Hello Charlie: I see this is your first post here on PC. So... welcome to PsychCentral! I hope you find the time you spend here to be of benefit.

Your dilemma made me think back to my first assignment years ago in grad school. I had basically given up everything & moved halfway across the U.S. to attend. The first assignment I was to be graded on was given out by a teaching assistant who basically gave us no direction at all. And when we received our grades everyone in the class got what amounted to a failing grade on the assignment. I think for most of the class, it probably didn't make that much difference. But I had always struggled in school in general. And so this experience scared me to death! I was sure I was going to flunk out! And, as a result, I spent the rest of my time in grad school studying as if my hair was on fire. I ended up with a 4.0 average. So the moral of this story is... try not to put too much emphasis on what's happening at this early stage of your university experience. Don't allow it to define you. You have a long way to go yet &, I would presume, plenty of time to do well.

There is also one other point I'd like to make with regard to this. Again, when I was in grad school, several of the professors encouraged us not get caught up in trying to graduate with a perfect 4.0 grade average. They pointed out that the pressures in grad school could be intense & that trying to do everything to perfection was simply not worth the stress it could put on a person. Of course, as I described above, I didn't listen. But I should have. I really drove myself crazy trying to make sure everything I did from that point on was perfect.

So my suggestions would be first of all to try, if you can, to relax & not see this one assignment as the "end all" experience of your university career. If you've only been at university for 6 weeks, you have a long way to go yet. Talking to other students, as shattered sanity suggested, is certainly a good idea if you can do that. Other suggestions might be to talk to someone in the office of the head of the department your class is in. It may also be worthwhile to talk with someone in your school's student counseling center if there is such a thing at your university.

And, beyond that, I would say just do what you can with the assignment. At least from my perspective, it's probably more important to turn in something, even if you feel it's not your best work, than it is to turn in nothing. To my mind, at least, I think there is a sense in which the situation, as you describe it, can be viewed as a good learning opportunity for you. As you go through life, you're likely to be confronted with many situations, both in school & beyond, where the appropriate way to proceed is vague & you simply have to "figure it out as you go along"... to "wing it", so to speak. So one way to view this situation is to see it as an opportunity to learn how to handle these kinds of situations.

My best wishes to you...