper, a film review... but these are all liberal arts papers. If they're going to bother with a writing seminar, it should be half liberal arts writing and half technical writing. If I'd gotten some useful technical writing practice, I'd be less bitter. </p>
<p>(And I'm not really that bitter... I did decently by most people's standards, probably got the grade I deserved given the amount of attention that I gave it, and I was heavily distracted by math and physics at the time.)</p>
<p>Are they really strict about footnoting and such? Like, will you get sent to the Honor Code Committee for plagerism if you site a source wrong??</p>
<p>I don't think they would do that if you attempted to cite it but did it wrong...it wouldn't just be a mistake and they would tell you to change. I don't think you would get sent to the honor committee for that</p>
<p>You do want to be careful with citations -- mistakes <em>can</em> send you to the Honor Committee. However, now that the Honor Committee considers intent and not just facts of the case, it's probably a lot less likely to cause you serious consequences. Also, your professor has to decide that the mistake is serious enough for the Honor Committee, and unless he/she really didn't like you for some reason, trivial errors probably aren't. Better safe than sorry, at any rate.</p>
<p>Also... citing a source wrong is a question of format... whatever you do, don't fail to cite a source. May seem like the same type of mistake, but the latter would be much worse.</p>
<p>I've never written a single paper in my life. I'm petrified :(</p>
<p>There are writing tutors in the College (and at the Writing Center), and my door (and other people's) is always open. We'll all stress and worry together, hehe.</p>
<p>Some people claim that their writing seminar instructor marks everyone harshly on the first paper then less harshly on the succeeding papers to give you a feeling of progress, and though my writing seminar instructor has specifically denied this charge, most people I know have had steadily improving grades. Or maybe we were just getting better, because the seminar really helped (me at least) to get away from the five-paragraph-essay mentality.</p>
<p>Also, this tip from a friend (which may or may not work for your instructor, and is not endorsed by me nor the U.S. government): when you've finished your draft, take two of your most importantly paragraphs and switch them with minimal editing for flow. Then you'll have a "major structural" issue to fix/talk about for your revised paper.</p>
<p>Wow. I was not this crafty.</p>
<p>It took two poets, three readings of Ulysses, and many many nights of alcohol induced trances to come up with that one, I hear.</p>