Homework: 10/2/08

Homework for Thursday:

In my September Sum Up, as I attempted to explain why I have asked you to read these five academic articles, one of the reasons I offered was:

The articles serve as models of what some genres or types of academic writing look like and how they work. Each academic discipline has its own rules and conventions for writing…Over the course of your time at RIC, you’ll get insight into the kinds of work (and writing) that many different disciplines do—from history to biology—and when you choose a major, you’ll need to learn the specific kinds of work that those in your major take on (and their ways of communicating about that work, through writing).

Please read the Mike Rose article, “Rigid Rules, Inflexible Plans, and the Stifling of Language: A Cognitivist Analysis of Writer’s Block” (Rose). You can download it on our google groups page. Use the Rose article to reflect a bit on academic writing. Please address the following questions in a blog entry (I believe we're on #7):

• How is academic writing as you’ve experienced it in these five articles, different from others kinds of writing you have read and/or produced in the past?
• If you were asked to explain such writing to a peer or a parent, how would you explain it? (please be specific and avoid general comments like “It’s boring” or “It’s hard”)
• Please identify three (3) features of academic writing that make it different from other kinds of writing you have read. Think about issues such as style, tone, title, persona, paragraph and sentence length, organization, purpose, audience, diction (the choice and use of words and phrases in writing or speech), syntax (the arrangement of words and phrases to create sentences). For each of the three features you identify, please cite a specific example by quoting directly from Rose’s article.

Homework for Tuesday, 9/30

For Tuesday:

1. Please go to our google group page and download and read the document called SeptemberSumup.pdf. This is my attempt to share with you my thoughts about where we have been with the class and where we're going.

2. Please go to our google group page and download and read the document called Notes.Flower_Hayes.pdf. These notes should help you to better understand the Flower/Hayes article, which we'll be discussing on Tuesday.

3. After reading my notes, go back to the 5 questions you wrote about the Flower/Hayes article last week (in your blog). Read your questions over and then re-read the Flower/Hayes article,

4. Blog entry #6: Having read my notes on the Flower/Hayes article and reread the article, what do you make of your five questions now? Can you answer any of them (if so, please do). What additional questions have arisen for you as you've revisited the article and your original understanding of it? (250 words or so)

Any questions, get in touch.

mm

Homework for Thursday 9/25

The reading for Thursday is Linda Flower and John Hayes' "The Cognition of Discovery: Defining a Rhetorical Problem." The article is posted in our Google group under "Files."

In addition to reading the article, in your blog, please generate a list of 5 questions you have about the article--as you do so, please refer to specific passages in the article and quote Flower and Hayes' actual words where/when necessary.

I continue to enjoy the level of intellectual engagement you all are bringing to this work (both in class and in your blog entries). Keep up the good work!

Announcements and Homework for 9/23

Announcements:

1. Today in class we had our first quiz. In the coming weeks, there will be more quizzes and, ultimately, quizzes make up 20% of your final course grade (see syllabus). Most of the quizzes will be like the one we had today. However, there will be another kind of quiz. Today in class we talked about annotating your text as you read. Annotating is the process of marking up something you read, as you read it, so as to better understand it and more easily access certain parts when you need to later. It is a critical skill for succeeding in college.

Occasionally, rather than handing out a multiple-choice quiz of the kind I handed out today, I will ask to collect the reading of the day (be sure to print out a hard copy of all readings and bring these hard copies to every class). Your quiz grade will be determined by how well you have annotated your copy of the article. So, I'll be looking to see what you are underlining or highlighting, how you make comments in the margins, etc. I will grade both on the basis of quantity of annotations and quality. If you don't have your reading that day, you will receive an automatic "F." If your text is not annotated, you will receive an automatic "F."

2. Big picture: next week I will introduce our first paper and we'll get started on it. In it, I will ask you to think about your composing process. Just a heads up that a draft of this essay will likely be due the week of 10/29. More to come on Tuesday.

3. For the next two weeks, we will continue to look at academic articles that explore the processes writers use to compose. Beginning in October, we will shift gears and move in a different direction. Plan to get a syllabus with details on the readings for the month of October during the last week of September.

4. On Tuesday, I will spend some time in class talking about the blogs and what my expectations are of them. I will put some of your blogs up on the screen and we will look at them so you can get a sense of what will constitute a good grade on the blog assignment (20% of your final grade).

Homework for Tuesday 9/23:

1. Read the rest of Jack Selzer's article "The Composing Process of an Engineer" (I asked you to read the first two pages for this past Thursday's class).

2. The reading on the syllabus for Tuesday 9/23 was

“The Construction of Purpose in Reading and Writing” (Flower)

I have changed it to:

“Revision Strategies of Student Writers and Experienced Adult Writers” (Sommers)

Please go the google groups course page and download a copy of this article. Please read it for Tuesday's class.

3. Blog Entry #4: Berkenkotter's study focused on Donald Murray, a professional journalist and English professor. Selzer's article focuses on Kenneth E. Nelson, a professional engineer. Write a short essay in which you discuss the differences between these two men's composing processes. This is an exercise in comparing and contrasting. You should first briefly summarize these men's processes and then discuss the ways in which they are similar or different. Also, describe the terms that Berkenkotter and Selzer use to characterize their subjects' composing processes and how these key terms are different. Please do quote from the articles themselves as you formulate your response. 300-500 words.

Good luck. And have a nice weekend.

Homework for Thursday, 9/18

No blog entry due.

Please read p 178-179 in “The Composing Process of an Engineer” (Selzer). This document can be downloaded at the "Files" section of our google groups page. Only read the introduction and “Procedure” sections.

Revisit the Downs/Wardle, Haas/Flower, and Berkenkotter articles to prepare for the quiz.

Announcements and Homework

Important Announcements:

1. The email address for our google group is: writingrhetoric@googlegroups.com. If you send an email to that address, or reply to an email that came to you from that address, you are sending your email to everyone in both of my Writing 100 classes. If you want to correspond with me, and just me, please address your email to mmichaud@ric.edu.
2. Please put the following on your radar (more info to come in class): i) you can expect a quiz on the Downs/Wardle, Haas/Flower, and Berkenkotter articles on Thursday, 9/18. ii) You can expect a draft of a formal paper (one of the three) to be due sometime during the week of 9/22.

Homework for 10/16

1. Go to our google groups page and download the document (under “FILES”) called: Notes.Haas:Flower.pdf. Read this document carefully; it is my notes on the most important points we discussed in regard to the Haas/Flower article.
2. Go to our google groups page and download the document called (under “FILES”): Berkenkotter.pdf. Print out a copy and read it. This is the major reading assignment for Tuesday. In this article, Carol Berkenkotter asked Donald Murray, an accomplished writer and writing teacher, if she could use him for an experiment to see what she could learn about how expert writers do their work. The article concludes with a brief follow-up essay from Murray in which he writes about what it was like to be Berkenkotter’s “lab rat” (meaning: research subject).
3. Blog Entry #3: Apply what you learned from the Haas/Flower about reading. Begin to create a “constructive” reading of the Berkenkotter article. In your blog entry, create three sub-headings:

a. Content Strategies
b. Feature/Function Strategies
c. Rhetorical Strategies

4. As you read, take detailed notes under each sub-heading. So, as you begin to speculate about the content of the article, take notes about what it seems to be about; as you begin to notice the various features within the article (or parts), take notes on them and what it appears their functions are; and finally, employ rhetorical strategies by going “beyond the text” to imagine the rhetorical situation of the article itself—take notes on what you notice when you think of the piece rhetorically, as a discourse act. (300-500 words)

If you have any questions/concerns, don't hesitate to get in touch (mmichaud@ric.edu).

mm

Homework for Thursday, 9/11

If you are one of the people who did not get the instructions on the homework for today, please check your RIC email address immediately and get up to speed. I will expect that the homework that was due for today (in particular, the blog posting) will be completed by, at the latest, this Friday at 5pm.

Here is the homework for this Thursday:

1. Read “Guidelines for Writing Scientific Papers” which (is saved as Guidelines.ScientificArticles.pdf) can be found here:

http://groups.google.com/group/writingrhetoric/files?hl=en

2. Read “Rhetorical Reading Strategies and the Construction of Meaning” (Haas/Flower)—you can find this reading on the same google groups page where you found “Guidelines…” As you read, take notes on where/when the authors move through the four (4) main sections of a scientific article: Introduction/Methods/Results/Discussion. They don’t have sub-headings to let you know where the Introduction section ends and the Methods section begins, but you can get a sense of it if you pay attention carefully.
3. Write Blog Entry #2: Summarize the key information in each of the four sections. So, briefly summarize the main points of the Introduction, then briefly summarize their Methods, the Results of their experiment, and what they conclude in their Discussion. (total: 400-600 words).

Homework for Tuesday, 9/9/08

This is the second email you should be receiving from me this afternoon. This email contains detailed information on the homework for Tuesday, 9/9/08. On your syllabus, it says that the reading for Tuesday is:

“Rhetorical Reading Strategies and the Construction of Meaning” (Haas/Flower)

We're going to push that off for Thursday, 9/11/08. For this Tuesday, please complete the following:

1. Create a blog using www.blogger.com (use ONLY this blog service, please).

• Go to www.blogger.com and create a blog (it’s fast and easy). Name it whatever you want (keep it clean).
• Once you’ve created your blog, you’ll receive a confirmation email from blogger. Open the email and follow the instructions.
• Once you have created and confirmed your blog, please email me your blog’s address or URL (it should look something like this: http://progressivelyprofressing.blogspot.com/). Please email it to me at mmichaud@ric.edu.

2. Once you’ve created your blog, write your first posting. VERY IMPORTANT: Title this first blog posting (look for the “Title” text box above the main text box where you type your blog entries) Blog Posting #1 (by simply numbering the postings in this way, it’ll make it easier for me to read/evaluate them). In your first blog posting, I’d like you to answer the following questions about the Downs/Wardle article I asked you to read for last Thursday’s class. We’re going to return to the article to discuss your responses in class this Tuesday, so bring a print-out copy with you to class.

Your answers should be thorough and include direct quotes from the Downs/Wardle article. Your response should run roughly 400-600 words (you can copy and paste it into MS Word and then use the “Word Count” tool, under the pull-down menu “TOOLS,” to find out how long it is). If you do not already have the article, you can get a copy by going to:

http://groups.google.com/group/writingrhetoric?hl=en

and then click “FILES.” By clicking on the Downs/Wardle.pdf link, the article will download to your computer.

Here are the question you need to answer in that first blog posting:

First Section (unnamed):

Paragraph 1:

• According to Downs/Wardle, why does the First-Year Composition (FYC) course (at RIC, it’s called Writing and Rhetoric) exist in the first place?
• What does the research say about whether or not such a course can accomplish its goal?
• According to Downs/Wardle, what is the field of Writing Studies, itself, guilty of?

Paragraph 2:

• What are Downs/Wardle proposing we change about FYC?
• What will Downs/Wardle do in the pages ahead?
• In writing this article, what are two of Downs/Wardle’s main goals?
• What are the three “important misconceptions” the authors of this piece will examine and attempt to dispel before moving on to describe their vision for FYC?

Section 2 (Systemic Misconceptions and Misdirection of Mainstream FYC)

• What seems to be the main point of this section?

Section 3 (Academic Discourse as a Category Mistake)

• What is the “category mistake” that has been made in regard to FYC?
• What kind of academic discourse is most often taught in FYC courses? Why? What is the problem with this?

Section 4 (The Open Question of Transfer)

• What do Downs/Wardle mean by the use of the word “transfer”—and what do they have to say about whether or not skills learned in FYC courses actually transfer to other writing contexts?

Section 5 (Resisting Misconceptions)

• What are the “two master narratives” that Downs/Wardle describe in this section?
• What, exactly, do Downs/Wardle believe FYC should be/do?

I think that's it. If you have any problems or questions or concerns, don't hesitate to get in touch. See you Tuesday.

Information and Update

Dear Students (Writing and Rhetoric, sections 06/14):

I have several important pieces of information to convey to you.

1. I want to apologize for having to cancel our second class this past Thursday, 8/4. On Wednesday, my infant son was admitted to the hospital back home in NH, where I live. He had a very high temperature and was not feeling well. After three days in the hospital, he and my wife came home this morning. He is fine, all is well, he seems to be fully recovered. Of course, I needed to head back to NH to attend to my family, which is why I missed class on Thursday. I will be back for our class this coming Tuesday, 9/9 and apologize for any inconvenience my absence may have caused you.

2. Here at RIC, we use a course management system called WebCT. At all other institutions I've worked at, I have used a different system, called Blackboard. After wading into WebCT over the past few days, I have decided that it is not a system I would like to use to conduct electronic business for our class. I have several reasons, which I will happily explain to you in class on Tuesday (if you care). Instead, I have opted to use google's services, which are free (whoopee!) and, I think, much easier to use.

I have created a google "Group" called Writing.Rhetoric. It can be accessed here:

http://groups.google.com:80/group/writingrhetoric?hl=en

Over the past 24 hours or so, I have added almost all of you as members, and I have done so using your RIC email address, which you will need to check regularly to keep abreast of correspondence in our course. I will be using our Writing.Rhetoric group for at least two purposes:

1. Communicating with you via email.
2. Posting course readings (the group page is where you will need to go to download the readings).