Jason's Story
Copyright© 2025 by writer 406
Chapter 20
Jason stood beside his desk, holding a stack of papers that he’d rather forget. The assignment had been straightforward: analyze the causes of World War I using three primary sources. What he’d gotten back was twenty-eight essays that read like they’d been assembled from Wikipedia articles and AI-generated summaries.
He looked up at his fourth-period class, the same students who could engage brilliantly in discussion but apparently forgot how to think the moment they sat down to write.
“Okay,” he said, setting the papers down with deliberate emphasis. “Guys, we need to talk.”
The students looked up with the wary attention of kids who knew they were about to be called out.
“These papers,” Jason continued, tapping the stack, “are some really awful writing. I know you’re all smarter than what you turned in. Good writing equals good thinking. Good thinking equals good grades.”
Uncomfortable shuffling. A few guilty glances.
“So before I hand these back, we’re going to have a lesson on how to actually write a term paper. Because what most of you turned in weren’t papers—they were copy-and-paste jobs dressed up with fancy fonts. Arnie, God help you, you even used Comic Sans.”
Tyler Morrison raised his hand. “Mr. Stone, I researched for like three hours. I used five sources.”
“Tyler, you used five sources to say the same thing three different times. That’s not research—that’s confirmation bias with citations.”
Jason moved to the whiteboard and drew a large circle. “Here’s how I want you to think about term paper writing from now on. It’s way simpler than most of you think it is. And way less time-consuming. I know you all have far more important things to do than writing papers for me to enjoy.”
That got laughter and a release of tension. He wasn’t going to yell at them.
“Before you sit down to read your research material, I want you to first imagine a planet with three moons.”
He drew three smaller circles around the larger one.
He pointed to the larger circle. “Now, this is your planet; it’s the main argument you’re going to make in your paper. What makes a good planet, you might ask? A good planet needs to be strong. It needs to have gravity. You can’t just say ‘Dogs are cool.’ That’s more like a wobbly asteroid. A good planet has a strong, debatable point, like ‘Dogs are one of the reasons mankind survived the Ice Age.’ That’s a nice bold statement. Emily, your white poodle’s ancestors might be one of the reasons we survived to build Stonehenge. Convince me.”
He pointed to the three small circles. “These are the three arguments that support the bold statement your planet makes.”
“Amy, let’s say you picked a topic like ‘Dating is really hard in high school.’ You might lead off with a story about how your date, Mr. Bill Spenser, showed up at your house on prom night dressed in a clown suit, fake red nose and all. You had a nice dress that you and your friends went to Nordstrom’s to buy. Bill, here, shows up in a clown suit because he heard on the Interweb that the way to win a girl’s heart was to make her laugh. Surprisingly, you weren’t laughing.”
The class was laughing. Amy was mock glaring at her boyfriend.
“So you make a broad statement that dating is tough because it turns out that a lot of the un-kissed frogs out there are not princes in disguise.”
The whole class by now was laughing, pointing to the blushing Bill Spenser, who in truth was always clowning around.
“Now you give me three different examples of why it’s so tough to date.”
Then he went to the board while the girls in the class enthusiastically started to name reasons.
You have to wait for the right boy to ask you out.
The right one might not like you.
Boys are jerks.
“Excellent. For a paper on the causes of World War I, your moons might be economic competition, alliance systems, and nationalism.”
“Here’s the critical part: most of you have been writing about these moons as if they’re completely separate. You dedicate one paragraph to economic competition, then another to alliance systems, and a third to nationalism. You’re treating them like they exist in a vacuum. But that’s not how this works. These moons don’t just orbit independently. They affect each other. They create tidal forces and gravitational interactions. Your job as a writer is to explain these interactions. Don’t just tell me what each moon is; tell me how it influences the others. Show me how economic competition created tensions that led to the formation of rigid alliance systems. Explain how nationalism complicated those economic relationships and made diplomacy even more difficult.”
The real power of your paper comes from showing how these individual forces worked together to cause the war. When you do this, you’re not just listing facts; you’re building a complete, interconnected argument. You’re showing me that you truly understand your topic, and that’s how you write a paper that gets an A.
Students were actually paying attention now, intrigued by the unusual analogy.
Maria raised her hand. “So like, for the World War I paper, the three moons would be...”
“Could be economic competition, alliance systems, and nationalism. But here’s where most of you failed—you wrote about economic competition, then you wrote about alliance systems, then you wrote about nationalism. You never explained how economic competition influenced alliance formation, or how nationalism complicated economic relationships.”
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