The idea that my students “struggle as writers” implies that that there is an unproductive or, at the very least, less productive way to write. While in the wide world of academic writing at large—and certainly in my own experiences with procrastination and revision—this is almost certainly true…is it true in the environment of English 101?? We have agreed to contract and teach the course as if, in this environment at least, to write at all is valuable regardless of its quality. Within that framework, I think the thing that most trips my students up as writers—maybe the only measurable account ENG101 can give of “struggling”—is simply not writing at all. Should my students find it challenging to write or frustrating to write or be unsure that what they have written is “good” or “correct”, as long as they do write I think they are successful. What may be considered struggle in another environment or course is, in this context, one of the hallmarks of success because we are looking at engagement and process, not final product.

However: staring at a blank page, arrested, blocked—whatever you call it, that is the greatest and arguably only struggle in the English 101 classroom. There are, I think, two primary causes of it: not knowing where to start and not understanding what’s being asked.

This quarter, students have failed to receive complete scores either because they don’t seem to know how to organize their thoughts coherently, or because they grossly misinterpret the assignment. In the first case, I think I as an instructor could incorporate activities which focus on basic skills that make them better writers: how to write an outline, different brainstorming activities, loads of freewrites. In the latter case, I think I could incorporate activities which we focus on basic skills that make them better readers: how to read a prompt, how to identify its purpose, how to formulate questions to clarify the confusing or find intersection between the prompt and their interest. And in that sense, maybe there is another root cause to their struggle: my own learning curve as their instructor, getting to know them as students and how to meet their various needs.