To: Writing students
From: Survivor
Date: May 8, 2012
Subject: How to capture the most value from Writing with Professor
Congratulations! You are going to have Professor for Writing. I took Managerial Communication with Professor, and I found the course that I took with Professor to be the most challenging and also the most rewarding course I have taken at Cornell University so far. The HADM 1650 Managerial Communication was very similar to the course you are going to take, so I will provide you with advice about how you can capture the most value with Professor.
Professor wanted you to know how to capture the most value from the writing class you are going to take, so he asked us, Survivors from China, to write this memo to provide you with advice. I have four pieces of advice that can help you capture the most values with Professor: prepare for class, prepare for tutorial, focus on learning rather than grading, and take challenges as learning opportunities.
 Prepare for class
You can prepare for class by finishing the assigned homework and reviewing for preview class notes. If you prepare well for class, you can have a better understanding of concepts Professor covers during class, and you can be able to participate during the class.
 Prepare for tutorial
You can prepare for tutorial by reading all comments in the margin that Professor made on your paper and trying to correct the mistakes on your own. If you prepare the tutorial well, you can effectively use the tutorial time and answer questions in tutorial.
 Focus on learning rather than grading
You may over-value the importance of grades. You may focus on your grades more than your learning because you went through the Chinese university entrance examination, and you got in your university because of your scores. However, you should focus on learning rather than grading if you want to capture the most value from Professor’s class.
 Taking challenges as learning opportunities
You will face many challenges in this class because you are international students, and English is not your first language. If you want to capture the most value from Professor, you should take challenges as learning opportunities. For example, you can develop your oral presentation skills by doing several presentations, or you can develop your teamwork skills by doing a group project.

Prepare for class
You will capture the most value from Writing 1101 with Professor if you prepare for class well. You need to understand how to prepare for class and what the benefits of preparing for class are. More specifically, you need to prepare for class by finishing the assigned homework and reviewing the previous class materials. You can capture the most value during the class if you prepare for class well because you can have a better understanding of class materials, and you can be able to participate in class.
How can you prepare for class?
You need to prepare for Writing 1101 by finishing the homework that Professor gives to you and reviewing the previous class notes.
• Finish the assigned homework
You need to finish the assigned homework before each class. More specifically you need to do all the readings that Professor assigned to you. Most of them are in the course packet, and you may also have extra reading materials. You can underline, highlight, or write down the important ideas from the readings. Moreover, if you have something in the readings that you do not understand, you can write your questions down. You may figure out the answers when Professor talks about the concepts in class. If you are still confused, you can ask Professor in class or after class.
I always do all the readings that Professor assigned before class. I will highlight the key concepts in the readings, and sometimes I will take notes to help me organize the key concepts in the readings. For example, we learned punctuation for convention, and we learned several rules in reading. I