Syllabus – How We Will Do Some Learning

This class will be a blend of asynchronous learning (happening at times convenient to you by a certain deadline) and synchronous learning (happening during a specific moment with other people). I will email announcements about the week each Monday.

 

Aside from the first two weeks, when we will meet synchronously for something close to the full class-time of 2:55pm to 4:35pm, we will do the following each week:

 

  • Complete asynchronous learning modules due by Tuesday, no later than 5pm (U.S. eastern).
  • We will meet as a class on Thursday from 3pm to 4pm. Not every week will follow this schedule (e.g., the first two weeks), but this will be the general pattern.
  • We will meet as small groups (of 3-4) every other week for about 30 minutes on Tuesday some time between 3pm and 4:30pm. You will communicate and work with your small group (i.e., Writing Group) throughout the whole term over Slack (more on this soon). We will start this in the third week.

 

The Learning Modules for Tuesdays will be accessible via our course website in the lesson plan for that day and will consist of low-stakes writing activities to complete, short readings, video, etc.

 

For our Thursday full-class meetings, we will also follow along on the course website lesson plan for that day and we will utilize Zoom’s features to do small-group activities, low-stakes writing activities, large and small group discussion, independent writing time, etc.

 

We will schedule the small group meetings shortly before we start them up in the third week. These meetings will be check-ins to see how you are doing and how writing is going.

 

I will also meet with each of you individually on Zoom at midterm.

 

REMEMBER: if you have any technical issues with Zoom or anything else we might be trying to use, you can reach me by email or phone that are provided on the first page of this syllabus.

Syllabus – How to Get Things

We will use two different websites that will contain information about the course.

Blackboard

The first will be our Blackboard site. You can access Blackboard by going to this link: https://www.baruch.cuny.edu/bctc/blackboard/. When you click on the link, look to the right side of the screen and click the button that reads “Login to Blackboard.” Enter in your CUNYFirst username and password. You will find our class on the left side of the page. I will have more information on how we will use Blackboard, but, generally speaking, we will use Blackboard to do the following:

 

You will find the syllabus and any updated versions under “Syllabus.”

 

I will post non-textbook readings, assignment instructions, and other resources under “Course Documents.”

 

Submit all Process Documents, drafts of major writing projects, and any other assignments under “Submit Assignment.”

Course Website

Because I prefer the interface, we will also use our course website at https://blogs.baruch.cuny.edu/eng2100fall2020libertz/ for:

 

Accessing our Course Schedule. The schedule on my personal site will be updated regularly for any changes that need to be made and it will also be much more detailed about what we are doing for a given week or day.

 

Accessing our Lesson Plans and Learning Modules. In the Course Schedule, you can click on any day and that will take you to what we are doing for that day for both our synchronous sessions (i.e., when we are all meeting together as a class) and asynchronous Learning Modules (i.e., when we do not meet but, instead, complete modules by a certain day). In the Learning Modules, you will often be making Comments as part of the participation grade for completing them.

 

Posting Questions for Second Reading Responses to the Blog in response to prompts related to some of the readings for the course. We might also post other informal writing there, to include Comments on other students’ blog posts.

 

You can also access the Syllabus and various resources (i.e., Writing and Language Resources and Community Resources) that can help you with writing, speaking, and many other things that can help you thrive as a person and student.

Syllabus – Textbook and Course Readings

Our textbook is Join the Conversation, a Writing I textbook designed by Baruch College faculty. We will use the online version that you can find the link to find it here:

 

We will also read a few other texts that I will give you access to via our Blackboard site.

Syllabus – Course Units, LGs, and Sub-LGs

Unit 1 – Identity, Language, and Process: Emotion and Writing
The focus on this unit is primarily grounded in the first two Learning Goals of the course (i.e., Composing as a process; Compose with an awareness of how intersectional identity, social conventions, and rhetorical situations shape writing). We will explore together the emotional foundation of writing, language, and rhetoric—that our feeling is integral to how we know our worlds and communicate about them. Sometimes, for sure, the feelings associated with language can make writing difficult, even lonely. Thus, we will focus on thinking strategically about the entire process of writing. The sub-goals we explore will include:

 

·      Understand language as social and as part of who you are

·      Experiment with the rhetorical power of tapping into the full range of your rhetorical expertise (i.e., your rhetorical practices in all of the contexts in which you use rhetoric)

·      Understand the role of reading in writing (e.g., procedures of annotating, reading to revise)

·      Set goals and a process for checking in on your progress on an ongoing basis. Re-evaluate goals, periodically.

·      Develop a writing practice (e.g., creating the best environment for productive writing sessions as possible, managing distractions, time management)

·      Develop your writing process (e.g., planning, outlining, drafting, reflecting, revising, editing)

·      Receive feedback, apply it, and give constructive feedback (e.g., in peer response, workshopping writing, interpreting comments, integrating feedback in a global sense rather than only locally, managing the embodied nature of having an audience for your writing)

·      Using examples effectively in your writing to help illustrate things you are trying to explain or argue

 
Unit 2 – Rhetoric: Awareness and Writing
In this unit, we will explore rhetoric in greater detail. We will start with the importance of audience and the relationship between audiences and genre conventions (and the slipperiness of what we can ever actually fully know about either). We will then consider the full nature of the rhetorical situation (i.e., exigence, constraints, and audience), the impact of ideology on how everyone reads and writes, and consider the value of a rhetorical outlook on the world around us. To realize these ends, we will develop our abilities as rhetorical analysts. This unit will mostly address the third and fifth Learning Goals of the course (i.e., Read and analyze texts critically; Use conventions appropriate to audience, genre, and purpose). Some of the sub-goals for this unit include:

 

·      Learn the functions of rhetoric: make knowledge, coordinate human and nonhuman activity, and impact others.

·      Learn the differences between genres at the level of words, sentences, paragraphing, document design, mode, etc.

·      Change stylistic features of your writing to accommodate your audience

·      Recognize the full rhetorical situation to understand the context for writing

·      Consider the important material concerns for writing, to include different modes, circulation, and other infrastructural concerns for writing

·      Learn how to analyze vs. summarize

·      Find, evaluate, and synthesize evidence in texts we analyze

·      Establish links between claims and evidence

·      Apply theoretical lenses to what we analyze in ways that both expand and limit what we can know

·      Integrate textual analysis into a larger argument or narrative

 

 

 

 

 
Unit 3 – Research: Knowledge and Writing
The focus for this unit is on research. Now, all writing requires research; research is an investigation into various kinds of information. We can’t really write without doing that. However, generally speaking, and in academic contexts particularly, research usually has a very systematic connotation. In other words, it means close analysis of primary and secondary materials to make some kind of argument about something in a specific disciplinary domain. In this unit, we will consider how research and writing intersect in terms of how writing makes knowledge, how developing information literacy can assist us in making that knowledge, and how there are both general and context-dependent conventions for research writing that help us communicate our research in impactful ways. This unit primarily addresses the fourth Learning Goal (i.e., Identify and engage with credible sources and multiple perspectives in your writing) but it also touches on the fifth (i.e., Use conventions appropriate to audience, genre, and purpose). Below are some sub-goals:

 

·      Write to learn (e.g., writing out processes and aspects of a topic to see what you know, moving from analysis to synthesis, moving from summary to analysis, coordinating multiple voices to reveal something new)

·      Develop information literacy (e.g., finding information via search engines/library databases/stacks, evaluating source credibility and relevance, analyzing primary vs. secondary sources, using citation tools)

·      Learn differences in research genres and disciplinary knowledge (e.g., using documentation style, IMRaD vs. thesis-driven paper)

·      Write with other voices (e.g., paraphrasing, direct quotes, summary, footnotes, endnotes, managing claims and evidence with other voices, qualifying claims, counterarguments)

·      Organize and making an argument (e.g., stasis theory, Toulmin’s model, organizing sources and mapping their use, making an annotated bibliography, supplementing research process onto writing process)

 
Unit 4 – Reflection: Lifelong Learning and Writing
In this unit, we will think deeply about the writing we have done this semester and how it applies to other aspects of our lives. We write all the time (in class and out of class)! So the question now is to think about what we learned these past few months and how to apply it to future writing. This unit mostly focuses on the first Learning Goal (i.e., Composing as a process), and will include these sub-goals:

 

·      Closely read your writing to learn about it (e.g., annotate your own writing, connect annotations to previous learning goals)

·      Use quantification to learn about your writing at a distance (e.g., complete a quantitative of analysis of certain aspects of your three major writing projects to detect things a close reading might not)

·      Write about your writing to learn about it—use what you learned in past units (about identity, process, analysis, rhetoric, and research) on your own writing to consider progress toward your own goals and course goals, as well as to develop new goals.

Syllabus – Learning Goals (LGs)

 

  1. Compose as a process: Experience writing as a creative way of thinking and generating knowledge and as a process involving multiple drafts, review of your work by members of your discourse community (e.g., instructor and peers), revision and editing, reinforced by reflecting on your writing process in metacognitive ways.

 

  1. Compose with an awareness of how intersectional identity, social conventions, and rhetorical situations shape writing: Demonstrate in your writing an awareness of how personal experience, our discourse communities, social conventions, and rhetorical considerations of audience, purpose, genre, and medium shape how and what we write.

 

  1. Read and analyze texts critically: Analyze and interpret key ideas in various discursive genres (e.g., essays, news articles, speeches, documentaries, plays, poems, short stories), with careful attention to the role of rhetorical conventions such as style, tropes, genre, audience, and purpose.

 

  1. Identify and engage with credible sources and multiple perspectives in your writing: Identify sources of information and evidence credible to your audience; incorporate multiple perspectives in your writing by summarizing, interpreting, critiquing, and synthesizing arguments of others; and avoid plagiarism by ethically acknowledging the work of others when used in your own writing, using a citation style appropriate to your audience and purpose.

 

  1. Use conventions appropriate to audience, genre, and purpose: Adapt writing and composing conventions (including your style, content, organization, document design, word choice, syntax, citation style, sentence structure, and grammar) to your rhetorical context.

Syllabus – Course Description

Everyone in this class is an expert in language and rhetoric (i.e., the use of symbols to make knowledge, coordinate activity, and to impact others). You have been doing language and rhetoric all of your life—and writing most of your life. You know some stuff—A LOT.

Our purpose in this class is to further develop that expertise in your writing to put you in position to succeed in present and future college classes, but also to succeed in any area of your life where you use language and rhetoric—which is pretty much every area of your life. We will do this by reading, writing, and reading and responding to each other’s writing.

Writing is meant to be read. Therefore, most (if not all) of your writing will be respectfully read by myself and the rest of class. We are always at least one of your audiences. Write some things we would want to read, things that will interest us, things that will challenge us. This will be a community of writers that will praise and push you toward the next draft (i.e., constructive criticism).

When I give you feedback on your writing, I’ll make comments as I read and then I’ll write a brief endnote for some things for you to think about. It’s a writing lesson, meant for you to think more about writing. The time and effort I put into commenting on your drafts is all LOVE. I’m not trying to make you feel bad or make any kind of judgment of you as a person. Usually, I will be praising something I see that I thought was well-done while also suggesting that you can make it better rather than saying something is only “good” or “bad”.

Finally, I know this is a very strange and scary time. Your health and well-being are always going to come first here. Let me know what you need and I will do everything I can to help you out.

Slack Learning Module (adapted from Seth Graves)

Image of Slack logo

Slack kind of works like text messaging and is conducive for group work, but good for general conversation, too. We will use it to coordinate our Writing Groups, to do large group conversations, and for smaller messaging between pairs or small groups.

Slack is a communication platform that has become sort of like texting for businesses. Slacks are organized into “groups,” which have their own pages (such as the group for our course). Discussion topics are organized by “channels.”

You can select how or if to receive notifications in each channel, and leave or join channels. For this class, we’ll have a channel open for general questions for the class as we move along, and use Slack for messaging to communicate with each other. You can also create your own channels and send direct messages to one more multiple people in the class.

How We Will Use Slack

Soon, we are going to solidify your Writing Groups. These groups will help offer extra support in your writing through some positive peer pressure. You will use Slack to coordinate with your Writing Group.

We will also use Slack to communicate as a class via different channels. Right now, all we have is #general (for general comments or questions about the class) and #random (for any random things that might only be indirectly related to the class or not related at all).

I also have a #music channel to share recommendations for songs, playlists, albums to listen to while reading and writing. Another channel I made is #tv-movies-activities to share shows we are watching, hobbies we have that help get our minds off things, etc. Periodically, I’ll ask you to contribute to some of these channels.

There’s a #say-hello channel that you will use to get some practice in a bit.

Finally, there is the #writing-practice-and-process channel. This is a space to work through how our methods of writing are and are not working as ways to pool resources and approaches together. We will start using that channel this class in a below activity.

I’d be very excited about creating other channels though!

Instructional Videos for Slack

Here’s a quick video from the Slack people that introduces how to navigate their software: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2JuAa6-ors

And here’s more information from Slack about posting to channels and sending direct messages: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IECPfpSB1RM

Slack for Mobile is a fairly solid app version. Here’s a video walking through that platform, as well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xsU4wbbuRY

Instructions To Get Set Up

  1. Go to the class Slack here. I would open it in another window or tab so you can stay on this module page and have Slack open at the same time. I also invited you through your Baruch email, so you should be able to open it from there, too.
  2. Create a Slack account and login. Since I invited you already to our workspace, it might be easier to create your account there.
  3. Be sure to remember your username and password so you can return here. Bookmark our Slack workspace so it is easy to return to. All web browsers have capability to bookmark page. Once bookmarked, you can just go to bookmarked pages and select it.
  4. Setup your bio and profile photo (if you want to).
  5. Post something to the Slack group’s #say-hello channel to introduce yourself.
  6. Bookmark this Slack page URL and keep it handy in your browser (I keep mine on my browser’s “Bookmarks Bar”).
  7. Go back to to your Profile (click your name at the top and select “View Profile”) and click the three dots meaning “More” underneath the profile photo.
  8. Write down your Member ID number.

 

Comment below before clicking button to continue: Post your Member ID number in the Comments below. If you had any trouble getting setup on Slack, also note that in your Comment.

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Blogs@Baruch Commenting

Blogs @ Baruch Comments and how they work in this class. (Adapted from Seth Graves)

hand-office-finger-gesture-pointing-down-addressing-3-12675 ...

Modules in this class will be mostly made up of pages like this one. Inside those pages might be interactive elements or other areas of the internet to visit, but this site is the course and module home.

You need to be signed in to Blogs @ Baruch in order to leave a Comment. If you have trouble signing into Blogs @ Baruch, let me know.

On most pages in a week’s module, you’ll often be asked to Comment at the bottom of the page before moving on. This is how I will mark you as having completed the module for your grade.

  • In order to get counted for completing a Learning Module, you must have responded to all Comment prompts in the module.
  • To count, Comments must be:
    • (1) on topic, and
    • (2) at least three coherent sentences long (unless the prompt specifically asks you to do something else).
  • Please write your Comments in complete sentences (don’t spit out short comments like “yep”).
  • Comments should offer meaningful participation—an attempt to engage with what’s being asked and/or what’s been said so far in the Comments.
  • Comments that offer no meaningful participation (i.e. are not on topic, are not complete or readable ideas) will not count, and will negatively impact your grade.

 

When we are done talking this over, click the below button to continue.

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Quick Module on Blogs@Baruch (adapted from Seth Graves)

image of Baruch College in background of Blogs at Baruch text

Blogs @ Baruch (WordPress)

Blogs @ Baruch is where you are right now. This course site is hosted on Blogs@Baruch, a locally hosted webspace that uses the WordPress website building platform. Our course page will house the course schedule, each Tuesday Learning Module, the Lesson Plans for each class, the syllabus, a place to post and comment, and a space to provide various resources.

Instructions

Login and Update Your Profile and Photo
  1. Login to blogs.baruch.cuny.edu with your email username and password (email me if you can’t get in).
  2. Click on “My Profile” and then “Edit.”
  3. Double check that the Display Name is the name you want to be called in the course.
  4. Add some writing to your “Academic Interests” section.
  5. Save the changes.
  6. If you want, you can add a Profile Photo (click “Change Profile Photo” and follow the instructions). You do not have to add a photo if you do not want to do so.

Go to Our Course Site and Create a Post

  1. Click on My Sites and double check that our class (“ENG 2100: Writing I, Fall 2020”) is listed. If it isn’t, email me to add you to it.
  2. Click on the site title (“ENG 2100: Writing I, Fall 2020”) to enter the site.
  3. Hover your cursor over the “+ New” and select Post.
  4. Write your Post and title it with your name.
  5. Write an introduction to yourself by quickly explaining why an image and YouTube video represent you in some way.
  6. Use the Block Editor (what you use to build your post) to incorporate an image and a YouTube video (you can copy and paste the URL of the video) into your post. To add the image, click “Add Media” and then “Upload Files” and then select a saved image from your computer (you might first search for an image and then save to your device). I would use pexels.com since these are images in public domain or under creative common license. Just search in the search bar. If nothing helpful there, you can just do images.google.com and something should turn up.
  7. Give your post a “Category” along the right side. Check the category “Introductions” and uncheck any other categories.
  8. Give your post any “Tags” you’d like. They can be funny or topical.
  9. Publish your Post.
  10. Place the URL to your Post here in the Comments section of this instructions page. If you were unable to publish a post and copy and paste a URL for it, please tell me why in the comments.

We can also see everyone’s introductions, starting with mine at the below link:
Introductions

For more information about building a WordPress post with the Block Editor, check out this video introduction: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BkQlTuJ4BH8

Important notes:

  1. As long as you are logged in, the dashboard option to add material with “+ New” will always appear from wherever you are on the course site.
  2. Please make sure to always include a Category in your posts.

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