EN100 Introduction to College Writing, Fall 2012
Framingham State University
CONTACT INFORMATION
Instructor: Emma Atwood
Email: or
Course Meetings: M/W 4:30-6:20 in May Hall 212
My CASA tutoring hours: TBA
COURSE DESCRIPTION
Introduction to College Writing is designed to build on skills you already have to strengthen your writing processes and to introduce you to key academic skills that will help you succeed. No matter what your major, I want this class to prepare you to think independently, critically read the world around you, express yourself articulately, and share your original ideas in an engaging and persuasive manner.
This course is reading and writing intensive. You will write four major essays and produce a significant revision of one of these essays. Additional short take-home writing assignments spread throughout the semester will help you develop your writing processes. You will also be expected to write a number of short pieces in class that will help you develop your ability to think on your feet.
Many of your essays will require you to reflect on or critique assigned readings; some of the readings will be technical and instructional with tips and tricks for better writing, and some of the readings will be published non-fiction essays meant to serve as models. These readings are designed to help you see writing as a conversation rather than a monologue. I’ve chosen readings that are up-to-date and charged with social interest; we will also be using our new skills to critique the televised Presidential Debates throughout the semester, finding “real world” application for our work in the classroom.
You will also workshop your writing with your peers at least four times in this course. Your participation in the writing workshops will be key to your success and will encourage collaborative growth and teamwork.
COURSE GOALS
1. CRITICAL READING AND THINKING: Students will understand that college-level reading is an active and critical process, and that critical reading requires attention both to what an author says and how an author says it.
2. PROCESS: Students will understand that writing is a recursive and collaborative process and that good writing often requires multiple drafts.
3. STRUCTURE AND DEVELOPMENT IN WRITING ESSAYS: Students will understand that college-level essays require both structure and development.
4. STRUCTURE AND DEVELOPMENT IN WRITING PARAGRAPHS: Students will understand that college-level paragraphs require both structure and development and are the building blocks of essays.
5. KNOWLEDGE OF CONVENTIONS: Students will understand the conventions of college-level academic writing.
MATERIALS
· A Sequence for Academic Writing, 5th edition. Ed. Laurence Behrens and Leonard J. Rosen. Boston: Pearson, 2012.
· They Say/I Say with Readings, 2nd edition. Ed. Gerald Graff, Cathy Birkenstein, and Russel Durst. New York: Norton, 2012.
· A notebook (any kind you want) that you bring to class every day
· A binder or folder (for organizing handouts and printed readings)
You are expected to come to class with all relevant materials, including the readings for that day, printed off in hard-copy and annotated in a way that helps you discuss the text. If you do not have your materials ready, you will be marked absent.
GRADING
This is a workshop-style course, and as such, cumulative performance, effort, and improvement are important factors in grading. You must perform a significant revision of one of your four essays at the end of the semester; the new revision grade will replace the first grade. The breakdown for grading will be as follows:
Description Essay: 10%
Summary Essay: 15%
Compare/Contrast Essay: 15%
Argument Essay: 20%
Peer Reviews: 10%
Participation: 10%
In-class writing and homework assignments: 10%
Final Portfolio with Reflection Essay: 10%
POLICIES
Attendance
You are expected to attend every class meeting. You are permitted one unexcused absence for any reason, no questions asked. Each unexcused absence after the first will affect your final grade. Serious documented excused absences (for illness, family emergencies, etc.) and absences for religious observances will not adversely affect your grade. Missing more than four class meetings total is grounds for failing the class.
Late Arrivals
Please be ready to start when class begins at 4:30. You may have one late arrival without penalty (up to ten minutes late), but two or more late arrivals will affect your grade. Three late arrivals will add up to one absence.
Late Assignments
Your papers are due on the day stipulated on the syllabus by class time. This includes drafts. Because of our peer-review system, if you do not have your draft ready on the day it is due, you will be marked absent and your grade on the polished version of that essay will drop by 1/3. Every day an assignment is late will affect your grade by 1/3 (so a B+ becomes a B, etc.). After five days, your paper will no longer be accepted and you will take a zero.
Academic Integrity
Academic Integrity includes refraining from cheating (the fraudulent or dishonest presentation of work), plagiarism (the act of taking the words, ideas, data, illustrations, or statements of another person or source, and presenting them as one’s own), and collusion (assistance or an attempt to assist another student in an act of academic dishonesty). Collaborative learning and group workshops are perfectly acceptable and part of this course. Any breach of this policy, including the submission of papers written for previous or concurrent classes, is grounds for failure of the assignment. We will learn about source documentation in this class, so you can be sure to avoid any breach of academic integrity.
Electronics
Silence your phones and put them in your bag; if I see you texting on your cell phone during class you will be marked absent for that class and you will be asked to leave. Take off your headphones. Check your Framingham email before each class – this is how I will contact you. I prefer you do not use laptops or iPads in class since they are a tempting distraction, but if you can demonstrate your ability to use these tools without distraction I will allow them. I reserve the right to take this privilege away at any time if I find these tools to be distracting.
SYLLABUS
W 9.5 Introductions
In class: “name narrative” exercise
M 9.10 The Writing Process
Assignment DUE: polished “name narrative” (1-2 pages ds) developed from Wednesday
Readings: SAW pp. 216-225; “Shitty First Drafts” on Blackboard
In class: “writing places” exercise
Unit One: Description
W 9.12 What is Descriptive Writing?
Assignment DUE: polished “writing places” narrative (1-2 pages ds) developed from Monday
Readings: “What is a Descriptive Essay?” on Blackboard
In class: Revise writing places piece in pairs
M 9.17 The Limits of Description
Readings: “The Blind Men and the Elephant” on Blackboard
In class: Descriptive Writing Practice and Field Trip; how to annotate instruction
W 9.19 Descriptive Essay Models
Assignment DUE: polished descriptive piece from Monday’s field trip
Readings: Virginia Woolf “The Death of the Moth” and Annie Dillard “Death of a Moth” on Blackboard
In class: Workshop descriptive field trip pieces together; discuss Moth essays; check for annotations
Unit Two: Summary
M 9.24 What is Summary? What is Paraphrase?
Assignment DUE: Descriptive Essay Draft (3 pages ds) – BRING TWO COPIES
Readings: SAW “Summary, Paraphrase, and Quotation” pp. 2-7; SAW “Paraphrase” pp. 33-36; TS/IS “They Say” pp. 19-29
In class: WSM “Paraphrasing Short Passages” pp. 241-242 and pp. 266-267 and summary activities
W 9.26 The Art of Summarizing
Assignment DUE: Descriptive Essay Peer-Reviews – BRING TWO COPIES
Readings: TS/IS “Her Point Is” pp. 30-41
In class: peer-review workshops; exercise 1 in TS/IS p. 40
M 10.1 David Finkel Event
Assignment DUE: Polished Descriptive Essay SUBMIT ONLINE
W 10.3 Summarizing and Quoting
Readings: SAW “Quotations” pp. 36-45; “In Harm’s Way” and “McCain” on Blackboard; TS/IS “The New Liberal Arts” pp. 190-197
In class: exercise 1 in TS/IS p. 196
W 10.3 Watch and Analyze the Televised Presidential Debate
M 10.8 Columbus Day - NO CLASS
Unit Three: Compare/Contrast
W 10.10 Grammar Games
Assignment DUE: Summary Draft (3 pages ds) – BRING TWO COPIES; 1 paragraph summary of one presidential debate topic from last Wednesday
Readings: “I Won’t Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar” http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2012/07/i_wont_hire_people_who_use_poo.html
In class: Grammar Games – may the odds be ever in your favor.
M 10.15 What is Compare/Contrast?
Assignment DUE: Summary Peer-Reviews – BRING TWO COPIES
Readings: SAW “Compare/Contrast” pp. 168-170; TS/IS “Reading for the Conversation” pp. 145-155; TS/IT Malcom Gladwell “Small Change” pp. 312-328; TS/IS Dennis Baron “Reforming Egypt in 140 Characters?” pp. 329-334
In class: peer-review workshops; compare/contrast Egypt essays
TU 10.16 Watch and Analyze the Televised Presidential Debate
W 10.17 Compare/Contrast and the Conversation
Assignment DUE: polished Summary essay SUBMIT ONLINE
Readings: TS/IS Liz Addison “Two Years are Better Than Four” pp. 211-4; TS/IS Charles Murray “Are Too Many People Going to College?” pp. 222-42; TS/IS Mike Rose “Blue-Collar Brilliance” pp. 243-55
In class: discuss compare/contrast techniques and apply them to readings
M 10.22 Evaluating Arguments
Assignment DUE: 3 paragraph compare/contrast study of one issue from the Presidential debate on Tuesday, answering the question, “Do they succeed?”
Readings: SAW pp. 51-63 “Do they succeed?”
In class: apply success barometer to last Wednesday’s essays
M 10.22 Watch and Analyze the Televised Presidential Debate
W 10.24 Rainbow Sentence Games
Assignment DUE: 1 page ds argument/opinionated response to one Presidential debate issue
In class: Sentence Games - may the odds be ever in your favor.
Unit Four: Argument
M 10.29 What is an Argument?
Assignment DUE: Compare/Contrast Essay Draft (5 pages ds) – BRING TWO COPIES
Readings: SAW “Argument Synthesis” pp. 122-130; TS/IS “Yes/No/Okay, But” pp. 55-67
In class: examine logos, ethos, and pathos in current political ads
W 10.31 Agreeing and Disagreeing
Assignment DUE: Compare/Contrast Peer Reviews – BRING TWO COPIES
Readings: SAW “Do you agree?” pp. 63-70; SAW “The Common App Fallacy” pp. 78-80
In class: peer review workshops
M 11.5 Thesis Writing
Assignment DUE: Polished Compare/Contrast Essay SUBMIT ONLINE
Readings: SAW “Writing a Thesis” pp. 226-232; SAW “Making a Claim” pp. 146-147
In class: practice thesis-writing
W 11.7 One-Source Arguments
Readings: Collection of artwork on Blackboard
In class: workshop together how to make an argument about a text
M 11.12 Veteran’s Day – NO CLASS
W 11.14 Multi-Sourced Arguments
Assignment DUE: 1 page ds response to the “American Dream” debate
Readings: SAW “Preliminary Research” pp. 257-270; TS/IS Cal Thomas “Is the American Dream Over?” pp. 568-71; TS/IS Brandon King “The American Dream: Dead, Alive, or on Hold?” pp. 572-79; TS/IS Barack Obama “A More Perfect Union” pp. 647-64
In class: discuss readings
M 11.19 Library Day & Research Techniques
Readings: SAW “Developing and Organizing the Support for your Arguments” pp. 164-168
In class: Trip to the library, MLA citation workshop
W 11.21 Catch-up and Review
TBA
TH 11.22 THANKSGIVING
Unit 5: Revision
M 11.26 Cut-and-Paste Paragraph Games
In class: Paragraph Games - may the odds be ever in your favor.
W 11.28 Revision vs. Editing
Assignment DUE: Argument Essay Draft (5 pages ds) – BRING TWO COPIES
Readings: SAW “Stage 5: Revision” pp. 245-250
M 12.3 Music Day
Assignment DUE: Argument Essay Peer Reviews – BRING TWO COPIES
In class: peer-review workshop; form-and-function music clips to analyze
W 12.5 Political Ad Competition
Assignment DUE: Polished Argument Essay SUBMIT ONLINE
In class: write political ads in class for current elections using semester’s skills and hold class votes
M 12.10 Revision Workshop
In class: catch-up and revision workshop of one essay of your choice
W 12.12 LAST DAY OF CLASS
Assignments DUE: Final Portfolio featuring all drafts, peer reviews, in-class exercises, and one full essay revision if you so choose. Your final reflection essay will be the focal point of your portfolio.
MAJOR ASSIGNMENTS
1. Description Essay – 3 pages double spaced
Your developed descriptive essay will evolve from our class field trip or from observations you have made on your own with this assignment in mind. Using Virginia Woolf and Annie Dillard as inspirations, and keeping the “Blind Men and the Elephant” story in mind, you will choose something particular to describe – a person, place, event, thing, etc. Your description should help your topic of choice come to life for your reader and should have a “so what?” purpose at its heart.
2. Summary Essay – 3 to 4 pages double spaced
Your developed summary essay will summarize three separate but related things: the David Finkel event we will attend as a class on 9.26, Mary Meehan’s article “In Harm’s Way” on blackboard, and John McCain’s article “Why we can – and must – win the war in Afghanistan” on blackboard. You do not need to put these texts in conversation with each other; you just need to summarize each one separately, using the summary, paraphrase, and quotation techniques we have learned in class.
3. Compare/Contrast Essay – 5 pages double spaced
Your developed compare/contrast essay will put two readings on the same topic into conversation with one another. You may choose to write your compare/contrast essay on the Arab Spring (Malcom Gladwell’s “Small Change” and Dennis Baron’s “Reforming Egypt in 140 Characters?”) or College in the 21st Century (choose two of the following: Liz Addison’s “Two Years are Better Than Four,” Charles Murray’s “Are Too Many People Going to College?,” or Mike Rose’s “Blue-Collar Brilliance”). You will want to build on the skills we learned during the summary unity to effectively summarize your sources, but you will also need to put them in conversation with one another.
4. Argument Essay – 5-6 pages double spaced
Good arguments usually answer a challenging question that doesn’t have a clear answer. For your developed argument essay, you will answer the questions: what is the American dream? And is the American dream dead or alive? You will have to define your terms, use outside sources to back up your claim, and produce and de-bunk a counter-argument. You will use the skills we have learned throughout the semester – description, summary, compare/contrast – to reach this final step. Your goal in any argument essay is to persuade your reader to your side. You will use the following essays: Cal Thomas’s “Is the American Dream Over?”, Brandon King’s “The American Dream: Dead, Alive, or on Hold?”, Barack Obama’s “A More Perfect Union,” ONE peer-reviewed academic or government source you find on your own, and ONE other reputable source of your own choosing. Use discretion in choosing this final source: if you choose a blog, magazine article, or op-ed, do so with the understanding that these sources come with pitfalls that could weaken your argument if not used well.