University of Wisconsin-Marathon County
English
101 Section 10 Dr.
Holly Hassel
Composition
I Office:
340
Room:
243 261-6265
(o)
Fall
2002 hhassel@uwc.edu
Office
Hours: MWF 12-1, 2-3 TR 1-2:30
Objective/Aim and
Scope
English
101 is a writing course that focuses on developing your ability to clearly
express thoughts and ideas in writing.
The focus of our course will be the personal essay, the definition of
which can be fairly malleable and which we will be working toward defining.
Throughout the semester, we will work toward that goal by reading and
discussing a number of published personal essays, from narratives to
descriptive essays to argumentative essays, and crafting our own personal
essays.
Some
points to remember about writing courses: we should remember that developing
skill in writing is an ongoing project, one developed through practice,
patience, and time, and that the portfolio system—where writers design and
select their own writing projects, topics, goals, and approaches—gives them both freedom in and
responsibility to the writing process and products. I believe that by determining your own
purpose, form, subject, voice, audience, and purpose for your writing projects,
you will be better able to approach future writing tasks with confidence.
Other
goals:
Materials
The
Norton Reader
Ed. Linda H. Peterson, John C. Brereton, and Joan E. Hartman
The
New
One
3-ring binder for your midterm and final portfolios
One
notebook for your writer’s journal
$10-12
set aside for copies throughout the semester for peer workshops
Requirements
Citizenship: 15% Citizenship is
something like participation but entails a bit more; it means being a good
student: arriving to class on time and prepared, participating in large and
small group discussions actively, attentively, and effectively, refraining from
distracting or obnoxious behavior in class, bringing copies on workshop days,
and consistently engaging and investing in the work of the course and in one’s
own development as a writer, reader, and thinker. This letter grade will be assigned based on
how active you have been in class (active meaning making an informed comment
during discussions, being consistently prepared for the day’s activities, etc.). A-level will indicate almost constant
involvement, B-level will indicate solid, frequent involvement, and C-level
will indicate minimal involvement.
Writer’s Journal: 25% Your writer’s journal will be kept in a bound
notebook and will consist of almost daily entries. It is a place for you to
document informally your thinking about the reading and writing of the
course. Most days I will have a specific
assignment (responding to readings, describing your writing process, generating
ideas for an essay). Each entry should
be one page unless otherwise specified.
Midterm Portfolio: 20%
and Final Portfolio: 40%
The
majority of the work we do in this course will be contributing toward your
midterm and final portfolios, that is, collections of polished work (personal
essays) that represent the best writing you are capable of at that point in the
semester. At the midterm, you will be expected to have 10 pages of polished
writing, and the final portfolio should contain 20 pages of polished writing.
The type of essays the portfolio contains will be at your discretion—we will do
a number of “invention” activities, or pre-writing activities designed to help
you start thinking about the kinds of writing you’d like to do, but the shape
of the final product will be determined by your needs and desires as a writer:
what kind of essay would you like to write? The readings we do in class, as
well, should provide springboards to help you think about the kind of essays
you would like to work on this semester. Portfolios will be assessed on both
quality and quantity of pages, clarity, coherence, depth, insight, interest,
syntax/mechanics, revision/process work, and reflection. A detailed handout will
precede due dates for each portfolio to give you a specific idea of the
criteria for the portfolio.
Conferences: You are required to
meet with me once during the semester individually. Conferences will be held in
my office during Week thirteen of the semester and will be scheduled the week
prior. This will be on opportunity to get individual feedback from me on the
work you’ve done over the semester, to ask questions about the final portfolio,
and get suggestions on preparing and polishing your work for the final
portfolio. This will count as one day of class attendance.
Large Group Peer
Review: All
students are required to participate in large group peer review. This will require signing up for a date,
making and bringing enough copies of your rough draft for the whole class,
reading the essays to the class, and listening to the class’s responses. You must save the copies which are annotated
and returned to you and turn them in with your portfolio. Failure to appear or be prepared on the day
you are signed up for large group peer review will result in a one-letter grade
deduction from the final grade of the portfolio in which the paper is
submitted. You will also periodically be
asked to bring in two or three copies of rough drafts for small group peer
review. If you come to class unprepared
to participate in small group peer review, you will be charged with an absence.
Policies
and Procedures
Grades: Grades are equal to the following percentages:
A+ 98-100
A 93-97
A- 90-92
B+ 87-89
B 83-86
B- 80-82
C+ 77-79
C 73-76
C- 70-72
D+ 67-69
D 63-66
D- 60-62
F 59 and below
I
reserve the right to assign borderline grades as I deem appropriate.
A
Note on Grades: An
“A” grade is not a gift you get at the end of the semester for always coming to
class and participating and completing your work on time. For that, you earn a “C.” Beyond that, your
work must be more than average—it must be good to earn a “B” and excellent to
earn an “A.” Please also remember that you
are not your grades—you are a person, not a letter. Good people can get average grades and vice
versa.
Attendance: Since many of the
activities in this class are interactive and occur during class, attendance is
crucial. I do not differentiate between excused and unexcused absences.
Students should plan to attend every class meeting. Students missing 20% of the
course meetings, or six class meetings over the semester, will receive a
failing grade. Further, missing more than two class periods will result
in a half-grade deduction from your final grade for every absence beyond two.
Academic Dishonesty: Academic dishonesty is also known as
plagiarism. Plagiarism is the use of another person’s language/words or ideas
without proper citation. If you use more than four words in a row from another
source, you should put quotation marks around them. If you borrow an idea from
a published source, you need to use parenthetical documentation to give proper
credit to that source. Any quote, paraphrase, or indirect quote must be cited
appropriately. Please be aware that I will not hesitate to check on sources
that seem incorrectly documented. The consequences of plagiarism are a failing
grade on the paper/assignment, possibly a failing grade for the course, and
reporting of the incident to the student judicial affairs office for further
action by the university.
Policy on Late Work: I’m pretty good
about accepting late work. I ask that out of consideration you contact me 24
hours prior to the due date of the work to let me know the mitigating
circumstances preventing the work from being in on time and to make
arrangements and agreements for when the work will be turned in. Late work may
be downgraded.
Participation: All students are
expected and required to participate actively in class. Students who fail to
come to class prepared and/or misuse provided workshop time will be asked to
leave and charged with an absence.
Computer Policy
By now, you have surely noticed we are in a
computer-assisted classroom. To use the
room effectively and consistently, you should bring an IBM-formatted 3 ½ inch
floppy disk to class every day. It may
be to your advantage, as well, to familiarize yourself with the various IBM
labs across campus so that you may work more efficiently outside of class.
The student code of conduct prevents several forms
of behavior regarding the use of computers on campus (viewing pornographic
material on the Internet, for example).
To this I would add the following: absolutely any use of the computers
in the room for purposes beyond the obvious purview of the course are
prohibited. This includes checking your email (unless using it to communicate
for research purposes), surfing the net without a purpose, or playing Internet
games. Clearly, as well, any attempt to
affect the programming or data on the computers is prohibited. Any violations
of any computer policy will instantly result in citizenship deductions.
Policy Policy:
Ideally,
this syllabus would cover every contingency of every possibility that might
arise in the course of the semester. Of course, reality dictates that will not
be the case. Thus, I reserve the right to make changes to this syllabus as the
need arises.
Routine
and Philosophy: Our
class schedule will be fairly regular, with Tuesdays reserved for discussion of
readings and writing activities and Thursdays for large and small group peer
review. However, be sure to check the syllabus for deviations from the pattern.
This
class operates under a workshop format, which values peer response and reader
feedback as key principles of generating good writing. You should be prepared
to participate fully in the revising and refining stages of the writing process
as a collaborative contributor to the work of your classmates.
Schedule:
Work is due on the day it is listed!
Week One
Tuesday September 3
Introductions
Syllabus
Getting to Know You
Dear Holly letter
The Writing Process
Discussion: What is an essay?
Rhetorical Modes and Purposes
Thursday September 5
Invention activity: On Being A
Free writing
Small Group Peer Review Instructions
Author’s notes
The Portfolio
Large Group Peer Review Sign-Up
Exposition: The
Personal Essay that Describes, Defines, Analyzes
Week Two: Compare and
Contrast
Tuesday September 10
Read: John McMurtry, “Kill ‘Em! Crush
Em’! Eat ‘em Raw!” NR, p. 322
Anna Quindlen, “Between
the Sexes, a Great Divide,” NR, 263
Cathy Davidson, “From
the Best of Japanese Families,” NR, p. 444
Practice Small Group Workshop
Thursday September 12
Thesis Statements
Small Group Workshop: Bring 3 pages of
your draft and four copies (total) for distribution to your group.
Week Three: Classify
and Divide
Tuesday September 17
Read: William Golding, “Thinking as a
Hobby,” NR, 218
Gloria Anzaldua, “How to
Tame a Wild Tongue,” NR, p. 537
In-Class: Hot Spotting
Thursday September 19
Large Group Peer Review
Week Four: Define
Tuesday September 24
Read: Nancy Mairs, “On Being a
Cripple,” NR, p. 34
Jean-Paul Sartre,
“Existentialism,” NR, p. 1168
Paul Theroux, “Being a
Man,” NR, p. 251
Invention Activity: Authority List
Thursday September 26
Writer’s
Journal Collected
Small Group Workshop: Bring 3 pages of
your draft and four copies (total) for distribution to your group.
Week Five: Analyze a
Process
Tuesday October 1
Read:
Jessica Mitford, “Behind the Formaldehyde Curtain,” NR, p. 328
Elisabeth Kubler-Ross,
“On the Dear of Death,” NR, p. 286
Revision Ideas
Thesis Statements
Thursday October 3
Large Group Peer Review
Week Six: Cause and
Effect
Tuesday
October 8
Read: George Orwell, “Politics and the English
Language,” NR, 575
Deborah
Tannen, “Conversational Styles,” NR¸ 545
Showing v. Telling and Concrete Language
Thursday
October 10
Small Group Workshop: Bring 3 pages of
your draft and four copies (total) for distribution to your group.
Week Seven:
Description
Tuesday
October 15
Read: David Guterson, “Enclosed. Encylopedic.
Endured: The Mall.” NR,
p. 206
Lars
Eighner, “On Dumpster Diving,” NR, p. 25
Mini-lesson: semi-colons and colons
Read:
Thursday October 17
Large Group Peer Review
Narration: The
Personal Essay that Tells a Story
Week Eight
Tuesday October 22
Read: Sherwin B. Nuland, “The Strangled
Heart,” NR, p. 297
Sallie Tisdale, “We Do Abortions Here: A
Nurse’s Story,” NR, p. 720
Invention Activity: Lifelines
Thursday October 24
Midterm Course Narrative: In Class
Midterm
Portfolios Due
Week Nine
Tuesday October 29
Read: Terry Tempest Williams, “The Clan of
One-Breasted Women,” NR, p 663 and “‘This Is the End of the World’: The
Black Death” by Barbara Tuchman, NR, 765
In-Class:
Thursday October 31
Small Group Workshop: Bring 3 pages of
your draft and four copies (total) for distribution to your group.
Writer’s
Journal Collected
Week Ten
Tuesday November 5
Read: Gary Soto, “The Guardian Angel,” NR,
p. 72
Alice Walker, “Beauty:
When the Other Dancer is the Self,” NR, 44
In-Class: Glossing
Thursday November 7
Large Group Peer Review
Week Eleven
Tuesday November 12
Read: Read: Maya Angelou, “Graduation,”
NR, p. 1
Judith
Ortiz Cofer, “More Room,” NR, p. 158
Langston
Hughes, “Salvation,” NR p. 1094
Mini-lesson: Commas, Read from
Thursday November 14
Small Group Workshop: Bring 3 pages of
your draft and four copies (total) for distribution to your group.
Persuasion/Argument:
The Personal Essay that Takes a Position
Week Twelve
Tuesday November 19
Read: Tom Regan, “The Case for Animal
Rights,” NR, p. 696
Carl Cohen, “The Case for the Use of Animals
in Biomedical Research,” NR, p. 707
Invention Activity:
Prompts
Thursday November 21
Large Group Peer Review
Week Thirteen
Tuesday November 26: No Class, Conferences
Thursday November 28: No Class,
Thanksgiving Break
Week Fourteen
Tuesday December 3
Read: Adrienne Rich, “Taking Women
Students Seriously,” NR, 482
Betty Rollin,
“Motherhood: Who Needs It?,” NR, 354
Thursday December 5
Small Group Workshop: Bring 3 pages of
your draft and four copies (total) for distribution to your group.
Writer’s
Journal Collected
Week Fifteen
Tuesday December 10
Portfolio Round Table Exchange: Bring a rough
draft of your portfolio to exchange with other members of the class
Thursday December 12
Final Course Narrative—in class
Celebrations and Evaluations
Last day of classes:
Friday, December 13
Finals Week: December
16-21: Final Portfolio Due During Final
Examination Period