I have no answers (1-19)

The purpose of a first-year composition class has been something that has been bothering me ever since I knew I would be asked to teach this course as a part of my assistantship. Sometimes I feel as if a well-defined purpose does not exist. At other times I feel that different people/professors/departments have a very definite idea of what the freshman composition course should do, it is just that all those individual ideas do not necessarily overlap. I would like to think that establishing a clear, direct purpose would make the course easier to teach, but I’m not sure such a simple answer exists.
As an undergraduate at Truman, I worked for a professor who taught the equivalent of Mizzou’s English 1000. For him, in part, the class was about introducing students to Truman’s philosophy of being a Liberal Arts and Sciences institution. That is one idea that I very much like, and would not mind incorporating into my course. The idea of studying across disciplines to learn for the sake of learning is something that appeals to me, and I think should be important in the university system. However, I also recognize that not all students come to college with that mindset. I remember one of the freshmen girls who lived on my floor last year wished me luck in teaching English, but also told me directly that she was only in college to get her nursing degree and couldn’t care less about courses that did not relate to that. Personally, I found that a little disturbing, but she is one example of the type of student I will encounter.
Thinking of the nursing major makes me wonder if it wouldn’t sometimes be better to have English 1000 sections grouped by major. For example, English 1000 for people majoring in the hard sciences might be different than for those in the humanities. Again returning to my undergrad experience, one of my best friends was a Biology major. She took the freshman comp course, but never wrote a similar paper until the Spring semester of her junior year. This doesn’t mean that she wasn’t writing; she probably wrote more than I did as an English major. It was just that she wrote lab reports, which were very different from essay-style writing. But then again, I really don’t want the comp sections separated by major, because that would definitely take away from the liberal arts and sciences ideal, and only fragment the university more.
Ok, I guess I’ve been avoiding the questions long enough (although perhaps not avoiding so much as showing that I really don’t know the answers). I see the first-year composition course as helping students to become more comfortable in expressing their thinking through writing. Personally, I believe most students have very good thoughts, but it is hard for some of them to transfer those to a written format, especially one that someone else will read and grade. (I know I still struggle with it.) I think the course should ask students to think critically, as well as demonstrate that critical thinking in their writing. Perhaps it should also show them that writing can be a tool to help stimulate critical thinking. I prefer to think of the role of the teacher as a guide—someone who helps to stimulate thinking while also encouraging students to realize the value of their own thoughts. I also think the teacher should remind the students that the writing done in class is only one form of writing, and a somewhat formal, academic type at that. Perhaps, freshman composition should just help students work through their fears of writing and teach them strategies to tackle writing more successfully. (Now, if I only knew how to solve those problems for myself, much less my students…)