Today’s Plan:
- Attendance
- Workshopping
- Questions
- Homework
Questions
Confusion About Weekly Writing
Not surprising, there were a number of questions regarding the weekly writing reports:
When exactly is the writing due each week?
The writing is due every Sunday at 11:59am.
I would like to talk more about the timeline of the project. I’m still confused on how its getting done.
I am confused on the weekly writing prompts and how exactly they are done.
One question I have for you pertaining to the class is be more clear on what is due, more
in-depth instructions. Maybe an example of recent projects?
Can you be more indepth and clear on your instructions. Also be more clear on when the actual posts should be up.
Something I am confused on was the weekly writing and the syllabus.
I would like for you to explain more in detail the way we should be writing. I’m confused because there is really no structure for this project.
I’m confused about how you want to progress with our writing in class. How exactly does your method work? I also need more motivation during class to engage myself with my writing after class.
In terms of what you need to complete every week, you need to read somewhere in the neighborhood of 3 articles/longer posts and write 750 words summarizing, synthesizing, and responding to those articles. My only other rule is that the 750 words cannot be one long post. You must post/publish more than one thing a week.
You tell me what you have read and what/where you have written that week by completing the Weekly Writing Report. If you scroll down, you will see that the report has space for weeks 4 through 13. Last Sunday was the week 4 report. This Sunday will be the week 5 report. Once you have shared the document with me once, you simply have to go to this document and update it every week. If you do not have a grade in Canvas for the Week 4 post, then you have not successfully shared the document with me. We can set this up today after class if you are struggling to locate, copy/create, or share your weekly writing report document.
I would say there is some structure for this project: read stuff, compare it to other stuff, write up your comparisons. But I readily admit that I’m not going to give you more detail on the way you should be writing. You are college students now. I am insisting that you develop your own details for the way you should be writing. I am here to help you write better, but it is your responsibility to determine what you will write. This approach is called postpedagogy, and I have published on it in a few places. If you are interested, then I recommend you read this piece that I co-wrote with Megan McIntyre (perhaps skip down to the parts where we talk about student survey responses to our courses). I also wrote an article about the development of this class, though it is a bit more theoretical in nature.
Here is a summary paragraph from the article with Megan:
Student responses suggest three major findings: first, students found themselves breaking rules and exploring new physical and intellectual spaces during the completion of these projects and throughout the course. Second, students believed that the vague nature of these projects and the lack of explicit constraints encouraged them to express a kind of creativity not necessarily required by other projects in other courses. Finally, students reported that our vague assignments produced anxiety and fear, but most students ultimately found this anxiety productive.
Since this is a freshman class, I have tried to be clearer about my expectations. And I think I have been pretty diligent about writing up these daily notes and specifying due dates and expectations. Please be sure you are checking the homework section at the bottom of the daily notes.
A demo on what a full week’s writing report looks like.
As I showed in Wednesday’s class, a completed Writing Report looks exactly like this. Notice the links to the student’s writing, along with a sentence or two that describes that writing. Notice the word counts. Notice how the student lists and links to what she has read.
If you can just give more exact examples of what is expected. Also show us more paraphrasing and how we can avoid plagiarism. If we do it on accident understand it wasn’t on purpose. Also give us time to work with these assignments because this class is the first class where most of us do not have a set topic and requirements for this class. Since we make our own schedule, it can be problematic. Just give us time–and you have and I thank you for that.
Absolutely I can do more on paraphrasing and avoiding plagiarism. I don’t want to “bust” people, I want to help people learn. I will put more paraphrasing exercises on the syllabus.
Explain how we should interact with the community on a weekly basis.
I’m not sure I can? If you are completing the Weekly Writing report, then you should be leaving at least one substantive comment somewhere on the Internet. You are free to leave more than one substantive comment! Every time you comment, document it in the Weekly Writing report with a word count so I can see it!
When we are re-writing sentences in class and are supposed to share them, I usually do not finish my sentence by the time you ask us to share them. So maybe give us more time or show a way to write sentences faster.
My bad. I can give more time. And if I am being a jerk, you should tell me “hey, wait, I need more time.”
I’m still confused on MLA formatting, so maybe towards the end of the semester go over that?
Oh my goodness certainly. As we move into the research project, we will have several days/exercises focused on MLA / APA formatting.
Something I would like for you to do in class more is to have a day where we go to the lab and everyone has the chance to write and talk about their weekly writing.
Yes, I agree that we need more lab time. I am in the process of trying to reserve the lab every Wednesday. I will keep you all informed.
More class time to read or write our papers with you there to help.
As with the above answer on labs, I want to do this. However, I will also PUSH FOR YOU TO COME TO OFFICE HOURS. Bring a draft of what you are reading or writing. We can read it together and come up with questions for a response or revision strategies. I am in office hours M&W from 1:00-2:00 and F from 10-10:45. Also, I will meet just about any time M/W afternoon from 2:00-4:00 if you want to make an appointment. And if you are struggling and can’t meet during those times, then let me know and I will come to campus on a T/R to meet with you. Seriously, you are paying a lot of money to have access to faculty. Take advantage of my availability.
Something I would like to learn more on is, how to make writing more focused on one topic. My writing tends to be very scattered. Though this may be more of a me-problem.
Every draft is scattered! What I hope you develop over the next few months is an internal ear that hears when a sentence breaks from the one before it. That’s really the key to revising (developing ideas) vs editing (fixing grammar, style, readability). We will work on this–but the most important step here is to READ YOUR WRITING OUT LOUD BEFORE YOU PRESS PUBLISH.
Could you go over powerful words to use in place of weak ones in writing. For example: What’s a good alternative word to “really” that is a little more powerful.
Yeah, I think a few workshops on synonyms could be good.
Focus on improving our work / talk about what you would like to see specifically.
Umm…I would like to see you telling me what you would like to see
What font would you recommend for online posting?
Let me flip this rhetorically on you (rhetoric meaning something like thinking about how the audience who receives a work might influence the production of the work). Look at the places you read. What kinds of fonts do they use? Of course, fonts have personality and there are “rules” for what fonts should appear where, but these rules get broken all the time.
Easy ways to make my writing more interesting, to put my thoughts into one paragraph.
Writing? Easy? You’re funny. But seriously, concrete details. Narrative. Tell stories, no matter what you are writing about.
I have no questions.
Cool.
Homework
Complete the Week 5 section of the weekly writing report by Sunday at 11:59am.
