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Maria Granic-White — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 09:49:36 -0500

I will have my students ask questions concerning their readings. I think I will also ask them to post ideas (not personal but rather ones they read/hear about) related to the upcoming election.

Comparing recruiting and anti-war posters for analyzing visual rhetoric

celder — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 09:34:31 -0500

Hi all. Leading up to the Visual Rhetoric project, my students and I discussed the war recruitment posters found in the visual rhetoric chapter of CDA. Then we compared these posters to parodies of the same posters, with an anti-war bent. (Huh? I hope that makes sense.) I've attached examples of the paired posters (the originals and the parodies) below. If you want to see more examples of these posters, you can visit www.antiwarposters.com

Peace out,
CE

Proposed Reading List

lslimak — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 08:41:49 -0500

Here's the way my proposed reading list shook out.

Lou

Syllabus Revision

aderosa — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 11:07:24 -0500

Alright, so after talking with Sam, here's a possible syllabus revision.

Week 1 Diagnostic Writing
Week 2 RR1 – adver-gaming
Week 3 Day 1 Off
Week 4 RR2 – group advertising
Week 5
Week 6 Paper 1
Week 7 RR3 – Multimodal Narrative
Week 8 RR4 – Source Evaluation
Week 9 Visual Rhetoric
Week 10 SPRING BREAK
Week 11
Week 12 Paper 2
Week 13 Abstract
Week 14 Annotated Bib
Week 15 Research Paper
Week 16 Presentation

syllabus in progress

dr. b. — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 10:08:18 -0500

Syllabus

Computer Assignment

Maria Granic-White — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 09:11:39 -0500

Here is my computer class assignment.
Maria Granic-White

Computer Assignment

1. Class exercise: Have students watch the video “Cry for Help: Stop Mutations in Rift Valley!” on Youtube.com.
2. Discuss with them the rhetorical devices in the video and have them identify the audience of the video.
3. Have them utilize a handout in which they check the appropriate boxes and comment bellow the table:

Questions V SO N
Was the thesis/ main idea of the topic clear?
Was the argument logical?
Did the presenter have good ethos?

OWL Scavenger Hunt

cmcmarti — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 08:35:19 -0500

Hey guys,

This is a computer lab activity I did early in the semester to familiarize students with Purdue's world famous OWL. The other point of the activity was to teach students about the structure of the paragraph and essay without, you know, actually having to teach it. The first time I assigned it, I had it available on my class web site, students opened it, and they typed their answers in. In the future, I might print it out. While this wastes papers, that will help me avoid students simply copying and pasting their answers into the blanks.

Crissy

Computer Class Ideas From Liz

ehoman — Sun, 02 Dec 2007 12:33:42 -0500

Hi all,

Suggestion for Group Advocacy

Kmc — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 12:07:55 -0500

I would like to propose moving the group advocacy assignment to the beginning of the semester.

First, I feel like having the students work together from the start will have a positive impact on the collaborative nature of the class by fostering more cooperation and less competition, especially important in activities like peer review. I also hope that other group projects -- perhaps a multi-media or video one (see Liz's blog) -- could be added later in the semester to help maintain this collaborative spirit throughout.

Tech Suggestions

lslimak — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 09:38:42 -0500

After playing a competitive round of Find It!, we moved on and into a discussion of search engines (which ones to use for what - Google, Google Scholar, Academic Search Premier, JStor, the library book catalog, etc...) how to find full text articles, and how to evaluate credibility in journals, books, web sources, and find an appropriate fit. We took actual prompts from the game - actual "requests" from the patrons - and in groups came up with sources found through a variety of the engines and then discussed their level of utility.

Digital Assignments: MovieMaker

aderosa — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 09:37:03 -0500

One of the ways to integrate MovieMaker into the classroom is to have them open the program on their own, insert a single song and some pictures, save it, and bring it to class. Then you can go through some of them, talk about the images used, when they appear in the chosen song (are there pictures of water when the song talks about the ocean?) and make a class movie. Then converse about the rhetorical effectiveness.

Not very innovative, but potentially fun and interesting.

Annotated Bibliography Handout

Maria Granic-White — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 08:51:48 -0500

I have attached the handout for the annotated bibliography assignment. Feel free to modify it in any way you find appropriate for your class.

Syllabus Prep and Tech Mentoring

dr. b. — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 09:22:01 -0500

As we are getting ready to head out for Thanksgiving let's start thinking about what is going to happen after we get back The week after T-giving starts our multi-week stretch of syllabus prep. During the 1st week I want you to come to class with a draft of your reading schedule. Yes, we still be using the same books and I would like for us to be doing the same units at the same time so that we can have current pedagogical discussions during mentor group meetings. This means if you really think that a unit should be moved you will need to propose that to the group with a solid rationale for why so that we can make a group decision. While we do have to agree on these things we can have varying supplemental media. I think that we can plan to do that for 2 meetings in order to be sure that we get everything covered.

The third class period (as well as any time that may remain from the 2nd meeting) will be spent going over the assignment sheets for next semester. We are going to have to have all of the major assignment sheets done (with rationale and objectives) before we leave for Christmas break. We can also work on the smaller assignments (i.e. visual projects and in-class exercises) and share those with the group and borrow liberally from one another as time allows.

Yes, that is only 3 days of a two week period. That is because you will be meeting with Marc Santos on the 27th to talk more about Drupal and to get the instruction on Moviemaker that you requested (yes, Marc and I do communicate) as well as anything else that he can squeeze into that time. Marc has asked me to tell you that he is canceling tech mentoring next Tuesday (thus the meeting on the 27th). This means that you will have next Tuesday off. As usual if you have any questions please do email me or come and bug me in my office!

Grammar Study Results

dr. b. — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 19:10:37 -0500

A new study, funded by Carnegie, just published it's results on a study on grammar drills and comprehension/retention. While we have known since the 60's that grammar drills don't work this new study has actually found that there is actually a negative correlation. Yet more of a reason to teach grammar and mechanics only in the context of larger pieces of writing. You can download the study report here.

Multitasking?

dr. b. — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 11:45:33 -0500

A friend sent me this and I immediately thought of you guys Yes, I do realize...

Position Paper Assignment

Maria Granic-White — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 09:39:50 -0500

Hey guys, here is what I used for my second 3-5 page paper.
Second Paper
Write a no less than 3 and no more than 5 page paper on one of the five topics which we selected in class. You may write either an expository essay or an argumentative essay. If you decide to write an argumentative essay, you may use one of the two following structures for the organization of your essay.
I.The Classical Arrangement
1. Introduction
 Introduce your debatable topic and capture the attention of your audience.
 Pathos (emotional appeal) offers a good introduction but you can employ any appeal.

Rectification

Maria Granic-White — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 09:38:33 -0500

Thank you CRIS (NO "H"). Sorry for the mistake.

Thank you, Chris!

Maria Granic-White — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 09:09:34 -0500

Chris, I wanted to thank you for the handout you posted. My students worked hard on CORE and they seemed to enjoy it. I will utilize it next semester, too before I assign the research paper.
Thank you again.

Here goes the neighborhood...

lslimak — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 09:59:14 -0500

Visual Aesthetics of Fascism

Exercise meets torture meets youtube...

HTML for Wiki page

Santosis — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 13:46:56 -0500

Here's a quick primer for the HTML needed for the wiki page. First of all, make sure you switch your input format to full HTML. I'm using three different tags- remember that all information in HTML begins with an open tag and ends with a close tag (signified by a slash). Here's the each tag I'm using:

the <p></p>, or paragraph tags: your commentary on a movie should go inbetween <p></p> tags.

Why English Teachers Should/Might/Don't Love YouTube

Santosis — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 11:49:42 -0500

All: I've made a quick guide to HMTL for those unfamiliar with code. Even if you are familiar coding for Drupal, make sure you switch your input format to full HTML before messing with this wiki page.

More Library Games

dr. b. — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 17:01:38 -0400

Remember my earlier post about the library games? Well, there are 3 links to other games on that page that are equally addictive. One of the better ones is the Outbreak game out of ASU. You have to gather sources, talk to professors, and get help from other students to collect samples before you run out of time (30 mins) and die from the infection that is spreading on campus yourself. I highly recommend this one.

BTW I bet Kyle can attest to the fact that some of his kids found the library games pretty engaging :-)

Connors and Christensen: What's in a Name?

lslimak — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 08:50:15 -0400

And by that, I don't mean their names. I mean what's in the name of the class that we teach and what difference does it make. Do we teach Composition, Composition and Rhetoric, Rhetoric, Grammar, Linguistics, Writing.... and so on. When I read Connors, I couldn't help but agree that somehow it does feel as though we've lost sight of the basic units of writing like the sentence and have been theoretically privileging attitudes (as he calls them) that trickle down from the English dept.

Variety is the Spice of (Essay) Life

cmcmarti — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 08:49:28 -0400

Christensen writes, "I cannot conceive any useful transactions between teacher and students unless they have in common a language for talking in sentences" (251). As the focus of high school writing courses moves further and further away from grammar and mechanics, rare is the first year university student who is completely comfortable using such grammatical terms as 'modifier', 'relative clause' and 'subordinate clause'. And, as someone who has taught undergraduate linguistics courses, getting them up to date is no small task.

Composition without the trapeze

celder — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 07:07:11 -0400

I think Liz has asked some good questions in her post below regarding how we might address sentence-level instruction in the composition classroom, and my immediate response would be not to do it the way Christensen is suggesting.

On p. 249, Christensen states the following:

Floating in Sentence Land

ehoman — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 19:47:54 -0400

The last two readings have really spoken to me as I have contemplated, struggled, and internally argued with myself (I'm not crazy, I promise) about how to work with my students on their sentences. I started the semester by encouraging my students to analyze the bigger rhetorical picture. Many of them were SO focused on sentence-level editing instead of paragraph- and paper-level revising that I spent the first many weeks introducing them to the larger units of a paper.

CORE Online Library Activity: Preparing for Research

celder — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 19:18:48 -0400

Last week in class I mentioned a "scavenger hunt" I had put together for the CORE site and used with my students in the computer lab to prepare them for topic discovery and getting started on their research. The CORE site consists of 12 modules that students can proceed through. I read through all of the modules and then designed the attached for six modules, those that I felt were most relevant and perhaps less elementary to my students. (A link to the CORE site is on the handout.)

I'll send a separate attachment from school tomorrow for the module on Evaluating Sources.

Teaching and Technology: A very current example

celder — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 19:05:15 -0400

Hi all. Bud Weiser, my (and Kyle's) professor for ENGL 591 (Intro to Comp Theory) sent us the following link to a very short article (two paragraphs) and an embedded You Tube video. It's a very interesting example of how a Cultural Anthropology professor and his students incorporated technology into the classroom while commenting on the current status of students and the institution of higher education.

http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/article/2462/kansas-state-u-students-re...

The video has been seen over 65,000 in the few days its been up.

Library Games

dr. b. — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 12:57:59 -0400

The Carnegie Mellon library system has released (in beta) two games meant to get at using the library system. The first game, Within Range, is not the most interesting but it asks students to re-shelve books based on LoC subjects and the Dewey Decimal System. Useful for helping them find books in the brick and mortar library but not riveting gaming. The second game, I'll Get It, is a much like Diner Dash (only in a library). You have to look up the patron's topic and choose from 2 books or 2 internet sources what you will bring back to the patron based upon their research question. This one is a bit more interesting especially since it goes in waves and gets more harried as time passes.

How effective is this? Can we teach students how to use a virtual library and expect them to extrapolate that out to the real world? Or will they simply google the topic and go from there?

via Dennis Jerz

The Chip on my Shoulder

ehoman — Tue, 16 Oct 2007 22:08:49 -0400

My husband is always telling me I have a chip on my shoulder about education; I'm relatively defensive of secondary public education, mostly because as a dual-role academic/teacher I hear both sides critique each other fairly regularly. More specifically, I constantly hear academics complain about the "crappiness" of secondary public education, and as a teacher in that system, I have a tendency to get offended and defensive. Thus, my response to Connors' article should contain no surprises.

Connors and the Sentence

Maria Granic-White — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 22:07:46 -0400

In "Erasure of the Sentence," Connors refers to the sentence as an element of composition pedagogy that has almost disappeared from the textbooks. His review of the traditional rhetorical classification of sentences offers the three most important sentence-based rhetorics in order to set up the stage for his discussion in which he attempts to demonstrate the stages and the causes of what he calls "the erasure of the sentence." The main reasons for the erasure of sentence rhetorics, in Connors's view are: anti-formalism, anti-automatism or anti-behaviorism, and anti-empiricism.

Rage Against the Revision

Kmc — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 23:55:05 -0400

Let me start by saying that reading Welch was a lot like riding a roller coaster: slow going at first, but once it started picking up speed, there were enough twists and turns to keep me hanging on, and some steep drop-offs I didn’t expect. Once or twice, I even thought about closing my eyes; I was afraid all the back and forth, between esoteric theories and pedagogic case studies, was gonna cause me to lose my lunch.

My Political Assignments

aderosa — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 11:52:14 -0400

As promised, here are the political assignments I'm going to be using for the final few assignments.

It's my prerogative

aderosa — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 00:04:55 -0400

"New Kids" in the hiz-ouse!
Sometimes I disappoint myself. Anyway, so here's how I think I'm structuring the final 3 basic assignments (RR4, Paper 2, Research paper).

All of this is based out of a shift to the political in class.

RR4: Very simply put, they'll be writing an Op-Ed piece on a subject of their choosing. They'll have to pick a relevant and recent news article and respond to the issue using whatever strategy they think works best (ethos/pathos/logos).

Visual Rhetoric Project

dr. b. — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 10:34:58 -0400

Extended mentoring, observations, and life in general has kept us apart (as a group) for far too long. We haven't had much time to talk about upcoming assignments. The visual rhetoric project comes on the heels of the advocacy project and before paper #2 (which for some/most/all of you will also be an advocacy project). My suggestion for the visual rhetoric project is to make it either an extension of the topic of the previous advocacy project or a part of paper #2 (with the latter being preferable in my mind).

Mid-semester student thoughts

ehoman — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 07:31:57 -0400

I've attached a survey I created for my students. I was curious what they thought about the class so far. My class has a very open, friendly atmosphere, which is the only reason why I decided to do this... it might be a little risky depending on what your students are like. I have faith that my students will supply me with useful information, so I'm going to have them type responses to this and print them out/hand them in anonymously.

Use if you choose

Liz

On Paper 2

aderosa — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 08:09:42 -0400

If we do the same assignment for Paper 2 where we assign them the task of picking a topic, how do we prevent them from choosing the same topics again? Anyway have suggestions on limitations? Paper 1 for me was focused on the Purdue/Lafayette area. Should Paper 2 be national? Right now I'm leaning towards politics.

Determine your ecological footprint while analyzing rhetorical strategies!

celder — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 06:22:58 -0400

Hi all. The below link can take you (or your students) to a site that asks a few questions about your lifestyle in order to determine your ecological footprint, or environmental impact, on the earth. As the site tallies your answers, it tells you how many earth's we'd need to sustain your lifestyle.

It's not exactly a gaming site like the ones we used at the beginning of the course, but it might be interesting to examine it for rhetorical strategies (and students might learn something about limited resources at the same time?).

An alternative assignment for Response Paper #4: Planning an advocacy project?

celder — Wed, 26 Sep 2007 09:40:57 -0400

Hi all. A few of us met outside of class to discuss our teaching of 106 over the next couple of weeks. Two of us were having a hard time differentiating Response Paper #4 from the T-shirt project students have already done, so one of our highly insightful and intelligent colleagues challenged us to perhaps change the assignment to an analysis project on an already established advocacy campaign. We really liked the idea and have come up with the attached assignment (perhaps still in draft form). We thought we would share it with all of you in case you might find it useful.

Visual Rhetoric Assignment

ehoman — Wed, 26 Sep 2007 07:26:28 -0400

Hi everyone. I might be a little ahead of myself here asking about this assignment, but I foresaw some confusion in my future and thought I would nip it in the bud...

What is the visual rhetoric assignment, exactly?

Liz

Liz's Media Portrait Assignment Rubric

ehoman — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 09:10:24 -0400

As I mentioned in class, I changed my Portrait Playlist assignment into a media portrait assignment, so here's my rubric for that!

More Reminders (of a less snarky nature)

dr. b. — Mon, 24 Sep 2007 15:40:22 -0400

You do have tech mentoring this week and next even though you will not be meeting with me on TH.

When you come to your one-on-one meetings to talk about observations please bring with you the following:
1. Yourself
2. Your three sample evaluated papers
3. Your teaching journal

I will be putting a sign up sheet on my door later this week so that you can choose a day and time.

Suddenly Sommers

lslimak — Sun, 23 Sep 2007 16:27:35 -0400

The heart of the Sommers article "responding to student writing" was, for me, her statement that "teachers' comments can take attention away from their own purposes in writing a particular text and focus that attentuion on the teachers' purpose in commenting." My reaction to her statement is two fold, partially in agreement with her basic theoretical premise here, but also, in disagreement with the unstated assumption that lurks behind this statement.

Upcoming Deadlines

dr. b. — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 19:07:10 -0400

For you as teachers and students

October 1 – Last day for grade correction for spring and summer 2007

October 4 by 4:00 p.m. – Reports of unsatisfactory work due in HEAV 314B. See information below.

November 15 – Deadline for pending fall 2006 incomplete grades to become failing grades

December 17 by noon – English fall grades due in HEAV 324.

Liz's Portrait Assignment Rendition

ehoman — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 09:46:28 -0400

Here's my adaption of the portrait playlist assignment...

Revision Strategies

Maria Granic-White — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 09:04:06 -0400

To emphasize to my students the advantage and the resposibility that comes with writing, I tell them the Latin saying: "Verba volens, scripta manent," which means "The spoken word flies away, while what is written stays there." Then, I tell them what Sommers mentions on page 176, that "Writing has a spatial and temporal features not apparent in speech." Sometimes I have the students work in pairs and I ask them to "tell" their paper to their partner. Upon finishing, they are to write down comments about their peer's paper and hand the comments to him/her.

Responding to Sommers' "Responding to Student Writing"

celder — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 06:37:10 -0400

On page 386, Sommers includes an illustration of a student's paper with comments on it given by a teacher. In her analysis of the example, Sommers notes, "In commenting on this draft, the teacher has shown the student how to edit the sentences, but then commands the student to expand the paragraph in order to make it more interesting to a reader.

Before & After

Kmc — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 00:12:09 -0400

You know that category on JEOPARDY where you're given a clue in which you have to connect two unassociated things that share a single word in order to come up with the correct answer (or in this case, the correct question)?

Well, tonight I thought of one:

While singing about the "ABC"s, be sure to include an introduction, three body paragraphs, and a conclusion.

What is the Jackson 5 Paragraph Essay?

Know a good activity for explaining context?

bguthrie — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 20:44:41 -0400

I find that my students are still struggling with the idea of context. I think one thing that is confusing is that the book seems to talk about context in two different ways. One is the context of the reception of the message, like a classroom, business meeting, or sitting and reading. The other is context as the greater social and political environment of the message. I used the idea from the CDA teacher's manual that looks at the design of Yahoo's and Google's search engines, and how they conceptualize the context of the internet and their audiences differently.

Response to Sommers on Revision

bguthrie — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 20:37:42 -0400

Sommer’s discussion of the revision strategies of experienced writers resonated with me. I’m one of those people who typically plan and think things through extensively before I start my composition, and then when I write it’s all done in a single draft. I think over ideas, cross some out, make connections, and then diagram the idea structure of the whole essay. After I’ve thought it all through it’s just a matter of putting those ideas into the right words. My revisions are just the tweaking of sentences.

Info question

ehoman — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 08:00:27 -0400

Hi everyone..

Where did we go on PU's website to change things like our office information and phone numbers? I can't remember where that was...

Liz

Another Reminder

dr. b. — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 13:46:13 -0400

Teaching journals and blog posts are not the same thing. Your teaching journals are to be kept in a notebook and are reflexive exercises that we will be using as the basis for our teaching philosophy statements that are going to be included in our portfolios. Blog posts are generally going to be used to ask a question, share an exercise, talk about the readings, and share interesting tidbits.

As I have said before I will be collecting the teaching journals twice or so this semester.

Oddly, there seems to be a breakdown in communication with some folks. Some folks are hearing what I say and others are totally missing it. If you look at the course description you will see that journals, cohort observations, and other things are detailed there as well as having been pointed out in class. You are responsible for getting these things done if you are going to successfully complete this practicum.

QUESTION about portrait playlist assignment...

ehoman — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 07:16:14 -0400

Hey all. I'm a little confused about the portrait playlist thing so I thought I'd post my question for all to see in case anyone else is confused:

The assignment says:

"This exploration/expression will be presented through three pages of typed text (approximately 1,000 words) and a mix CD."

But it also says:

"take as much creative liberty as necessary, so long as it is an identity/personal narrative in some medium (text, pictures, objects, music, web content, multimedia, or a combination of these)."

Put it On Deck (Week 5)

dr. b. — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 10:34:28 -0400

Things that we need to do this week. Feel free to add additional things that you want to talk about in class this week.

1. Schedule teaching observations and talk about collecting evaluated papers.
2. Talk again about observing others.

I am (not) your audience

ehoman — Sun, 16 Sep 2007 13:53:33 -0400

Booth reiterates a statement made by Jacques Barzun when he says "to bore the teacher is a worse form of failure than to anger him" (142). One of my greatest goals as a teacher is to help my students -- middle school or university -- understand that their audience is not just me, and that writing for a grade is basically the equivalent of "boring the teacher" by ignoring an implied, broader audience.

Booth: Stance Schmance

lslimak — Thu, 13 Sep 2007 09:53:24 -0400

"Successful rhetoricians are to some extent like poets, born, not made. They are also dependent on years of practice and experience. And we can finally admit that even the firmest of principle about writing cannot be taught in the same sense that elementary logic or arithmetic or French can be taught."

Ha! See rant on Rose. Attach comment here as evidence of my point.

Rhetorical Stance

Maria Granic-White — Thu, 13 Sep 2007 08:42:31 -0400

The exercise Booth mentions represents a good way to make students aware of the importance of writing for the intended audience and of the idea of writing what he calls "purposeful human communication" (141). I have employed variation of this exercise. I have asked my students to describe a phenomenon or a place for at least three different types of audience: interested in science, music, computer, sports, and/or a field of particular interest to them.

Web Page Mania

ehoman — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 22:16:34 -0400

I was looking for something fun to do today in my computer class since their ad projects are due tomorrow and they're all FREAKING OUT. Since a lot of my students said they had never created a web page and would like to learn how to do so, I decided to do a crash course in web development. This was only partially motivated by the fact that it's a HUGE hobby of mine and, as we all know, a little bit of us always comes out in our teaching.

The World Through Rose Colored Glasses

lslimak — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 21:37:06 -0400

I kept going back to the Mike Rose article after class Thursday, and every time I did, I got more and more pissed off. It wasn't that he was saying anything that was all that disagreeable, its more that he's really a piss poor academic.

Look at his argument for a minute, and I mean really look at it rhetorically and you'll see what I mean. You can boil his argument down to this (and if his paper was a student's paper, this is what I'd do)

1. Blocked writers get blocked because of rules.
2. Good writers don't get blocked because of rules.

Question about Facebook

bwerensk — Sun, 09 Sep 2007 20:23:20 -0400

I have a question for Dr. B, but anyone could help me out with this.

One of my students has asked me to be his friend on Facebook (I'm not going to make any judgments about motives here). Although I am not opposed to being his "friend," I feel weird about accepting and even weirder about telling him why I can't accept his invitation. I don't have anything profane on my page, but I certainly don't want him reading what other people may happen to write on my wall. Is there a way to handle this delicately?

Brett

Peer Editing Sheets

dr. b. — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 00:24:21 -0400

The peer editing sheet has been added to the handouts section.

Planning and Flexibility

Maria Granic-White — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 09:58:37 -0400

Rose's article reminded me how important it is to emphasize to my students that writing is a process and that they CAN change their minds during the writing process as long as they do not announce on the due day that they do not havea a paper because they have another idea. They need to be flexible if they want to improve. Class activities can help students overcome the writer's block, as they are designed to make students become aware of what works for them and what does not when they write.

Facebook

Maria Granic-White — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 08:44:12 -0400

Today my students looked at facebooks and they discussed ways in which facebooks "tell" us about the person who manages it. The discussions went well and they were even able to guess their peers' majors based on what they could see on facebook. Only one student does not (but more than likely will) have a facebook and he found out that he had many things in common with one of his peers. This activity helped the students to find out more about their peers and their interests and to understand that images, texts, etc. reveal our spheres of interest, focus, likes and dislikes.

Perl's Article

Maria Granic-White — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 08:31:17 -0400

In her article “Understanding Composing,” Sondra Perl illustrates recursiveness and retrospective structuring in writing. To do so, she looks at the writing process of writers such as college students, graduate students, and teachers. Her demonstration reminded me to emphasize to my students the importance of rereading bits of their writing, identifying their key terms, and using what Perl calls felt sense, or what one may call inspiration, inner voice, intuition, or a visceral reaction to the topic.

A Rose by Any Other Name (or, why I like Mike)

Kmc — Mon, 03 Sep 2007 18:02:51 -0400

I know the cognitivists have kind of fallen from favor within certain circles of composition studies, but I still agree with a lot of what Mike Rose has to offer in terms of better understanding the mental processes our students are going through while writing their papers.

Student-Led Discussion

ehoman — Mon, 03 Sep 2007 15:36:49 -0400

Hi everyone!

I just wanted to share something with all of you. I just posted my student-led discussion rubric to the handouts page. I've decided to require all of my students to do one day of student-led discussion. I divided them into groups of three and gave each group a discussion date.

Their requirements include leading 30 minutes of class with an activity and discussion questions that focus on the readings and content covered that week. This will happen almost every Thursday, which falls at the end of my instructional week (I have conferences with them on Fridays).

Student-Led Discussion

ehoman — Mon, 03 Sep 2007 15:30:55 -0400

This is my rubric and guidelines for student-led discussion, which accounts for 50% of my students' discussion grade for the class.

Small Groups

Maria Granic-White — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 09:39:47 -0400

I have noticed that my students work better in small (3-4) groups. They participate without hesitating in the discussions and in the act of negociation of meaning. In regular class, I try to utillze visual aids as a starting point of the discussion as most of the students are visual learners. I mentioned to them the different types of learners and I encourage them to become aware of what kind of learners they are in order to choose different ways of approaching texts or writing.

Ad Assignment

ehoman — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 09:13:15 -0400

This question is mostly for Samantha, but if anyone else has insights feel free to answer...

Weighing in on the conference structure

lslimak — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 23:36:27 -0400

I usually hate throwing around my opinion (ok, so that's a lie but i usually at least admit that my opinion is probably pretty cheap to come by) but after three days of one-on-one conferencing, I just want to relay an anecdote or two that I think speaks to both the utility and the humanity of giving our students some individual lovin', and by lovin' i mean conferencing (as I wrote that I felt some people (this means you Sam) possibly growing a little tense).

Other Warm-Ups...Literally

cmcmarti — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 14:12:29 -0400

For very early, very late or just very lazy classes, I have found it beneficial to start the hour off by an activity that gets the students up out of their seats and gets their blood flowing. I introduced two such activities last week.

"Vague, Fuzzy Feelings"

Kmc — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 22:51:58 -0400

After reading Perl’s “Understanding Composition,” I decided to reflect upon my own writing process to see if I could capture the elusive “felt sense” of which she speaks. Of course, as soon as one captures it, felt sense is transformed into something else, something tangible, like the way feelings of gratitude get turned into “thank you” cards. However, by looking carefully at my own routines, I hope to catch at least a glimpse of the creature before it flees back into the darkened recesses of my mind.

Getting Students Engaged at the Crack of Dawn!

dr. b. — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 10:33:32 -0400

This discussion started with Maria's post, but I thought that I might move it to its own post to be sure that folks saw it.

Other ideas for getting people engaged at 7:30 are:

1. Doing a morning exercise where they all write one question that they have from the day's assignment that you can use for class discussion.

Writing Activities (from Kyle)

Kmc — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 11:48:01 -0400

I'm not really sure where all of these came from -- some I made-up, some I stole from books or websites (OWL?) -- but please feel free to use or abuse at your leisure.

Dealing with .docx files

dr. b. — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 12:10:08 -0400

From ITaP:

Some people want to keep using the older version of Office but are concerned about working with others who have the new version of Office. To help smooth this exchange, Microsoft is offering a compatibility pack design to give users of the old versions of office the ability to open Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007 documents. To download and install the Microsoft Office 2007 Compatibility Pack, browse to http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/products/HA101686761033.aspx and follow the instructions online.

First Day

Maria Granic-White — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 09:16:16 -0400

My first day of class was very quiet except for very few occasions, mainly caused by my voice. My students were very shy and I had to try hard to encourage them to talk. Apparently they are very scared of saying something that would affect their image. In order to make things easier, I utilized self-deprecating humor, of course, not exaggerating too much. The atmosphere became less tense and I could sense their relief. Nontheless, they seemed to be puzzled or intrigued by either the class or me.

The First 50 Minutes

Kmc — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 14:11:37 -0400

As I made my way to WTHR 214 to teach my first day of ENGL 106, I was feeling more than a bit encumbered by the weight of readings just assigned to me by Professor Irwin “Bud” Weiser in ENGL 591 (four to five articles per class?!?). I was also questioning my ability to pull off the precarious balancing act I was about to undertake. Sure, I’d been a grad student before, but I’d had the luxury of a fellowship during my first year at IUPUI, so I didn’t have to teach.

Whoop-whoop... first week excitement

ehoman — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 07:14:00 -0400

Hi crew,

Just thought I'd blog a bit about my first week. Thus far it's gone pretty well... I assigned and read their diagnostics, which we didn't get to do on a computer since the computer day was my first day. I think that the use of the computers would have been a better way to "diagnose" their writing... so something to keep in mind for next semester. I know I write far differently on a computer than I do by hand -- I assume that's true for most of us, my students included.

A heads-up about organizing students into groups for conferencing

celder — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 17:38:08 -0400

Please excuse me if you already know what I am about to express below and I somehow spaced it:

First day

lslimak — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 16:48:07 -0400

Well it came and went, and really, for the most part, was unremarkable. Thankfully. (With the exception that I was wet - soaked actually - but had luckily brought a change of clothes). I did have one poor student sit all the way through class, come up afterwards and say, "Hey I wasn't on your roster when you called roll." So I looked at his schedule and he was in the wrong room for the wrong day... Ha!

Rhetoric & Ideology

Kmc — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 14:23:54 -0400

Since we never got around to discussing it in class, I thought I'd go ahead and post my thoughts on the Berlin article we read last week to see if anybody else wanted to comment.

Maria's image

Maria Granic-White — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 13:40:49 -0400

Here is my image:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=images+from+Provence

Maria

Cris' English 106 Grading Rubric

celder — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 11:01:55 -0400

Please see the attached. Feedback welcomed.
Cris.

Aaron's Rubric

aderosa — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 09:27:34 -0400

doo doo doo doo doo Inspector Gadget

grading rubric Brian

bguthrie — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 09:15:55 -0400

Grading rubric ENG 106

Lou's Rubric

lslimak — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 09:13:43 -0400

It's general but that was the idea.

Maria's Rubric

Maria Granic-White — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 09:12:41 -0400

Rubric

Crissy McMartin-Miller's Very Basic Rubric

cmcmarti — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 09:11:44 -0400

I plan to add some explanation for each requirement over the weekend.

Kyle's Rubric

Kmc — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 09:08:35 -0400

ENGL 106 -- RUBRIC

Name: ________________________ Teacher: McIntosh

Title: _________________________ Date Submitted: ______________

RHETORIC & DESIGN (_____ out of 30)
AUDIENCE _____________________________________________________________________
PURPOSE ______________________________________________________________________
CONTEXT ______________________________________________________________________
GENRE/MODE __________________________________________________________________

CRITICAL INQUIRY (_____ out of 25)

Brett's Rubric

bwerensk — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 09:08:02 -0400

Words

Liz's Rubric

ehoman — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 09:07:50 -0400

Here's my Rubric!

Collaboration, Collaboration, Collaboration (and ESL, too)

cmcmarti — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 23:54:13 -0400

As I read Harris' article, it was interesting comparing her observations of peer response and tutoring with my own, most recently as an ESL instructor and as a student in a rhetoric class long ago and far away.

The challenges of tutor and peer response

celder — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 08:59:59 -0400

I found Harris' article on the (similarities) and differences between tutor responses and peer responses to be very useful and interesting. As a composition teacher to both international students at a graduate school and native or bilingual speakers at a community college, I have relied on both as supplements to my own teaching in class. While I was very grateful to have these two resources available to me, I sometimes found tutor or peer responses could also hinder rather than help student progress in their writing.

English Departments -- Acquiring Identit: Parker's Article

Maria Granic-White — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 08:59:43 -0400

William Riley Parker argues that although we speak of English departments nowadays, the English department has not established its identity. In order to prove his point, Parker pinpoints the main historical events concerning the English language, starting with the Anglo-Saxon times and ending with the European and American universities and (speech and writing) associations. Mentioning important

Response to First Five Minutes

bguthrie — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 08:57:33 -0400

I agree with Newkirk that student preparation is important to conference success. In the cases he examined the students did not seem to understand what was expected of them in the conference, and as a result the student and teacher had communication difficulties. The students took a passive role, seemingly expecting direct advice on what they needed to do to improve their paper. I don't think they understood that the teacher was there to help them work through their ideas, and negotiate an improved paper.

On Newkirk

aderosa — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 08:56:52 -0400

To read Newkirk in conjunction with the Harris article, we’re left with a very interesting dilemma about the role of teachers in a one-on-one conference. Whereas Harris draws distinctions between in-class peer review and the tutoring that goes on in the Writing Center, so too must we draw a distinction between the teacher in the classroom and the teacher in conference.

Talk it out...

ehoman — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 08:56:37 -0400

While reading Newkirk's article, I was most intrigued by the second conference transcript -- the trainwreck discourse in which the teacher spoke far more than the student and thus blocked the student's ability to discover his (or her?) own writing difficulties. My first impression of this transcript as I was reading it was "wow, the teacher is talking too much," so I certainly agreed with Newkirk when he followed up the transcript with "What stands out in this conference is the domination of the teacher" (323). The domination is complete -- it goes beyond simply speaking more words.

The First Five Minutes

Kmc — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 08:56:32 -0400

My initial reaction to Newkirk’s analysis of writing conferences was, “Oh, no! I’m like a Mack Truck too!” Not that I'm unaware of the “less is better” approach to conferencing. In theory, I agree that it is almost always better to help students make discoveries for themselves than to tell them what needs to be done. But in practice, especially when you only have five or ten minutes to talk with each one, it's hard to resist the temptation to impart upon them all of your “wisdom” and send them on their merry, if slightly overwhelmed, way.

Response to Harris article

bwerensk — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 08:56:29 -0400

What struck me as most interesting about the distinction between tutor and peer responder was its similarity to the difference between counselor and friend. When a person asks a tutor for help, he or she is asking for help from someone who, as Harris notes, straddles the gap between peer and teacher. Much in the same way, a psychological professional stands in the gap between peer and parent (or some other advice-giving authority figure).

Conferencing Response

lslimak — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 08:53:20 -0400

I've read a lot of Newkirk and other New Hampshire-ites, and other conference heavy compositionists like Lad Tobin, and, in theory, I don't think I could possibly agree with their ideas and approach more. Writing, as an expression of self (even if that self is performative in nature, which I believe that it is) is necessarily a personal act, and, for these students, this will indeed be the first experience of direct and intimate contact with a Professor and, possibly, their other students.

Amazon Interactive: The Ecotourism Game

celder — Tue, 14 Aug 2007 12:03:17 -0400

Hi all. Here's another link to add to the list of newsgaming. Students can watch their natural resources and money either increase or decrease and make decisions about the survival of their jungle tribe.

Have fun!
CE
http://www.unesco.org/education/tlsf/TLSF/theme_c/mod16/www.eduweb.com/e...

Fall 07 Comp

lslimak — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 22:15:54 -0400

Hey all, I think sharing stories helps develop a community between us as fellow tas as well as provides some entertainment, a place to vent, and a chance to develop and further understanding within the classroom. That sounds kinda serious... Anywho, if ya've got an anecdote ya'd like to share or even a passing stray thought, stick it here.

See ya'll in the trenches.

Lou

Lou's Test Post

lslimak — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 22:12:58 -0400

Sorry for the test all, but I like to see how I'll screw things up before I actually try and do it for real.

First Post

admin — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 00:57:23 -0400

This is the traditional (and now cliche) first post.

Principles for Comments and Replies

admin — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 18:45:02 -0400

Posting comments and replies to the reading responses and drafts of others will be a primary means of class interaction and discussion. Instructors may promote blog posts to the front page of the course website. There, everyone will respond to and discuss the readings, drafts, or other work posted to our course website. The course description explains the purpose of this coursework:

Principles of Reading Responses

admin — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 18:23:11 -0400

Each week, you will be responsible for creating a reading response. Each reading response should be specifically focused on the reading and the prompt provided on the calendar, clearly indicate that you have read and thought seriously about the reading, and be sufficiently developed. Reading responses should be 300 words or longer. Post your reading response as a blog entry and tag it "Reading Response" or use the tag provided in the prompt itself.

Principles for Posting to Your Weblog

admin — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 18:19:05 -0400

You'll do a lot of the writing for this class in your individual weblog space on the course website. You can access your weblog via your my account page.

Creating Hyperlinks

admin — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 17:56:23 -0400

For this class, you'll have to learn at least one HTML tag, the one for making hyperlinks.

It's easy to learn. Check it out:

How to Post to Your Individual Weblog

admin — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 17:49:03 -0400

Posting to your individual weblog is a little more complex than posting a comment, but after a couple of times, you'll find it as easy as email.

Creating PDF Files

admin — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 17:43:26 -0400

Portable Document Format (PDF) is a file format created by Adobe Acrobat and useful for sharing printer ready versions of documents. Unlike when files are shared between different productivity applications (i.e., word processing, spreadsheet) or different versions of the same productivity software, the same layout and typographic styles are maintained regardless of the computer environment. What the author sees when creating a PDF is exactly what the receiver of the file sees and can print out on their computer.

How to Post Comments and Replies

admin — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 16:04:54 -0400

Posting comments, as you will soon see, is easier than creating and sending an email.

Creating Avatars and Images for Your Profile

admin — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 15:59:03 -0400

Some of you may be in search of an avatar or image to use in the profile that you created for yourself when you registered. If so, here are some suggestions:

Learning to Navigate the Site

admin — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 12:21:51 -0400

For the first day of class, you'll want to explore some of the features of the site. This document gives an overview of a few features you might want to take a look at that will help you to navigate the site.

Navigation

In the header visible at the top of every page, you'll find one row of links:

Guidelines, Handouts, and Support

admin — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 12:19:20 -0400

This section of the course syllabus contains support materials for teaching ENGL 106.

Getting Started 3: Editing Your Account for the First Time

admin — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 11:31:51 -0400

To get started with ENGL 420Y, you'll also need to complete this third step, which will take a bit more time than the previous two.

Editing your account for the first time

Once you've logged in successfully, you need to edit your account and provide some additional information about yourself.

Click on my account link in the navigation menu on the left.
read more

Getting Started 2: Logging in for the First Time

admin — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 11:28:07 -0400

To get started with ENGL 420Y, you'll also need to complete this second step:

Logging in for the first time

Getting Started 1: Registering on the Site

admin — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 11:22:14 -0400

To get started with ENGL 420Y, you'll need to complete a few steps, which include

Registering for the course website (here).
Logging in for the first time.
Editing your account for the first time.

Registering for the course website

Live Chat

admin — Wed, 30 May 2007 12:39:37 -0400

Currently, Drupal 5's own live chat features are not stable enough to be used in production. Nevertheless, there are options for instructors who wish to use live chat in their courses. Instructors should contact Jeremy Tirrell about chat options. Jeremy can set up a chat interface that appears inside Drupal sites on an individual basis.

Projects and Activities

admin — Mon, 07 May 2007 11:42:40 -0400

Use this space to share projects and assignments that you have found particularly useful and/or successful in your own class.

Calendar

admin — Mon, 07 May 2007 11:35:13 -0400

Date