First Week in College

“Wake up, today is your first day at college, do not be late,” yelled my mom. I did not really want to go, because my heart has lingering memories of high school. Every single moment when I think about college, learning in a new environment, I am scared and nervous. However, the school is not hard like I thought, but kind of interesting. From my first week of college, I have learned lots of great knowledge such as how I read and understand an article, how to write an essay, and what mistakes to avoid in writing.

Firstly, the useful technique that I mastered after the first week of college is how to read and understand an article. When I have to answer the questions about what I have read, it’s hard for me to answer, or at least find the right place to give the answer because too much information confuses me. However, after my reading technique class, my problem has been solved. When I have to grapple with an article to find the answer, my professor suddenly asks: “what is the most important sentence you need to find first?” A quiet atmosphere pervades the whole classroom. With the smile on her face, she explains that the central topic is the main idea of that article. I have to distinguish which sentences are the main idea and which are minor ideas that support the main idea. As a result, it’s easier for me to read and understand what it covers.

Furthermore, the second important lesson I have learned is how to avoid mistakes in writing. After my first essay assignment, my professor found a mistake that one of my classmates made, plagiarism. Plagiarism is borrowing or copying someone’s idea, but if you borrow or copy, you need to credit where you get it. Someone may think plagiarism is when you copy the whole paragraph. However, using a sentence or just your words to replace some in someone’s paper is still called plagiarism. Moreover, she also mentions what we should not do in grammar such as punctuation, run-on sentences, and sentence fragments. This