{"id":2481,"date":"2018-03-01T12:32:32","date_gmt":"2018-03-01T18:32:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/?p=2481"},"modified":"2018-10-21T19:19:58","modified_gmt":"2018-10-22T01:19:58","slug":"what-do-they-mean-how-to-translate-your-professor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/what-do-they-mean-how-to-translate-your-professor\/","title":{"rendered":"What do they mean? How to translate your professor"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Brooke Engel<\/p>\n

              I\u2019ve never been more frustrated than when I emailed my professor for the FOURTH time because I still didn\u2019t understand what they were asking for. I had tried everything\u2014 and I knew that I understood the material. I just couldn\u2019t figure out what question they wanted me to answer, and nothing I was doing seemed to help. I was at a loss, and I ended up falling short on the assignment.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve all had teachers who use words that are highly academic and often a little too confusing to understand. Sometimes, it can feel like your professor is speaking in a foreign language (maybe they actually are!). So what do you do when you have no idea what their assignments are asking for?<\/p>\n

              Whether it\u2019s a quick reflection paragraph or an end-of-term paper, knowing how to dissect prompts can be helpful so that you can show what you\u2019ve learned. Here are a couple tips that might help:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Find someone who\u2019s familiar with your professor. <\/strong>There\u2019s bound to be a student in the major (maybe even in your class) who has taken multiple classes with your prof and has succeeded\u2014reach out to them and ask if they have any ideas or understand what the prompt is asking. Sometimes it helps to find someone who has already done the translating.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

     <\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Email your professor<\/strong>, or drop by during their office hours for a meeting. Professors are often well aware that their prompts can be confusing and will be happy to re-word their assignments or give you some insight as to what they\u2019re asking for. If you still don\u2019t understand after just one conversation, DON\u2019T GIVE UP! Keep asking questions. Professors want you to succeed in their courses, but they can\u2019t help you if they don\u2019t know you\u2019re still struggling.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

       <\/p>\n

        \n
      1. Come see a writing tutor!<\/strong> We can help you read through the assignment and highlight key ideas and questions that your professor is asking. We\u2019re students, too! So we\u2019ve been there, and thankfully we\u2019re trained to help bring a fresh set of ideas and eyes to help you work through the prompt (but you have to get to the tutor station first!). We can even read through your responses to the assignment specifically to look and see if you\u2019ve met the prompt requirements. It\u2019s super helpful to you, and we love to do it.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

        Don\u2019t let a pesky prompt stop you from doing well on an assignment or in a class. There are plenty of resources to turn to, but it\u2019s on YOU to ask for help. We\u2019ll see you at the tutor station!<\/p>\n

         <\/p>\n

        Brooke is a sophomore studio art major who was part of the Slovenia Abroad this past summer. She likes taking long walks on the beach and singing songs to dogs to make them smile. <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

        by Brooke Engel               I\u2019ve never been more frustrated than when I emailed my professor for the FOURTH time because I still […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[109],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2481","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-writeherewritenowwriteon"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5DI6r-E1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2481","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2481"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2481\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2484,"href":"http:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2481\/revisions\/2484"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2481"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2481"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2481"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}