The 30-foot Toss*

With the trash can sitting by the door, one student tries to "make a basket" with a crumpled sheet of paper from the back corner of the room. His performance is impressive, and he gets very close but does not make every toss in three tries. A second student is given the "ball" and stands over the trash can. She successfully makes the toss three times out of three.

Oftentimes students try to make "30-foot tosses." Instead of working on assignments day by day, students wait till the last minute. Instead of studying every day for exams, students wait until the night before. As a result, students fail when they could have been successful.

Once when working in the campus Reading and Writing Center, a student called me over to help her with her research paper. When I read over what she had written so far, I quickly saw that the paper was unorganized and incoherent. The student was using three articles as source materials, but the articles were only loosely related to each other, and the student had not established any connections of ideas in her paper. I suggested she return to the library to do additional research.

"I've been to the library," she said.

"Yes, I see that," I told her, "but you need different and better sources for your paper."

"You are not listening to me," she said, "I have been to the library."

I began to get a very uneasy feeling, and I asked a question of which I was afraid I knew the answer. "When did you go to the library?"

"Look," she said. "I went to the library this morning when it opened (8:00 a.m.). I've been working on this paper, and I need you to help me with it now."

It was 9:30 a.m., which meant that she had spent an hour and a half finding three sources, reading them, and writing five pages for her paper.

"I am trying to help you, and looking over what you have written, I think you need to go back to the library and find better sources for your paper."

Now she was clearly angry. "You don't understand," she said, "I have to turn this paper in at 10:00 a.m."

I was concerned because I couldn't see what she could do to finish the paper on time, so I asked her if she thought the teacher might give her an extension on her time.

"You are not listening to me. My teacher said that I have to turn this paper in today, or I am going to fail her class."

Then she said the thing that did make me angry although I tried very hard not to show it.

"It is your job to make sure that I don't fail this paper."

No, it wasn't. It was her responsibility. Here she was, fully aware that failing this assignment would lead to her failing her course. She waited till the last possible moment to work on the paper, and now she wanted to make me responsible for her failure. The truth is, if I had moved the student aside, sat down, and written the paper myself, it would have been impossible for me (or anyone else) to have written the paper well enough, in that short amount of time, to make a passing grade. I gave her the best advice I could, knowing that it was not enough, and left her to "face the music." Hopefully, she learned from this experience not to put off assignments till the last minute.

What was worst about this situation was that, as I explained what needed to be done to her paper to make it presentable, it dawned on her that she was going to "miss the basket." Then she became frantic, further insisting that it was my responsibility as a tutor to make sure that she made a passing grade. I did what I could, which was to try to help her make the paper look like it wasn't what it was, a last minute hodgepodge of nonsense.

Obviously, this student was going for the "30-foot toss"--and she was going to miss badly.

I confess I have sometimes taken the "30-foot toss," too. My first semester working on my graduate degree in English, I had a job where I was working 45 hours a week, had family responsibilities, and, foolishly, signed up for 12 hours of English courses. I had to read a total of 13 novels, 3 books of poetry, a book of plays, and 5 textbooks and supplemental reading texts; write 8 papers plus daily writing assignments; and keep 2 journals. I found myself studying 30-45 hours a week, leaving very little time for anything else with my work and class schedule. I learned my lesson (at least about classwork) and never took more than two classes a semester after that.

To be successful in school and in life, take "3-foot tosses" not "30-foot."

^* The "30-foot toss" is a concept developed by Skip Downing in his On Course Workshops.

Writing

The best advice for students when it comes to writing essays is that they need to

• do the necessary preparation in reading, note-taking, and research, and
• accept that the early stages of writing are messy, far from perfect, and often frustrating.

As novelist Terry Kay has said, "Writing is the easiest thing in the world. Just put one word down after another." But he also explains that writing is the hardest thing in the world to do well, and the only way to do well is to re-write and re-write and rewrite.

People who have not done much reading often model conversational patterns in their writing. As a result, the writing is flawed by simplistic vocabulary (overuse of common verbs like go, run, see, get, make, and so on), repetitive sentence structure, casual use of grammar, and conversational tics as in phrases like, "Like I said before." Writing is always more formal than conversation. The difference is similar to the difference between talking with a friend and giving a speech before an assembly.

Steps to Improve Writing

• Work on grammar issues
  • Become aware of bad habits and why you make those choices
  • Learn new habits and why you should change
  • Consciously practice the new habits when revising papers
• Use vivid nouns and verbs: Avoid easy verbs like "run" or "get"
• Say more by saying less: Write what you saw, heard, smelled, tasted, and touched rather than explaining to the reader what you thought or felt
• It's not the topic; it's the reason: Writers can write about anything (wind, beer can, highway construction). What is both important and difficult to do is to find a reason for writing about the topic.
• Model good writing that you read
• Read over your work out loud or have someone read it to you. Pay attention to places where your reader stumbles over the writing. These may be areas that need revision.
• Revise, revise, revise

To write well means to try, to put forth the effort necessary to create something worth reading. I suspect that most weak writing occurs because students don't want to write, wait till the last minute to complete the assignment, throw it together as quickly as possible, and turn it in to get it out of their sight. For these students, writing is like eating vegetables. Push it aside till the end, or wolf it down quickly, but get it over with. However, if students are going to write well, they must put forth the effort to write well. My advice is, pretend like you like to write. In the end, maybe you will.

The next thing that people need to realize is that writing is always selective. No piece of writing contains everything that could be said. In every piece of writing, the writer chooses what to include and what to exclude, and those choices are based on the writer's overall purpose (or, in the case of an assignment, what the instructor has identified as the goal and purpose of the assignment), the amount of time the writer has for the project, and the availability and access to the resources needed to complete the project (or, in the case of an assignment, the limits that the instructor has placed on the resources to be used).

Qualities of a Well-Written Essay

A well-written essay must be supported by details that provide evidence in support of the thesis.

• Essay should not just have an inventory list of details. Details should directly relate to and support the thesis (Skwire and Weiner 93).
• Details should be selective and not all inclusive (can't tell everything) (Skwire and Weiner 94)
• Details should be "lively" (concrete) and specific (Skwire and Weiner 95)
• Specific details (mathematically precise) - important for providing evidence, especially in arguments
• Concrete details (sensory) - important for emotional impact
• Details should be organized (order and grouping) in some way that supports and develops the thesis (Skwire and Weiner 95)

Characteristics of Good Writing

• Interesting--engages the reader's interest, has relevance
• Stays focused on topic, includes pertinent details, has unity
• Vivid--uses description, has good details, has strong nouns and verbs, uses concrete language
• Makes sense, logical, has coherence
• Understandable and clear
• Ideas 'link' together, has cohesion
• Language is simple and direct or complex as needed, spare to make clear arguments and dense with details; every word counts, concise

The Writing Process and Research Process sections of this web site give detailed explanations of the writing and research processes. Study those materials and practice their guidelines to become a better writer.

For tips on taking an essay exam, see the section on Timed Writing in the Writing Process section of this web site.

For information on creative writing, see the Creative Writing section of this web site.

Literature

Literature is art, and art is contrived. Literature is never merely the presentation of the world as it is. Literature is always an artifice where the writer has made choices, both conscious and unconscious, about what the work contains. How something is said is often as important as what is being said in a work of literatue. And the literary work exceeds the writer's purpose because of the nature of language and how it is perceived by the writer and the reader, how it reflects the culture in which it was written and how it is perceived through the filter of the culture of the person reading. It is this 'ambiguity' that explains how the value of specific works change through time for both cultures and individuals.

When reading any literary work assume that everything in the work is there for a purpose. Look for things that are repeated, things that seem significant (even if you don't know what that significance is), and things that seem odd or strange. Often, these offer clues to the meaning of the work. Also pay attention to the sound of the writing. Often the sound is as important in conveying meaning as the content. This is true for all literature but especially poetry. In her essay on living in Los Angeles, Joan Didion uses sentence length to illustrate both the movement of the Santa Ana wind and its effect on people by using sentences of varied length.

There is something uneasy in the Los Angeles air this afternoon, some unnatural stillness, some tension. What it means is that tonight a Santa Ana will begin to blow, a hot wind from the northeast whining down through the Cajon and San Gorgonio Passes, blowing up sand storms out along Route 66, drying the hills and the nerves to flash point. For a few days now we will see smoke back in the canyons, and hear sirens in the night. I have neither heard nor read that a Santa Ana is due, but I know it, and almost everyone I have seen today knows it too. We know it because we feel it. The baby frets. The maid sulks. I rekindle a waning argument with the telephone company, then cut my losses and lie down, given over to whatever it is in the air. To live with the Santa Ana is to accept, consciously or unconsciously, a deeply mechanistic view of human behavior. (Didion)

She also uses the rhythms and sounds of the words and sentences to reinforce meaning. The second sentence mimics the movement of the Santa Ana wind through the countryside by its length and the use of participles (the words ending in ing). The short sentences mimic the sense of irritability that people feel: "The baby frets. The maid sulks." By ending those sentences with harsh sounding words, the sense of iritability is intensified.

What it means is that tonight a Santa Ana will begin to blow, a hot wind from the northeast
whining down through the Cajon and San Gorgonio Passes,
blowing up sand storms out along Route 66,
drying the hills and the nerves to flash point. (Didion)

It is also valuable to pay attention to what isn't said as well as what is. Look closely at who the speaker or narrator of the work is. Is their view objective or subjective? Do they present an accurate view of things, or is their view skewed due to their own biases, culture and worldview, or failures of understanding?

Often with poetry, it is helpful to begin by gaining some sense of the tone, the emotional feeling or mood expressed in the poem. These are revealed through language: word choice, descriptive details, sentence lengths, sounds.

Pay attention to things that are repeated, things that seem significant (even if the significance is unclear), or things that seem odd or strange. Look for patterns involving these things that may suggest their meaning and purpose within the text.

All of these things serve as entry points into understanding a work of literature.

The Literary Studies section of this web site has materials explaining what to look for in a literary work and how to write about literary works. Review those materials carefully.

Literature Survey Classes

Composition courses that focus on writing about literature and Introduction to Literature courses examine the primary literary genres: poetry, fiction, drama, and creative non-fiction. Students learn about the literary elements common to those genres, read works illustrating those elements, and write papers showing how those elements develop the central theme or meaning of the works.

Literature survey courses examine the nature and influence of literature on a particular culture through time. In a sense, a literature survey course is a specialized history course focused on the writers and works that influence and define a generation within a specific culture. Examples include courses in American literature, British literature, Continental or European Literature, Asian literature, and so on. By nature, these courses are selective in identifying the writers that represent a particular period, often focusing on those writers and works considered part of the canon of literature, those most influential, most important to, or best representative of a specific culture, historical era, or literary tradition. Often a consequence of this selective process in the study of Western literature is to ignore works by writers who are not mainstream, that is, those who are not male and white. As a result, some literature survey courses focus on marginalized groups of writers: female/feminist, black, Latinx, or LGBTQ+ writers; marginalized cultures: Hispanic literature, Native American literature, African literature, South American literature; or marginalized genres: science fiction, fantasy, horror, detective, romance, Western ("cowboy") fiction.

Understanding the differences between these types of literary courses can help students understand why they are reading specific works and what the significance, importance, relevance, or value of those works are. Students should recognize that the works studied in a particular course were selected from a much vaster array of works because the works selected were felt to best fit the historical and culture concepts around which the course is organized and not necessarily because those works are superior in quality to works not selected. Failure to realize this can result in an elitist attitude that fails to recognize and appreciate works of literature outside the canon.

Other Resources

Be sure to study the various resources on this web site for understanding writing process, research, and literary studies. The section on mythology can also be useful.

There are a number of books that are useful in helping people understand, read, and appreciate literature. Consider reading the following:

Three very readable books that examine philosophy and may be helpful for students studying literary criticism are

Durant, Will. The Story of Philosophy: The Lives and Opinions of the Greater Philosophers. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1961.

Gaarder, Jostein. Sophie's World: A Novel about the History of Philosophy. Tras. Paulette Móller. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1994.

A young girl receives mysterious letters explaining philosophy.

Sire, James W. The Universe Next Door: A Basic Worldview Catalog. 4th ed. Leicester, England: Inter-Varsity Press, 1984.

Sire takes a Christian perspective on various philosophical approaches, often illustrating them with literary references.

Works Cited

Didion, Joan. "Los Angeles Notebook." Many Californias: Literature from the Golden State, edited by Gerald W. Haslam, 2nd ed., U of Nevada P, 1999, p. 187. Google Books. < books.google.com/books?id=xpb49H-1cogC>. Accessed: 15 Nov. 2019.

Skwire, David and Harvey S. Wiener. Student's Book of College English : Rhetoric, Readings, Handbook. Mishawaka, IN: Better World Books, 1992.