It's Not Me, It's You

One of the teachers here at Desert Vista assigns a persuasive letter as her third essay in Writing 100 every semester. This semester's crop of essay topics has been the best I've seen. Instead of students trying to get the State of Arizona to completely overhaul their education system or convincing the government to change laws, these students picked accomplishable goals: Dad, stop smoking; downstairs neighbors, stop filing all those complaints; suitor, look elsewhere for romantic involvement; teacher, amend your assignments; etc.

These are manageable requests, and working with these students has generally centered on two ideas:

1. Me, Me, Me
The students know what they want. Knowing what they want is the first hurdle they overcome. And the first obstacle they face. It's what the student wants, so their rhetoric focuses on how this change will meet their needs. They pretty much stop right there. They don't realize that while the request they make originates in a need they have, the action will take place on the other side of the fence, so they need to go over there and see it from that person's perspective.

2. You, You, You
What they need to do is think about who they are persuading and what their idea involves for that person.

Instead of presenting tons of medical information to get your father to stop smoking, think about why your father smokes in the first place. What if he doesn't care so much about his health, but cares more about appearing manly because he started smoking on a ranch as a preteen because his father let him? Data about lung cancer may not hit the bullseye.

Instead of asking your neighbors one floor down to "put yourselves in my shoes," you need to slip into theirs. They complain about the noise your two-year-old makes at ten o'clock at night because they want to go to bed. If you want them to stop filing complaints, explain your situation (why is that kid up at 10:00pm?), explain what you'll do to try and be quieter, and maybe go so far as to invite them up for a meal so they will think about how wonderful you and your family are instead of curse you and call the apartment office the next time they hear stomp stomp stomp when they are trying to fall sleep.

Instead of pointing out how much of an idiot he is, lay out the differences between what you want and what the guy who keeps asking you out wants in a relationship. Be objective. Sure, he wants to be a drug dealer and you think basing your life on illegal crime is a bad idea, but he's not going to change if you tell him he's stupid. Take the emotion away for a bit and present your case rationally. You want security. Comfort. Not men with guns. Maybe he'll see that getting a real job isn't so bad, especially if he wants to date a girl.

Instead of asking your teacher to rework her entire semester's worth of assignments to exclude personal details, think about why she set it up that way (hint: you already know yourself and don't have to do research in a non-research class) and how much work would be involved in crafting an entirely new class. Then think beyond your desire to not talk about your bad memories and examine why focusing on other things might help more people learn to write. Oh, and give her some ideas about what you would be willing to write about. You don't want to appear "like [you] don't want to participate." Help her out and think about what she's trying to accomplish: getting you to write essays without sinking you into deep research.


These are interesting conversations. The students don't realize they are focusing solely on their own needs. Or they don't realize they are using broad arguments that don't necessarily apply to their audience. Bringing it up changes their papers from a general repetition of their basic premise to specific thoughts aimed at actually getting something done.

Keep Calm and Carry On

It's the time of year when people start freaking out because big projects and final papers are due. I shared this image with a particularly stressed student today. She's a non-traditional student of the sort who combines go-getter-ness with I'm-gonna-make-something-of-my-life-ocity, so everything must must must be perfect.

In reality, perfect doesn't happen all the time. Deadlines come, things are handed in, the semester marches on, and so should she.

Evolution as It Pertains to Introductions

I've noticed myself repeatedly saying something new about introductions lately. It's the natural evolution of my usual advice.

My usual advice on intros: Wait.Work on the body paragraphs. Know what you have to say first. It's okay to work on the middle before the beginning.

See, people jump in and write their intro first because it's the first part of their paper. They jump in without knowing what they have to say. They just know that they need to get this paper done, so logically start at the beginning and try to work from there.

The problem, as I said, is that they don't know what they have to say. Thus, the evolution.

The evolution in my advice on intros: Your intro should introduce your paper, not the general topic you're working with.

Student writers sit down with a blank Word document and they start generally writing about whatever it is that they are supposed to be writing about. They make broad statements that include all people everywhere or every time anyone has done a certain thing or been a particular place. They are doing the wrong work. They are trying to go from general to specific before they know the specifics. They are not introducing their paper. They are trying to introduce a subject, an assignment, a big idea, but they are not introducing what they will cover in their essay.

So I've started to talk about that specifically with people whose intros are painted with broad strokes. It seems to be helping because it removes the stress of getting the paper off to an interesting/humorous/engaging/thoughtful/never-before-seen/amazing start and subtly plants the seed that they do in fact have something specific to say with this paper.