How many times were you asked to write about this topic when you started a new school year? In my memory, this question came up every single year, and every year I had a hard time coming up with a response. One year I got to go to a YWCA camp, but mostly I reported on what I read. And I guess I’m still at it, since I’ve read some very good books this summer, which I will be writing about in future posts.   But in fact, I did some other things besides read. I wrote like a demon, revising The Everyday Writer for its 7 th edition [!] and The St. Martin’s Handbook for its 9 th , and working on a couple of essays. For one of those essays, I drove from my home on the northern California coast inland to the town of Willets to interview Sally Miller Gearhart, feminist activist for gay rights, the environment, and social justice, at her home. Now 88, Gearhart is renowned for her very early linking of feminism, rhetoric, and environmentalism, a linkage she explores in her groundbreaking article “The Womanization of Rhetoric.” I will write more about this interview soon, but below is a picture of Gearhart, wearing a T-shirt with Wanderground, the name of her most famous sci-fi novel, on it. What a woman!  In addition to reading and writing, I enjoyed working on the board of directors for the Kronos Quartet, the amazing group that has changed the very definition of “string quartet” with their ever-growing repertoire and over 900 commissions. They are now working with third graders in San Francisco, aiming to inspire them to take up an instrument, and are working to complete a huge project called “50 for the Future,” fifty new commissioned works (half by women, half by men) for string quartet that will all be open source, available to anyone anywhere to download and play. For this project, Kronos has partnered with Carnegie Hall, and I and other board members have worked hard to raise the funds necessary to pull this off: it takes a lot of money to make music available for free! You can learn more about this project here—and listen to some of their spectacular music.   Finally, I had a week-long visit from my sister and my two beloved grandnieces, Audrey and Lila, now 15 and 12. Audrey was in charge of our schedule, and she had us moving every minute of every day! We went “thrifting” in Gualala and Mendocino (where she bought six pieces of clothing for $21 and was thrilled), fed giraffes at the B Bryan Animal Preserve (pictured above), watched Napoleon Dynamite, which the girls had never seen, took hikes, and every night walked out onto the ocean bluffs to watch the sun set and the moon rise before going back to soak in the hot tub.   So, I had a fun and productive summer, and I hope you did too. Now I am nostalgic once again for the beginning of school. This is my favorite time of year, when the new class arrives, and I’m hoping to visit Stanford in a week or so just to meet and greet some new students. My heart is always in the classroom—and I’m wishing you a wonderful teaching year.   Image Credit: Andrea Lunsford ... View more

Misty Fuller (recommended by Jimmy Butts) is pursuing her PhD in English with a concentration in Rhetoric and Composition at Louisiana State University. She expects to finish in Spring 2021. She currently teaches first-year composition courses but has taught Intensive Writing as well as Writing for Business. Misty was a visiting instructor for two years at the University of North Florida, where she was nominated for the Outstanding Undergraduate Teaching Award and served as a member of reader and assignment committees for first-year writing courses. Additionally, she sponsored and advised UNF's first Musical Theatre Club. She serves as the Pedagogy Chair for her department's English Graduate Student Association. Misty's interests include first-year writing pedagogy, WAC, WID, and community learning. Is there an instructor or scholar that helped shape your career in rhet/comp? How?  A large number of instructors helped shaped my career in rhet/comp. I keep in touch with all of my mentors, so I could never pinpoint one specific person. I argue constantly with some of them. It seems I agree on everything with others. Then, of course, there are those who fall in-between. I find that I need all of these viewpoints with their different ways of disagreeing, agreeing, and talking about the issues I face as a writing teacher to grow both as a person and as an educator. If I had to choose my two biggest influencers thus far, I would have to choose Dr. Timothy J. Donovan simply because he was patient. He used that patience to encourage me to reflect, explore, and even argue as to why I’m so passionate about writing and teaching writing. I’d also have to credit Dr. Linda Howell. Working with her has shown me the immeasurable benefits of empowering a school’s Writing Center and Program to reach out to students and instructors alike.  What is the most important skill you aim to provide your students? The skill I would most like my students to discover is curiosity. I primarily teach incoming freshmen, and they often have an idea of learning as limited to what they’re being told by an authority figure or just what they’ve heard. I want to embolden my students to go beyond what’s easily available or what the standard is (or has been), to see the value in asking questions. Meeting students in their first year of college and highlighting the value of curiosity helps frame their college experience for the better. The writing classroom is an excellent space to be curious because there are boundless ways in which to express that curiosity and find effective, respectful ways to discuss the questions that arise as a result.  What have you learned from other Bedford New Scholars? My colleagues in the Bedford New Scholars program are wonderful, caring people. Through our brave vulnerability, we comfortably communicate the struggles we face as writing instructors. Although we all come from different backgrounds and regions of the U.S., we find that we often meet the same challenges on a daily basis. It’s so comforting to learn, no matter how many times, that I’m not alone and that support from my colleagues is always available. Essentially, what I’ve learned from my fellow scholars is to not be afraid to talk, even if we’re only strangers at first comparing our syllabi. It’s wonderful what we can accomplish together if we can open ourselves up.  What's it like to be a part of the Bedford New Scholars program? It’s refreshing to be a part of the Bedford New Scholars program. Speaking with, and actually getting to know, the people who develop textbooks that are commonly used in the classroom is enlightening. Life as a graduate student can be isolating sometimes, and this opportunity allows for some appreciated interaction with those in my field who participate in a different aspect of it. Feeling that the individuals at Macmillan respect my values and experiences as a teacher is also encouraging in my journey to becoming a Writing Program or Center Director. Misty’s Assignment that Works During the Bedford New Scholars Summit, each member presented an assignment that had proven successful or innovative in their classroom. Below is a brief synopsis of Misty's assignment. You can view the full details here: Annotated Bibliography. My assignment for Assignments that Work is an Annotated Bibliography in which students can write their annotated bibliography in a creative way with a specific audience in mind. That audience can be themselves, another discourse community, or a specific person. For example, if they want to write an annotated bibliography for themselves, they may do so. Let’s say that one student is a more visual learner and enjoys comics or doodling; they can create an annotated bibliography for themselves that bursts with imagery. As a part of the assignment, students must also include a reflection as to why their rhetorical choices differ from a standard annotated bibliography, with a particular audience in mind.  In one sense, this assignment asks students to consider what works best for them in terms of their reading and writing habits. Consequently, they examine what it is about their rhetorical approaches that appeals to them. Alternatively, if a student chooses an audience outside of themselves, they can still have fun while continuing to reflect on what makes their bibliography different from the standardized version. Fundamentally, they must contend with the question: Why is this annotated bibliography more effective for a particular reader? This assignment encourages students to use their base knowledge of rhetoric and annotated bibliographies in order to think critically about how to transform it for that audience. I’ve only run this assignment once, but I’ve found the biggest challenge is getting students to be creative and step out of the standardized boxes. Learn more about the Bedford New Scholars advisory board on the Bedford New Scholars Community page. ... View more

August Greetings! I’m writing to let you know about Pedagogue, a podcast project hosted by Shane Wood. Shane’s project is to create short episodes exploring a single topic about composition teaching or research. In his own words, “Pedagogue is a podcast about teachers talking writing, dedicated to building a supportive community, committed to facilitating conversations that move across institutions and positions, and designed to help celebrate the labor teachers do inside and outside the classroom. Each episode is a conversation with a teacher (or multiple teachers) about their experiences teaching writing, their work, inspirations, assignments, assessments, successes, and challenges. The podcast is meant to promote diverse voices at various institutions and help foster community and collaboration among teachers of writing.” Recently, I had the pleasure of talking with Shane and recording a podcast. Our conversation began with Shane’s question: “What advice would you give first-time writing instructors?” Wow—what a wonderful question, I thought. I can’t imagine work more exhilarating (and exhausting) than teaching writing—work that requires humility and leaps of faith and the desire to listen to and learn from our students. You’ll hear my enthusiasm for teaching and advice to first-time writing instructors here. I would love to hear your advice for first-time writing instructors. Let’s start a conversation. With every good wish, Nancy Image and Pedagogue description courtesy of Shane A. Wood. ... View more

Recently, several colleagues have asked me about my grace period, which is part of my late policy on student work. Their interest encouraged me to write an update on how it’s been working. I began using a grace period in 2013, and I’ve used it ever since. When we talk about students and their requests for extensions, someone usually talks about the number of family deaths that students mention in their requests for more time to get their work done. I’m happy to report the grace period means that I never read that kind of an extension requests. That’s right! No grandmothers are killed in my classes! So how does the grace period work? Below is the statement that I include in my syllabus for the summer session. Canvas, which is mentioned in the policy, is our course management system (CMS): Late Policy (Grace Period) My late policy includes a grace period that should cover most problems that come up, whether academic conflicts, an illness, a religious holiday, or a personal issue. It applies to most graded work and can be used multiple times. You do not need to ask in advance or explain why your work is late. Just take advantage of the grace period, as explained below, for any work OTHER than your final exam: The due date is the day that your work is due (usually Fridays). Every student has a 3-day grace period after the due date during which the project can still be submitted. The grace period occurs between the due date and the deadline. Work submitted during the grace period will be marked as late in Canvas; however, there is no grade penalty for work submitted during the grace period. The deadline comes 3 days after the due date (usually Mondays) and is the final moment that Canvas will accept a project (listed as the “available until” date in Canvas). There are no extensions on deadlines. If you do not turn in your work by the end of the grace period, you receive a zero for that activity, and you cannot revise. Unlimited, punishment-free revisions are NOT intended to support those who never did the work in the first place. Final Exam: There is no grace period or make-up option for your final exam. Your final exam must be submitted by the due date (11:59 PM on Saturday, August 17) so that I can turn course grades in on time. If you have three exams on Saturday, August 17, let me know and we can make alternative arrangement. Extenuating Circumstances: In the case of extenuating circumstances, let me know immediately. I understand that things happen. To pace course work for everyone, I will not post work early to resolve a conflict. If you let me know reasonably ahead of time, we can find a solution. As long as you are honest and timely in letting me know what’s going on, we can try to work something out. Religious Holidays & Events Please take advantage of the grace period explained in the Late Policy section above if the due date for any work in this class coincides with a religious holiday that you celebrate. Please let me know before the holiday if the grace period will not be adequate, and we will come up with an alternative plan. I have learned a few lessons in the six years that I have used the Grace Period system. After some experimentation, I settled on three days as the length of the grace period. Longer grace periods interrupt progress on the work students need to do. At one point, I used a week-long grace period. Unfortunately when a student turns in a rough draft a week late, she can’t use any of the revision strategies we are talking about during the next week of the course. Three days seems to be just right. I also learned to warn students not to use the grace period to procrastinate. We will begin working on the next project as soon as the due date passes. During the grace period then, students will end up working on two projects at once. If they procrastinate too much, they may be behind all term. I advise them at the beginning of the class to try to keep up with the due dates, and I remind them throughout the term to try to catch up if they do fall behind. Others have described this system as humane and supportive. Those are great advantages to be sure. I’m selfish though. I created this policy for myself. I no longer have to weigh the believability of student excuses nor respond to those email messages asking for extensions. The grace period is one of the best policies I’ve made as a teacher. Do you have a policy that has made a big difference in your teaching? I’d love to hear about it. Tell me in a comment below. I look forward to hearing about what works in your classroom. ... View more

Video Link : 2458 Public Domain video from FedFlix Duck and Cover! by the Federal Civil Defense Administration If you ask your students to create video projects, today’s post is for you. Showing students where to find public domain videos will give them thousands of free-to-use videos that they can clip or embed fully in their work. These resources exponentially increase their options beyond what they can gather by filming their own footage and using short clips from copyrighted material under Fair Use. As I explained last month, Public Domain Assets have no copyright restrictions, so students can use these resources in their own work without worrying about permissions or take-down notices. All they need to do is cite their sources in an appropriate way. NASA’s Videos and Ultra Hi-Def Videos and the National Park Service, Multimedia Search from my last post, for instance, provide high-quality video footage that students can use freely in their projects. Last week, I shared where to find public domain images, and in today’s post, I’m giving you details on some of the best public domain video resources available. These collections are arranged by the different kinds of resources that they offer, so students may find footage relevant to their subject areas at any of them. Public Domain Search Sites and Collections Prelinger Archive This archive focuses on ephemeral films, which the site defines as advertising, educational, industrial, and amateur films. The collection includes a subset of home movies and has a variety of search filters that can help students find relevant footage for their projects. Feature Films, from the Internet Archive Moving Image Archive These public domain videos include feature films, short films, silent films, and trailers, such as the William Castle film House on Haunted Hill. The collection does include nudity (such as shorts featuring strippers) and graphic images (such as a U.S. Department of Defense film on Nazi Concentration Camps). FedFlix, from the Internet Archive Moving Image Archive A collection of videos from the U.S. government, this archive includes a variety of historical movies (like the Duck and Cover! video above) as well as movies related to such areas as the military, the FDA, and law enforcement. U.S. Government Agencies, on YouTube Many government agencies post their public domain videos on YouTube, making them widely accessible for student projects. Here are some examples that are worth sharing with students: National Park Service Federal Trade Commission The Obama White House Department of Transportation National Highway Traffic Safety Administration Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) HealthCare.gov on YouTube Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) Department of the Interior National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) United States Geological Survey (USGS) Veterans Health Administration (VA) Students can embed videos from these collections into their projects, but they cannot download the videos without violating YouTube’s Terms of Service (unless the video has a download option). Final Thoughts If students are working on documentary projects or narrative projects, these public domain collections are likely to include resources that they can use. The ways that they can use the footage vary, so check the details on the sites to ensure that students abide by the policies of the collections they are interested in. If you know of additional collections of public domain videos that are appropriate for student projects, please share them. The more resources available for students to use, the better! Just leave the details in a comment below. I look forward to hearing your experiences with using public domain resources in the classroom. ... View more

Nina Feng (recommended by Jay Jordan and Andrew Franta) is pursuing her PhD in English with an emphasis in Writing and Rhetoric Studies at the University of Utah. She expects to graduate in May 2021. She teaches Intermediate Writing, Writing in the Social Sciences, and Write4U, a course for transfer students. Her research interests include game pedagogy, multimodality, sensory rhetorics, and critical race theory. What is your greatest teaching challenge? I’ve faced many difficult situations and made many mistakes throughout my teaching career. It’s taught me that I have to continue educating myself on student needs and working towards recognizing my own biases, which is a process that I hope to always engage in. One of the greatest challenges I’ve faced in teaching is to be self-aware and unafraid to relinquish control, along with previous ideas of success in writing. I try to be thoughtful about how I expect students to respond, or how the lesson should go because if we allow students to claim authority and show us unexpected ways to approach assignments, we can give them space to grow in confidence and develop their own aims and strengths.  How do you hope higher education will change in the next ten years? I hope that more and more teachers and institutions will adopt translingual approaches, emphasizing the acts of translation and interpretation that happen when we communicate, destabilizing curriculums that depend on standards of white supremacy. I think we’re seeing more of that happen in many fields, and we’re beginning to embrace language difference as potential, rather than deficit. What do you think instructors don't know about educational publishing but should? I think instructors should know that there are meticulous processes and engaged conversations happening with publishers and educators on the ground. Many of the materials that are created can be extremely useful, in supplementary ways and beyond composition classrooms as well. It’s worth considering and looking through potential textbooks to see what might help new instructors, in particular. What have you learned from other Bedford New Scholars? I was very fortunate to work with an incredible group of graduate students, and I learned so much from each one of them. I realized how much social justice work is happening at multiple institutions, and also how we’re all trying to reinvent similar assignments, ones which depend on basic, durable rhetorical models but need innovative modifications to address student needs. I also learned how many brilliant ideas are brewing in the minds of individual instructors — we could all benefit from a larger network of closer connections across institutions. During the Bedford New Scholars Summit, each member presented an assignment that had proven successful or innovative in their classroom. Below is a brief synopsis of Nina’s assignment. Nina’s Assignment that Works: Rhetorical Synthesis of Multimodal Works For this assignment, students are asked to choose four pieces of media/readings we’ve been studying during the first month of the semester, and to write a synthesis focused on the similarities and differences between rhetorical strategies utilized among the pieces. The pieces range from radio clips to short films to video games, encouraging students to become more aware of the mediums and modalities that contribute to rhetorical effectiveness. In an effort to help students think about the various tools, people, histories and contexts involved in communication, I think the more diverse the modalities and media we present, the more visible we can make the multiple layers of communication processes.  Learn more about the Bedford New Scholars advisory board on the Bedford New Scholars Community page. ... View more

Public Domain Illustration of Frederick Douglass In my last post, I shared details on Encouraging the Use of Public Domain Assets in student projects. Public domain images, video, text, and audio provide free-to-use, copyright-free resources that students can incorporate in any of their work, such as illustrating a pamphlet, creating a slideshow, or producing a video. The public domain illustration of Frederick Douglass on the right, for instance, could be used in a student project, with details on its source in the Flickr collection of the Internet Archive Book Images as well as the illustration’s original source. The challenge with public domain resources is knowing where to find them—and that’s my topic this week. I will share several subject-specific sites, and then I conclude with collections that cover a variety of topics. The sites I am sharing do include some video and audio resources, but the majority focus on images. Public Domain Search Sites and Collections The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) As I mentioned last week, NASA is the ideal source for any student working on aviation, aeronautics, or space-related topics. The NASA website includes three different kinds of multimedia: Videos and Ultra Hi-Def Videos Images Audio Because NASA is a government agency, all of NASA’s multimedia are usable within public domain permissions. National Park Service Students can find resources on historical locations, natural landscapes, and the inhabitants of those landscapes. The National Park Service, Multimedia Search can help students find such resources as photos of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial and a video on Preserving the Historic Orchards at Manzanar National Historic Site (a WWII Japanese Internment Camp). The site includes photos, videos, audio, and webcam footage. Do remind students to check usage rights as they decide on resources to use. Most of the materials are in the public domain, but there are some exceptions. U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) The USDA Agricultural Research Service maintains an Image Gallery Search that includes photos related to subjects such as crops, animals, food, insects, and lab research. The USDA Agricultural Research site also includes a collection of videos, issued from 1996 to present. The videos focus on various research and news stories, such as this video of Honey Bees Tossing Out Varroa Mites. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) The collections in the NOAA Photo Library include all the images from the National Weather Service, highlighting both storm photos and unusual meteorological phenomena. The library also includes collections on Fisheries, Gulf of Mexico Marine Debris, and national marine sanctuaries. Flickr Resources Many governmental agencies have collections on Flickr, and you can quickly find them by visiting the USA.gov Group Photostream. The group combines the photostreams of official U.S. federal, state, and local governments on Flickr, with collections from groups ranging from the U.S. Corps of Engineers to the Peace Corps. The Commons on Flickr is an international group of cultural institutions that provide public domain images, such as the Smithsonian Institution on Flickr and the British Library on Flickr. The group includes museums, historical societies, religious archives, and university collections. Wikipedia Public Domain Resources Wikipedia uses public domain images on many of the entries on the site. As a result, Wikipedia maintains a list of Public domain image resources. The dozens of sites listed repeat some of the resources above (such as the British Library on Flickr), but they also include sites that organize images from other collections. While the sites above are all reputable and reliable, the sites on the Wikipedia page may not be. If you recommend this page to students, spend some time talking about how to evaluate Internet resources. Final Thoughts In addition to knowing where to find public domain resources, students need to know how to cite the resources they include in their projects. I talk about documentation before students even begin their search for assets to help ensure they avoid citation errors. To my way of thinking, reminding students to gather citation details for a photo is just like reminding them to write down the page number for a book quotation they plan to use. This week’s links favor photos and illustrations that can contribute to any multimedia project. There are times when students will want to go beyond still images however, so I will share collections that focus on video footage in my next post. Until then, let me know if these sites are useful or share some of your own favorite public domain sources. Just leave me a comment below. I can’t wait to hear from you. Image credit: Illustration of Frederick Douglass from Internet Archive Book Images, used under public domain. ... View more

Hi everyone, I'm teaching Intro to Literature this fall but haven't taught it in a long time. I usually teach composition courses and feel I'm a bit out of touch with what would be great texts to use as well as assignment prompts. Is anyone out there willing to share? Does anyone incorporate Reading Apprenticeship routines into your Intro to Lit course? You can reach me by my personal email if you prefer. Thanks for any advice, Joan Joan Jarrett Associate Faculty: English; ESL; Basic Skills Instructional Assistant: Instructional Resource Center Feather River College 570 Golden Eagle Avenue Quincy, CA 95971 jjarrett@frc.edu 530-283-0202, extension 245 ... View more

Hello hive mind! I'm returning to the classroom after a brief hiatus, and am teaching Freshman Composition with Everything's an Argument 8e. I'm looking for any samples you'd be willing to share of essay prompts, specifically rhetorical analysis. I think I've written a pretty good assignment prompt, but I'd love to see what others--who may or may not use EaA--have for this. I appreciate any samples, and wisdom, you're willing to share! Thanks, Sarah ... View more

Today I'd like to highlight Shane A. Wood's podcast: Pedagogue.  Pedagogue is a podcast about teachers talking writing, dedicated to building a supportive community, committed to facilitating conversations that move across institutions and positions, and designed to help celebrate the labor teachers do inside and outside the classroom. Each episode is a conversation with a teacher (or multiple teachers) about their experiences teaching writing, their work, inspirations, assignments, assessments, successes, and challenges. The podcast is meant to promote diverse voices at various institutions and help foster community and collaboration among teachers of writing.  Recently, I was fortunate enough to have several conversations with Shane: the first (Episode 4 of the podcast) building on the ideas developed in Writing Communities - building community partnerships and teaching within a social justice framework, and the second (the first Bonus Episode) discussing whether graduate education is meeting the aspirational goals of the new generation of community-engaged graduate students. I invite you to take a listen, as well as to explore Shane's other episodes! What are your thoughts on building community partnerships? How do you incorporate social justice in your classroom? Find me on Twitter (@StephenJParks) to let me know, or reply in the comments below! Image and Pedagogue description courtesy of Shane A. Wood. ... View more

Image credit: NASA If your students are creating projects that include images, video, and audio, public domain resources can contribute to amazing work that avoids many of the headaches of using copyright-protected assets. Since public domain assets are free of copyright protections, students can freely incorporate them into their projects without asking for permission or evaluating them for fair use. Here’s an example: If a student needs an image of Earth for a project, going to the NASA site for the photo (like the one on the right) is the best choice. Because NASA is a government agency, its work is automatically in the public domain. The student will find hundreds of high resolution, free images that can be incorporated into any project without asking for permission. All she needs to do is provide attribution and documentation for the source. Likewise, if the student is creating a video and needs a clip of the planet, she can find everything she needs on the NASA Videos site. If anything, she will have difficulty choosing among the many options. To encourage students to take advantage of the benefits of using public domain resources, I created a one-page overview of the basic details of what I see as the three most important questions people tend to have. I used the same model I did for previous resources on why you should use documentation and what needs to be documented. As in the past, I created the page below (shown as an image) on “Using Public Domain Assets.” The page is also available as a Google Doc or a PDF to provide full accessibility to students. This overview outlines the details that I hope will encourage students to search for public domain resources to use in their projects. Once we have reviewed this information, I would share places to find public domain resources as well as details on how to indicate credit for the creator and document their public domain sources in their projects. I’ll talk about those topics in future posts. Do you have questions about encouraging students to use public domain materials? Do you have feedback on my one-page overview? I would love to hear from you in a comment below!   Photo credit: Taken with NASA's Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer aboard the Terra satellite. ... View more

Earlier this year, I shared my strategy to bribe students by offering extra points for those who turned in their work before Spring Break. I had some success, but there is still room for improvement. I am currently teaching a six-week summer session class, and I’ve accidentally found a strategy that encourages students to turn in work sooner, rather than later. The challenge of a summer class is jamming fifteen weeks of work into six weeks. Every day in the summer needs to cover as much material and work as two and a half days in the fall or spring classes. My normal routine is to have a rough draft due one week and the final draft due the next week. That schedule allows me to provide feedback on the rough drafts so that students can use the information as they revise. As I set up the schedule for the course, I realized I would be unable to keep that set-up in place. Realistically, I have to cover a new project every week, assigning the project on Monday and then asking for a rough draft due on Wednesday and a final draft due on Friday. My late policy gives students a three-day grace period, during which they can still turn in their work without any penalty. I bet you can see the problem. I cannot push the rough draft any earlier in the week if I want to allow students time to process and work on their projects. I decided to tell students that I could not give them feedback on rough drafts that were turned in after Wednesday. Even with the small class size during the summer, it isn’t realistic to think students can turn in drafts later and still get feedback before the final draft is due. I added this paragraph to the assignment: I will not provide individualized editing or revision feedback on rough drafts submitted after 11:59 PM on Wednesday, July 17. I will provide everyone with collective feedback that goes over the issues that I see in the drafts all members of the course submit. I may use excerpts from your draft to provide collective feedback to the class, based on the Anonymous Use of Student Texts policy. There is no grade penalty involved. Students earn the same number of points no matter when they turn in their drafts. The firm deadline only relates to the individualized feedback involved. The surprise for me came that first Wednesday night when I checked to see how many drafts had been submitted. Eleven of my fifteen students had turned in a draft! That’s an amazing 73% of the class, far outweighing the 31% who turned work in early during the spring term. Amazing! I feel a little selfish about the policy. After all, my job is to give students feedback. Within the time constraints however, it was the only option that seemed reasonable. I never expected the policy to entice so many students to stay on track and turn work in on time. It seems as though I have found a bribery strategy that is working. Will it last through the entire term? I’ll have to let you know after a few more assignments. I am certainly wondering whether I should try it in the fall as well. What do you think? Do you limit the feedback that students can receive from you? I would appreciate hearing from you. Just leave me a comment below. Photo credit: wocintech (microsoft) - 114 by WOCinTech Chat on Flickr, used under a CC-BY 2.0 license. ... View more

Students typically know about design in their own career fields. Civil engineering majors, for instance, typically know what a good bridge, a well-designed intersection, or an efficiently designed airport looks like. They may not be able to design and build one yet, but they can tell the difference between a good design and a bad one. This active learning strategy taps into students’ prior knowledge on design and then asks them to apply what they know to document design. The activity has two parts: first, students document their own knowledge, and second, they collaboratively draw conclusions about design and consider how the concepts apply to writing. The Individual Activity described below is presented as it would be to students while the Follow-Up Group Activities are presented as instructions for the teacher. The Individual Activity Before we begin our discussion of the principles of design that apply to writing, I want you to think about how design principles shape work in your own career field. For this activity, find an object related to your career field that demonstrates strong design principles and then prepare an informal presentation that explains the design principles to your group. Using the presentations from all your group members, you will reflect on what we can say about design across disciplinary and career fields. Instructions Focusing on your career field, choose a well-designed object. A civil engineer could choose a bridge. A software developer could choose a program interface. A packaging science major could choose a reusable packaging system. A building construction major could choose a hand or power tool. Whatever you choose, be sure that you would say it is well-designed and that you are familiar enough with the object to talk about it. Brainstorm a list of features that demonstrate the object’s good design. Just jot down the features that come to mind. You will come back to this list later in this activity. Find information on your object that you can share in class. Ideally, find digital versions that you can incorporate into your presentation. Possible sources include the following: Photos or screen shots Drawings or illustrations Instruction manuals Schematic diagrams Blueprints Advertising materials Demonstration or instructional videos Review the information you collected for additional features that point to the fact that the object is well-designed. As you find characteristics, add them to your brainstormed list. Create a chart that aligns characteristics that make the object well-designed with the evidence from the information you have gathered. For instance, you might point to details in a photo that demonstrate a feature that contributes to the design. You can add or remove features from your list as you work. Create a slideshow presentation to share the features you have identified as integral to a well-designed object in your field, following these guidelines: Add a title slide that shows an image of your object and provides a title that identifies the object. For instance, you might use a title such as “Strong Design in the Humpback Covered Bridge.” Add a slide for each characteristic of good design you have identified, following these suggestions: For the title of the slide, use a word or two to name the characteristic. Include the evidence that you found that demonstrates that characteristic. Add a source citation for your evidence. Do not add any more description or bullet points since you will explain the details to your group. Add speaker’s notes if you like. Practice your presentation so that you are ready to share your well-designed object with your group. Aim to share your information in two to three minutes. Revise your presentation as necessary after your practice session. Follow-Up Group Activities After students have their presentations ready, arrange the class in small groups and ask students to share their presentations with one another. Have students listen for similarities among the principles that are presented. Remind them that the same underlying principle or idea may not use the same name in every career field. Once students complete the individual presentations to their groups, ask them to identify five characteristics that transcend a single career field. Explain that students are looking for similarities among all the principles that have been presented. If students need additional help, suggest that they look at what the principles focus on. For instance, are there principles that focus on what the object looks like? Consider how they are similar. Have groups share their five characteristics by writing them on a section of the board, on a Google Slide, or on chart paper. Ask each group to explain their five characteristics briefly. Use a full-class discussion to look for patterns and similarities among all of the characteristics that have been posted. Ask students to share their immediate observations, and use questions to help them see any details that are less obvious. Display a well-designed document, or pass out copies for students to observe. You can also point to a document in your textbook. Ideally, choose an example related to an current or upcoming writing assignment. Invite students to apply the characteristics posted by their small groups to the example document. As necessary, ask questions that help students apply their career-field knowledge to the example. For example, ask students to apply design principles about an object’s appearance to the appearance of the example document. Synthesize student observations by listing the characteristics that apply to document design. Take advantage of the opportunity to introduce and discuss key principles of design (such as contrast, repetition, alignment, and proximity) by connecting to the principles that students have identified. Follow this activity with one of the ideas from Examining Design Principles through Active Learning Tasks or ask students to apply the design principles discussed in the class sessions to the drafts they are currently working on. Alternately, students can apply the design principles to their presentation slides. Final Thoughts Writing and document design can feel alien to students whose area of expertise lies outside the writing classroom. This activity makes students experts in the classroom, telling us all about their career field and then applying that expertise to document design. Students work as active learners, building connections between what they know and the work of the writing classroom. How do you help students understand concepts in the writing classroom that may not seem obvious to them? Do you have classroom activities or assignments to share? I would love to hear from you. Just leave me a comment below. Photo credit: Virginia's Oldest Covered Bridge, Humpback Covered Bridge by Don O’Brien on Wikimedia Commons, used under a CC BY 2.0 license ... View more

In “The Importance of the Act of Reading,” Paolo Freire wrote: “Language and reality are dynamically intertwined. The understanding attained by critical reading of a text implies perceiving the relationship between text and context” (6).   Our own stories of reading and writing are significant-- and at the same time those stories do not exist in a vacuum. My thoughts this summer return to the literacy narrative assignment, and how to complicate that assignment for first-semester students enrolled in their first writing course in college. The writing project that I envision would combine literacy narrative and analysis, as described below. This combination allows students to understand the broader contexts of the literacy narrative, and to practice analysis of a model literacy narrative.  Students would begin by reading Paolo Freire’s literacy narrative and lecture, The Importance of the Act of Reading. In Freire’s work, students are offered a model of analytic writing alongside a literacy narrative of reading, writing, language learning, and education inside and outside the classroom. After practice with the difficult language of this lecture, students are invited to analyze ideas from Freire’s lecture in concert with their own experiences of education.   Why Reading? Reading offers students opportunities to grapple with making meaning from difficult language. Working together in class and in journals, drafts, and revisions, students practice the skills they will need to be able to make sense of language and ideas in STEAM textbooks, and other texts that require persistence for comprehension. For more thoughts on the significance of this pedagogy for first-year writing, see McBride and Sweeney's A Place For Reading Instruction in Our Writing Classrooms and this post about reading and writing about a lecture by James Baldwin.   Supporting Class Activities Jigsaw Method: Jigsaw  “The Importance of the Act of Reading.” Divide the class into groups and assign each group a section of the reading to summarize and explain to the rest of the class. Students can use dictionaries and languages other than English to come to an understanding of their reading. An example of using the jigsaw method to discuss reading can be found here, with an appendix here.  Important Quotes: Using medium-sized post-it notes, invite students to choose important quotes from  “The Importance of the Act of Reading.” Post the quotes on the classroom walls and ask students to discuss how each quote relates to the main point of the reading. Unfamiliar Words: Ask students to select difficult quotes from the reading. Project the quotes on the screen, one at a time. Together with students, look up unfamiliar words and make meaning from the quote.  Topic Sentences: On the screen, project the topic sentences of each paragraph of the reading. Invite students to discuss how these sentences offer an outline of the reading.  Examples: Remind students that any of the course readings can be used as models for their own essays.  Concepts for Reading and Writing Interpretation: Cite a specific quote, paraphrase, or summary from Freire’s lecture. What is Freire saying here? What are the meaning(s) of Freire’s words, in English or another language? To aid understanding, use the context of the paragraph and surrounding paragraphs where the quote appears. Also consider the context of the entire lecture. Does Freire present the same idea in other parts of the lecture? Analysis: What are Freire’s main point? What is the relationship between specific parts of the lecture to the main point of the lecture? Why would the specific parts or the main point be important to Freire’s audience of teachers and university students attending the Brazilian Congress of Reading?  Supporting Evidence: Supporting evidence comes primarily from Freire’s lecture. Additional evidence can come from your own experiences, songs or other popular or social media, national, local, or international current events, and/or research on references used in Freire’s lecture (such as Gramsci). Suggested Prompts Following are 4 suggested prompts for essays that could be written in response to Paolo Frerie’s lecture “The Importance of the Act of Reading.” Note that each assignment invites writers to keep the main focus on interpreting and analyzing the meaning of Freire’s lecture.Your own experiences may be used as supporting examples to help interpret and analyze Freire’s lecture.  Research: Who is Gramsci? What is counter-hegemony? Why do you think Freire referenced Gramsci at the conclusion of his lecture (Freire 11)? Does Gramsci’s work hold relevance to your current or previous education? Why or why not?  How do your own experiences inform your response? Language: “Part of the context of my immediate world was also the language universe of my elders, expressing their beliefs, tastes, fears, values, and which linked my world to larger contexts whose existence I could not even suspect” (Freire 7).What does Freire mean by a “language universe”? Describe at least two different settings that form part of your own “language universe.” Some examples of settings are: elders and peers, home and school, school and social media. What connections and disconnections do you find in language use in these settings? How do your own experiences inform your response?  Education: On page 5 Freire writes: “Reading the world precedes reading the word, and the subsequent reading of the word cannot dispense continually reading the world.” What does Freire’s statement suggest about education? Do you agree or disagree with Freire’s statement? How do your own experiences inform your response? Multimedia: Take a look at the gif “Writing is the hardest thing ever.” What details stand out to you in the gif?  Why do these details stand out? What quotes and ideas from “The Importance of the Act of Reading” support and contradict the gif? How do your own experiences inform your response? Remember: Writing is the hardest thing ever -- and potentially the most rewarding. ... View more

I am currently revising my Technical Writing Course Manual, in preparation for my summer session course, and I want to share the document and how it has worked this week. I first created the manual, using a Google Document, for my spring courses to eliminate the dozens of web pages that I had created previously. The manual addressed several challenges that I had encountered in courses: With the information chunked out in a series of web pages, students had trouble finding details when they needed them. Placing everything in one manual meant the information was all in one searchable place. Students frequently needed a direct link to a specific policy, explanation, or detail in the course materials. The headings in the Google Document let me link to discrete information in the manual. Previously, I used a separate website for the kind of information included in the manual, but students were sometime confused about the need to go to a separate place outside the course management system (CMS) to find course information. The Google Document was easy to embed within our CMS, so I did not need to use a separate website. The manual proved successful during the spring term. Students consulted it it regularly throughout the term. Whenever I looked at the embedded manual on the course homepage in the CMS, I saw a collection of anonymous animals, from the Anonymous Anteater to the Anonymous Wombat. I came to value all those anonymous animals as evidence that students were going back to the course documents long after the first days of the course. I’ve never had that kind of validation with a traditional syllabus. One issue to address as I revise is the length of the manual. It currently comes in at 34 pages, and I’m still tweaking things. Naturally, I don’t expect students to read and memorize the manual; but what seems obvious to me may not be obvious to students. I have added the section below to explain how I expect students to use the manual in the course: How to Use this Manual This course manual is a guide to English 3764, Technical Writing, as taught by Traci Gardner at Virginia Tech. The manual is arranged in three large sections:  Syllabus and Basic Course Information: all the information typically included on a syllabus, including details on course assessment and the textbook. Requirements: explanation of the work that is expected in the course. Policies: all the guidelines that apply in the course, listed in alphabetical order. Do not feel compelled to read the manual cover-to-cover. This guide is a reference you should review at the beginning of the course and then return to throughout the term as necessary.  At the beginning of the course, you should skim through the entire manual. Read the information that provides key details on the class carefully, such as the “Tentative Course Schedule” and the “Late Policy.” Pay attention to the kind of information that is included in the manual as you skim.  During the course, check this manual for the answers to your questions first. You can check the Table of Contents as well as use the Find command to search the manual. Most general questions about the course are answered here. I’ll emphasize these instructions the first week of the course as well, when I point out some of the key details students should review. I’m looking forward to a second term using the manual, and I hope it will be a positive experience this term too. As you check out the document, note any questions or suggestions you have and leave them below as a comment. I’m planning to use the document again for the fall semester, so I can use your advice and feedback! ... View more