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I know of no other art or craft as accessible as photography. Much has been written on the technology. People who love photography are happy to help you. Once you learn a few simple techniques, you apply them to anything that moves you. Kodak has great guides on all aspects of serious photography, available in serious camera stores. See Resources for some other books and for web sites dedicated to teaching photography.
The reason photography teachers may have you starting with a manual-focus film camera is that you are forced to learn about f-stops, shutter speeds, and the finer points of exposure and depth-of-field. You will see more teachers allowing you to start out with a digital SLR, but emphasizing the basics. The principles of exposure and the relationships between shutter speed and aperture are the same. An optical lens is focusing an image onto a digital collection device, instead of onto film. Light is controlled in the same way, using some automatic features, but also in ways that you control. Zoom lenses can be a distraction, or, used intelligently, a flexible photographic tool. The old schoolmarm teachers, of which I was one, would tell you to stick with your 50mm lens. The 50mm was the cheapest lens film camera makers offered as well as one of the most versatile and sharpest, in terms of resolving fine detail. For some classic uses of the 50, see Henri Cartier-Bresson's work at www.peterfetterman.com. On an APS-C sensor camera, the 35mm lens has the same angle of view as the 50. If you have a Canon small sensor digital SLR, the EF 35mm f2 is a great inexpensive lens. For Pentax users, the FA 35mm f2 is excellent. Treat yourself to at least one quality prime (not zoom) lens. It will reveal to you the best capture capability of your digital camera. You will be pleasantly surprised when you zoom into your images on screen.
If you begin with a film camera, at your teacher's request, or out of financial necessity, shoot some slide film. Learning to use slide film will give you a step-up in learning exposure with digital. Like digital, slide film is quite sensitive to exposure errors that blow out the detail in highlights. What you shoot is what you get; no printing machine will make adjustments for exposure errors. If your exposures are too light or too dark, you can eliminate the variables caused by the printing process and concentrate on WHY they are not right. Once you can fairly consistently get good exposures with slide film, you will be free to try to be more creative. You will be a leg up on digital, and can appreciate even more the ability to snap-edit your shot right after you take it. For the digital shooter, one of the best tools at your disposal is the histogram. It is an instant readout of the light intensities in your image. It shows nothing about where in the image the bright and dark parts are; it shows the frequency of occurence of each of 256 light intensity values. A common problem is the highlight "trainwreck" , on the far right side of the histogram. This tells you the image is overexposed. Shoot it again, adjusting your exposure compensation to the MINUS side.
If you are taking a class, set aside time for shooting what pleases you. Keep this work away from critics for a while. It is yours alone. Work it until you are pleased that it communicates what you want to say. Not everything worth saying can be easily verbalized. Maybe a photograph says it better. Shoot for class, but I think your most important work is for yourself. To Learn Photography, Look at Photographs!
Ask yourself what you like about a photograph, and what you don't like. You'll adopt other people's way of doing things without thinking about it. You can't copy them, because you weren't where they were, nor would you want to copy them. Your view of the world is as good as anyone else's. Look at the greats. See the Time-Life series on photography, and any photography books your library has.
Look critically at magazine photography. National Geographic and National Geographic Traveller maintain high standards. You may not like every image, but you won't see junk. For not-so greats, look at some popular magazines. You'll wonder how some of these images ever got published! The newest fad is motion-blurred images with off-kilter horizons. This, too, shall pass.
After 35 years of photography, my greatest inspiration comes from the younger photographers whose work I see at betterphoto.com. Their work is fresh and innovative.
Look at Paintings
Painters have always been masters of composition, and of awareness of how light falls on things. The Impressionists carried these to new heights. Even art book reproduction makes this apparent. Treat yourself to art shows and museums. Monet, Renoir, Morisot, Pissaro, Degas, Vermeer and so many others will make you a better photographer. Let them into your life. Get up early, and eat dinner late, as they did, and you'll see light as they did. Their painting was a slow process, forcing them to see the effects of changing light. Slow down and look.
Lighten Up!
Finally, during the day, and even on vacation, see the world around you without a camera. Let the photography rest and notice things, people and places around you. I was thankful I left the camera in the hotel when we saw older couples dancing the cha-cha and tango in a square in Mexico one evening. Not having a camera freed me to enjoy the moment with my wife. Photography is just one great thing in the world. It's not everything.
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