Tufts Blogs

     So, you've gotten through the first couple of weeks of classes, reunited with old friends, and maybe even made some new ones. For the freshman, you've probably had countless new experiences in the short time that you've been here so far, one of them being choosing classes. If you're lucky, you got an early sign up time and managed to schedule all your classes Monday-Thursday, so you have Friday free.

Or maybe you got stuck with one of the last sign up times (like I did last year) and ended up with a bunch of 8am classes

Whatever kind of class schedule you ended up with this semester, there's still a little time left to add or drop classes. So, in honor of that, I thought I'd share my 5 favorite classes that I've taken so far at Tufts:

 

5. Poetry in Spanish America

     It's a Spanish class, it's a poetry class, it's a world civilizations requirement! You really can have it all! In a class like this one, you don't need to memorize verb tenses or do a lot of busywork outside of class. The name "Poetry in Spanish America" tells you pretty much everything you need to know about what you'll be studying in this class: spanish. poetry. Spanish Poetry.

Aside from getting to read poems by poets like Neruda, who is extremely well-known, we got to explore other, lesser-known poets, and their different styles of writing. One day, we even got to walk around outside and write our own poems using the style we learned about earlier that day. This class mostly focused on "vanguardismo", which included pretty much all styles of writing from creationism to surrealism to cubism and more.

The best part of coming to class was the professor, Professor Mazzotti, who was always sharing his insights into the poems we were reading, or telling us funny stories, and sometimes even bringing in candy for the class.

TL;DR- take a literature class in whatever language you take and put all that knowledge from your grammar classes to good use, and possibly also get candy?

 

4. Introduction to Acting

     A lot of people take this class to get their arts credit, so actors and non-actors alike can play improv games, work on monologues and scenes, and even spend a few days pretending to be animals. Because so many people take this class, there are a lot of people who are new to acting, making it much more comfortable for people like me who start sweating at just the thought of having to do improv.

It's a great chance to break up a day full of sitting in lecture halls, taking notes, and trying to contain your anger at the person loudly sniffling directly behind you because of course they chose today to forget to bring their tissues to class.

ALSO: in Acting I, you get really good at reading people and reacting to what they actually mean (from expression, intonation, body language, etc.), not just what they say. This means you'll never lose an argument again. If that's not a good endorsement, I don't know what is.

TL;DR: If you have a cold, take a decongestant before going to class PLEASE.

 

3. Legal Reasoning

     Legal reasoning was the faculty seminar that was assigned to me along with my pre-major advisor the first semester of freshman year. Having never been interested in law, I was pretty bummed when I got that email over the summer saying that this was going to be my advising class. But after the first day, I did a complete 180 and went from dreading class to discussing what constitutes a felony with my friends in Dewick. I don't know if this class is still offered, but my advice isn't to take legal reasoning (although it is a great class and you should). My advice is to take a class in a subject that is new to you, or maybe in a subject that you previously thought you didn't like. You might surprise yourself.

TL;DR: You decided to come to a liberal arts college- branch out, you'll like it.

 

2. Introduction to Child Development

     Intro to CD is another class I took where I had no idea what I was walking into on the first day. This was actually the first class I ever had at Tufts, and I couldn't be more glad about that. This is a huge lecture class, but you would never know if you were just listening in on the discussions we had. It's discussion based, with people frequently talking about different gender roles and stereotypes that children encounter, or people recounting a childhood fear or favorite book. And it's all led by Professor Gidney, or "Chip", who gets his students as passionate about child development as he is. I went from not knowing what CD was to taking a CD class every semester so far.

TL;DR: see previous TL;DR

1. Cell Biology

     Yes, I had to sneak a biology class in here. I'm a biology major, I don't know what you really expected from me. But hear me out, even if you're really "not a science person". Cell Bio is the best class I've taken at Tufts so far. It is a hard course, I will preface with that, but, it's also totally worth all the hard work, because now I can use words like "epithelial-mesenchymal transition" in everyday conversation*! Maybe you've always loved biology, or maybe you're just intrigued to know that there's a protein out there named "MAP kinase kinase kinase".

If biology really isn't your thing, and you don't want to take a course like cell bio, at least try and find a class to take with the professor, Professor Koegel. Voted teacher of the year last year, Dr. Koegel makes biology even more fun (I didn't think it was possible at first either) and more accessible. In a class of 100 or so students, the first time I walked into office hours, having never met her before, Dr. Koegel immediately says, "Hi. You're Jane, right?" In a class that big, it's really great when the teacher takes the time to learn everyone's names and make the class feel like it's not just another big lecture.

TL;DR: take cell bio, use big words like mesenchymal-epithelial transition** to impress your friends.

Hopefully you all are enjoying classes so far, and starting to compile some of your top 5!

 

*Maybe not everyday conversation per se, but I'm working on it

**That's right, there's an epithelial-mesenchymal transition AND a mesenchymal-epithelial transition! As my long-time friend and life coach Bill Nye would say, "Science rules!"