Hackneyed, Medieval, Obsolete, Austere, Mediocrity, Mundane, Ponderous, Prosaic, Sedentary, Apprehension, Harbinger, Ominous, Premonition, Timorous

AND Trepidation, Innovative, Naive, Nascent

hackneyed- worn out through overuse
medieval- referring to the Middle Ages; old fashioned
obsolete- no longer in use; old fashioned
austere- without decoration; strict
mediocrity- the state of quality of being average; of moderate to low quality
mundane- commonplace; ordinary
ponderous- extremely dull
prosaic- unimaginative; dull
sedentary- not migratory; settled
apprehension- anxiety or fear about the future
harbinger- something that indicates what is to come; a forerunner
ominous- menacing; threatening
premonition- a feeling about the future
timorous- timid; fearful about the future
trepidation- uncertainty; apprehension
innovative- introducing something new
naive- lacking sophistication
nascent- coming into existence; emerging

After six years of at my elementary school, things began to become very old to my class. All the fun activities that the teachers would try to have were hackneyed. One of my teachers would make us use this obsolete typewriter that we liked to play on when we were in the third grade. It was fun when we were younger and naive, but by fifth grade it was old. We were used to the medieval piece of machinery. It really must have been from the Middle Ages. The whole school became mundane to us. The classrooms were ponderous. Majority of our day was doing sedentary work. The teacher's lesson plan seemed to prosaic to us. Our boredom caused us to begin to turn in work that was tainted with mediocrity. Our essays were dry regurgitations of the book. They were austere summaries, not analysts. We wanted something innovative to trigger our imaginations. We looked ahead to middle school, feeling that it might be relief. But we did have some apprehension about middle school. Something about going to a new place seemed ominous and made us a little timorous. The new people caused some trepidation in us. The alum that came back to visit told us that they loved middle school. We took that as a harbinger of good thing in middle school. It gave us the premonition that middle school would be alright. A nascent Class of 2003 was coming out of all our situations with hope in the future.