iFALCON FOCUS
Activity: Planning a Response to an Assignment and Actively Defeating Procrastination
You’ve been given an essay or project assignment in class. Perhaps it’s a major term paper; or perhaps it’s one of several projects you’ll have to complete during the semester. This is when procrastination is likely to set in; since the assignment isn’t due immediately, many students will choose to avoid the stress of preparing for the assignment, putting it off until later.
Bad move.
A student who wants to be in control of her success and to avoid the stress of late planning and last-minute work will take control of the assignment from the start. This activity will provide you with a template for starting that process.
Activity:
I. Set up a timeline.
With the help of a calendar, create a timeline for the assignment you’ve received. Divide that timeline into segments that allow you to manage the work in smaller chunks, rather than all at once days (or hours) before the assignment is due.
For example, imagine the assignment is due in one month:
Week 1: Initial outline and research
Week 2: Ongoing research and rough draft
Week 3: Development of first complete draft and feedback from instructor (office hours), peer study group, and Writing Center tutor.
Week 4: Revision of draft and final complete draft; final feedback from instructor, peers, tutors.
Assignment Due Date:
Use your calendar to assign actual completion dates to each of the steps in the timeline, and keep to those steps. Setting up a peer study group with two or three other students from class is a good way to get feedback throughout the process and to help each other keep to your schedule.
II. Week 1 Planning Activity: Outline your response to the assignment.
To get started sooner rather than later, write down the following during the first week of the assignment period. Then review these with a peer study group and your instructor, during office hours, to be sure you’re on track.
1. Create a tentative thesis for essay 1 or statement of purpose for a project. (See the example below.)
2. Freewrite a detailed planning paragraph (more than one paragraph may be necessary) explaining what you hope to prove in this focus on the essay, or what you’ll discover in the project’s research, which text(s) you'll focus on, and why you think it's important to take this focus. What do you hope it will reveal to you and to other readers? How does it respond to the instructor’s assignment?
3. Complete a rough outline of the project illustrating how you might organize your ideas by section in the finished work. So, imagine I’m writing a midterm essay for an American literature class. In my tentative thesis, I claimed:
For Anne Bradstreet and Washington Irving, home defines one’s position in the broader society, provides a secure sense of belonging, and asserts one’s identity. With the metaphoric loss of home, the individual’s very self is threatened.
If I'm writing about Anne Bradstreet's poem "Upon the Burning of Our House" and Washington Irving's story "Rip Van Winkle," I'll map out my essay by using the thesis to create major sections of my planned writing and research:
A. Anne Bradstreet's faith in God gives her comfort in “Upon the Burning of Our House” (2 paragraphs)
B. Despite this faith in God, though, she mourns for all that she has lost, including her sense of self (2-3 para.)
C. Rip Van Winkle's comfort in nature and in the community, despite his wife's antagonism, defines his sense of self (2 para.)
D. Rip's awakening and the loss of home--of literal home, but of friends, family, dog, and community--destroys his sense of self (2-3 para.)
That's a rough idea of what my initial planning outline might look like. With that, I can start the research and begin to map out my ideas more fully.
Try this with your own class assignments, revising the activity as needed to help you get started. And visit the iFALCON website for more academic success tips at