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Conquering English 101
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Conquering English 101 |
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Larry C
since 2001-09-10
Posts 10286United States 
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Conquering English 101 By Larry Chadwick It started in grade school. I was in a two room school and had the same teacher for grades five through eight. The fact that John, who was a grade ahead of me, knew the subject of English better than the teacher did not help. Every time he challenged the teacher on this subject he was always proven right. Although my teacher had to research his answer every time. I had already lost my confidence in English as an academic topic in high school. By my senior year I was prepared to do anything to avoid it. Which explains why I took speech class instead of English IV. More mounting evidence of my lack of knowledge on the subject. The reason I did not take the prerequisites for college was simple. I had no intention of attending. But, like girls, adolescent boys are pretty good at changing their minds. It certainly made matriculating through high school easier. However, getting through college proved to be more difficult. My freshman year I fulfilled my obligation to my student advisor and enrolled in freshman English 101. I even attended class. I failed but I attended. So second quarter I tried again. I failed again but I tried. My sophomore year was a repeat of my freshman year. It seemed to me that grade school had really let me down. I made one more shot my junior year. There is more. By the time I tried my sixth shot at taking freshman English there was an accumulated list of incompletes. On the bright side, those 27 hours of incompletes were all for unwritten term papers. So once more I tried to fulfill my obligation to my student advisor. It was fairly soon in the first quarter, of my senior year, that I recognized familiar academic, or lack of academic, behavior patterns. Except this time it came with the dread that I would not be able to complete my Bachelor of Arts degree, because of English 101. It really seemed to me that grade school had let me down. Out of utter helplessness I did what most students saw as obvious but had never occurred to me. I went to my professor. I plead my case including, in my defense, my grade school history. The fear of not completing college compelled me on even though I was persuaded there was nothing anyone could do to get me past English 101. Turns out I should have taken English 101, the first time, from Professor Gary. Fortunately I was sitting down when he guaranteed me a passing grade. It was so unbelievable that I demanded the promise in writing. And I got it. That B.A. degree was finally looking achievable. There were stipulations however. I had to attend every class and my own death was not an acceptable excuse. Further, I was obligated to do every assignment and write every test when they were due. I earned a B. The hard part was writing nine research papers. But only because I had to do them on top of a full class load. And I accomplished two more things. The college made two changes in the student handbook. First, upper classes could not be taken until all lower division requirements were completed. Second, incompletes were given a fixed deadline. And all thanks to my grade school teacher, Mr. Vander Mei. He would be so proud. February 4, 2003 If tears could build a stairway and memories a lane, I'd walk right up to heaven and bring you home again. [This message has been edited by Larry C (02-04-2003 11:19 PM).] |
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| © Copyright 2003 Larry Chadwick - All Rights Reserved | |||
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Jaime
Registered
MemberPosts 250 |
I enjoyed reading this.  Math was always my killer. shivers Shiva went on break now look at how much it's gonna take to make this place a space where we can breathe. |
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JamesMichael Member Empyrean
since 1999-11-16
Posts 33336Kapolei, Hawaii, USA |
Enjoyed reading this...my dreaded subject was Math...I had an Algebra teacher that promised me no less than a C if I attended and participated in every class...I made it but only by his grace...after that I gave up on Math. James |
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Larry C
since 2001-09-10
Posts 10286United States |
Jaime,  I took one quarter of math. General math. It seemed like college arithmetic! I was quite pleased with myself. And thank you. JM, Seems it's better to quit while we're ahead. I did the second quarter of freshman english on my own and got another B. Funny part was that when I started college it was a three quarter course! Woohoo beat that one. And thanks for your kind words. If tears could build a stairway and memories a lane, I'd walk right up to heaven and bring you home again. |
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