So Far, So Good

The Spring is always a little slower around Desert Vista, and the beginning of the semester sometimes takes awhile to get going, but it's been a good beginning of 2009 around the Writing Lab.

I'm basing that solely on the students who have crossed our door so far. They are eager and curious and self-deprecating. That means they pay attention and ask questions. I've already had the chance to explain comma splices to some foggy-minded students, who usually need to be told that breaking words into sentences is not a bad thing, that they can still explain what they are explaining in the next sentence, or who just need a little warning to think before sprinkling commas throughout their papers.

I also had the chance to explain the ideas of rhetoric to a couple students engaged in breaking down Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech. Honestly, I love watching people realize that they can not only read the What of a speech or essay or book, but also the How and Why that is tucked in those same words. That's the foundation of a critical thinker.

Early on this semester, I helped a student move from a dull summary (mistaken for description) of a movie to a lively little essay on her fish. Her refugee fish. See, she and her husband are Tucsonans via relocation from New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. They got on a plane without knowing the destination, leaving everything, including their fish, behind in their flooded home. When they returned months later, the looters had removed everything of value but left the fish, which was just fine. It's now a Tucsonan, too.

I'm hoping the semester continues like these few early weeks.