Expert Advice
Now that you’ve completed your Anthology and understand all that is involved, please write a letter of advice to the Freshman class as they enter the grade of 10 Honors next year.
English 10 Honors
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Now that you’ve completed your Anthology and understand all that is involved, please write a letter of advice to the Freshman class as they enter the grade of 10 Honors next year.
Dear Freshies,
This coming year you are going to be faced with one of the most difficult projects that you will ever have to accomplish in your high-school career; The Anthology of Doom! This anthology will consist of 20 works, such as; novels,poems, short stories, a quote, etc. There are 2 rules that you must follow to successfully complete this anthology: 1) Have fun 2)DO NOT PROCRASTINATE! This project will not be enjoyable if you are not having fun. You should enjoy either putting it all together in it’s completed binding or finding your works. Lastly, procrastination is one of the worst things that one can do. If you procrastinate, your work will probably “draw through a straw.” You would not have reached your full potential and put together something sloppy. This is a project that should be done over time, not just the night before. That is all, so have fun with the anthology (of dooooom)!!
You’re Welcome,
Caitie Post
Dear ye little fresh’s,
The anthology will be one of the most simple assignments you will ever recieve but most times it will be the most frustrating idea you have ever heard of. Everyone will most likely call Mr. J a few offensive names under their breath (I choose to scream mine!), but I promise he will forgive you, as will you forgive him. This project will leave you with great satisfaction in the end, and the anthology will grow to become something you will be proud to show off. I agree with Caitie when she said procrastinating will affect your work. Even if you do procrastinate, I assure you that you will still be working on your project the night before it is due. I started mine two months ago, “finished” it two days early, and I still added final touches the night (well the period) before I handed it in. If Mr. J does the same thing to you next year and adds a post script two days before it is due, call him all the names you want. Just be ready to admit the post script was a nice ending touch to your anthology. Follow the rules, have fun!
Your Welcome,
Theresa Farris
Ladies, such kind words and no sarcasm from Theresa. That is difficult to fathom. I wonder if Taylor will spread the peace and goodwill. I look forward to hearing from Ms.Trank as well.
Dear Freshmeat…I mean men,
GREETINGS! Welcome to English 10 or English 10 Honors. This year you will have the most frustrating project you will ever have to do. This my little kiddies is The Personal Anthology. This, if you don’t know, is a collection of works that you enjoy and can connect with. Fear not my little friends. It won’t be horrible. Well that is if you start it when it is first given. There is only one piece of advice that I can really give you. DO NOT PROCRASTINATE!!! This will lead to most definite stress and much threatening aimed toward Mr. J. ALSO!!! Decorating takes much longer than you think it will if you want it to look nice. I was up until four in the morning the day before it was due. Yeah I advise not to do that. I think that you should get started early. Maybe finish it a week before it is due and just revise it. Fix any mistakes and decorate to your hearts content. Even though I just finished mine, I wish I would have done it differently. I wish I would have given myself more time to work on it and make it better. There was so much more I wanted to do with it. But seriously folks just remember to give yourself time and to just have fun with it. It will be totally worth it when it is finished.
P.S. don’t let Mr. J push you over! Don’t let him add things two days before it is due!!
p.p.s. it is okay to say how much you hate Mr. J in your anthology. I did and he would it quite funny.
that’s supposed to say found… not would.
Dear freshmen (who have absolutely no clue what you are getting yourselves into),
Anthology, this will be a word that you will indubitably fear for the entirety of your sophomore year. In about June you will receive a packet about four or five pages long and think “oh great a chance to express myself”. Well of course it will be, to express the utter anxiety you will feel, and the overwhelming stress! You probably will procrastinate, but don’t let that haunt you; Jarz TV screen countdown will do that well enough. Enjoy the period when Satan will rise and Armageddon will begin. Have Fun!
Ok I was just kidding about all that, way for me to sound optimistic huh. Well youngsters this project is not that bad at all. Just keep up with the work and try your best not to procrastinate. It will help you in the long run. But honestly, for this project try to make it enjoyable. So pick out things that you like and would like writing about. And don’t forget decoration is always appreciated. And do not forget, write what you want to write and be yourself.
-The sarcastic one
The word June is supposed to say January whoops sorry:(
Sorry about the last sentences too. I forgot what I wrote and wrote the same thing twice:(
Dear all ye freshman,
Anthology time is here!!…Haha..I mean aww, poor you. Mr. J told us that we had to give you some words of wisdom, so here ya go! The “anthology of doom” as Caitie Post referred to it, is just has bad as you have heard. I am not going to be nice and tell you it waan’t as bad as I thought, because it was worse. I am a very stressful person and this anthology just made my stress levels sky rocket. But, there is some advice I can give you. Well, first of all, everyone is going to tell you not to procrastinate, but you will do it anyways, everyone does. But, I will tell you to do eerything as you go along. For example, cite your works, as you go and alphabetize them as you go, so all that is left is to type it. Another thing, typing. Don’t waste your time writing each work out and then typing them. It is a waste of time, type as you go. And yes, I was up late decorating my baby (anthology) but, I feel you should wait till the end to decorate, that way everything else is done. And all you have to worry about is putting it all together. Well my final words. Have fun. And the most rewarding part, is holding the finished product in your hand and saying “Wow, I did this!!” Ok so maybe it wasn’t that bad, but I would never do it again. So you have entered your ride towards the anthology of doom, have fun and keep your arms and legs inside the cart at all times.
*Feeling sorry for you*
~Chelsea~
Class of 2011 (I’m mixing it up with the salutation, here):
Beware the Anthology of Dooooom. It has teeth, ferocious ones, and if you procrastinate, think too hard, or don’t think enough, the project will come back to bite you.
I’m probably a bad person to ask for advice about this project, because seemed to come together by itself (albeit the fact that it did so the night before and day it was due). Since I don’t know whether yours will do that or not, I can’t really recommend detailed strategies.
But I can say that, as much as we pick on you this year, next year you won’t be freshmen. And although we’ll inevitably pick on you still, being a sophomore does give you an elevated status over the new kids coming in. Meaning: if you’re not incredibly obnoxious this year, we’ll be here to help you out come 2008-09. Even if that “helping out” is only listening to you as you spew words of derision, cynicism, and loathing in Mr. Jarzynski’s direction.
I can tell you though, a few general suggestions that you’ve doubtless heard before.
01- do not procrastinate. If you put off this project, your parent/guardian will come storming into your working area at two o’ clock in the morning of the day it’s due, demanding to know why the [expletive] you haven’t finished the [expletive] thing yet.
02- don’t overthink it. That’s where I got into trouble. Mr. J stopped making sense to me, and I had no idea what I was doing, so I focused to hard on the anthology and mostly just ended up giving myself a stress headache. Or fifty.
03- don’t give up. It sounds lame, but seriously. If you lose your enthusiasm for this project, you’ll end up putting forth little effort and ending up with a craptastical result that you’re not satisfied with– and the satisfaction of finally being done, I think, is the best part.
Anyway. I should probably get going, so: good luck-good luck!
–Kim.
Dear Future Sophmores,
Do not procrastinate and have fun with this beasty project. I did not believe my peers when they told me that I would run out of time and now looking back on it I wish I could have work on it more or put in more time on it because it was not as creative as I would liked. You will miss working on it and will have an empty hole in your schedule that will shake you up a little bit. Yes, there will also be caladeral damage to your social life but that is exspected. I wish you all good luck and try not to stress out to bad because if you put enough time into your Anthologies you will finish on time.
Dear Freshman,
Do not wait to do your anthology. The longest you should ever wait to start is until a month before it is due. Even that is too long. Put forth a great amount of effort and explain things better than I did. Make your anthologies long and descriptive. Eat up any advice given to you from Mr. j, it will help. Other than that, thoroughly read through the outlines he gives you, they will most certainly help you. Most of all be honest with your anthology, so you can say you did it your way. Unfortunatly though I’m going to have to say that while you are doing this project you are going to grow to despise it.
Dear you unlucky Freshman,
I feel bad for you that you have to still write your anthology. You have two choices to either embrace it or run in fear from it. I have to tell you to embrace it and try to enjoy it (even though that is very hard to do). If you want it to be good and you are excited about it, it will comeout great, but if you wait and wait and then wait some more you may not like it so much when it comes down to the last week. If I could redo my anthology I would start right away looking for poems, books, and short stories that mean a lot to me. Instead I had to pickout works to fill my anthology just so I could get it done. So my overall advice is to just do it and get it over with so you are not throwing stuff into it the last few days, good luck!
Dear pre-anthology freshfolk,
Sure, you could start early, have plenty of time to finish and skip the whole grey hair from stress part of this monster. You certainly could, but no matter what we say, you will end up procrastinating. I know it and you know it. I won’t say very much on the subject of procrastination. Though, it would help to start reading even before you are officially assigned it. That, by far, takes the most time. You know yourself and how you work, all you need to do is get it done before the due date.
One of the things you should do is make this project your own. Be honest. It will all end up easier if you’re honest. It sounds like a paradox, but have fun working on it. Don’t focus on what it is, focus on what it means, what you mean. This project is like nothing you’ve ever done before, in ways both good and bad. Don’t go for the short stuff because it will be easier, go for the stuff you can understand. Also, practice your voice in writing, as if you were speaking to the reader. Think of this as a challenge, because that’s exactly what it is. Think that what you say is permanent once you’ve handed it in. It will be fine, we all made it out fine, with some grey hair (at least we’re not bald). That’s me always the optimist. And save everything you write, if you are using a computer. USB, flash drives are a great help too. Lastly, make sure you get sleep, it’s very important.
- The Optimistic one who sympathizes (A Procrastinator)
P.S. Don’t lose sleep, just know what you’re doing.