Rubric: Bring Two Copies for Monday's Peer Edit (Print at Times New Roman Font 10)

Writing Rubric: Please Bring TWO Copies of this for each Peer Edit Day

Writer:                                                           Reader:

6   Essay: Excellent

                - perfectly accomplishes the objectives of the prompt

-  includes a clear and thought-provoking thesis

                -  appropriate and effective organization

                - lively and convincing supporting material

                - effective diction and sentence skills

                - perfect/ near perfect mechanics including spelling and punctuation

5 Essay: Very Good

-  effectively accomplishes the objectives of the prompt

-  includes a clear and thought-provoking thesis

                -  appropriate and effective organization

                -  convincing supporting material

                -  shows careful diction and mostly effective sentence skills

                -  few mechanical errors,  including spelling and punctuation errors

4 Essay: Good

-  accomplishes the objectives of the prompt for the most part

-  includes a clear thesis, though the ideas can be more refined

                -  appropriate and effective organization

                -  convincing supporting material, though not perfect

                -  shows careful diction and mostly effective sentence skills

                -  contains a number few mechanical errors, including spelling and punctuation errors

3 Essay: Acceptable:

-  minimally accomplishes the objectives of the prompt

-  includes an identifiable thesis, thought it could still be developed

                -  appropriate and effective organization, with some flaws

                -  contains supporting material at various degrees of effectiveness

                -  diction and sentence skills could be improved

-  contains a significant number of  errors including spelling and punctuation errors, but not enough to deter the understanding of the composition

2 Essay: Needs Improvement:

-  may be missing part of the objectives of the prompt

-  includes an identifiable thesis, that clearly needs to be further developed

                -  organization contains significant flaws

                -  contains supporting material that may be irrelevant or incorrect

                -  diction may be imprecise or overly generalized, showing rudimentary sentence skills

-  contains a significant number of errors, including spelling and punctuation errors.  The errors are significant enough to deter the understanding of certain parts of the composition

1 Essay: Needs Significant Improvement:

-  does not accomplish the objectives of the prompt, or is confused about the objective

-  may be missing a thesis

                -  composition is minimally organized

                -  may be missing a significant amount of supporting material

                -  diction and sentence need excessive improvement

-  contains a significant number of errors, including spelling and punctuation errors.  The errors are significant enough to deter the understanding of certain parts of the composition

Hello All,

This is a revision of the Syllabus' Schedule for the next couple of weeks.  The next revision will come after grroups sign up for their respective presentation dates:

Week 3 – Assaying and Essay

2 September  NO CLASS! LABOR DAY!

4 September  

- Due: Essay #1, BRING TWO COPIES.

            - Peer Essay Review: By Groups

            - Writing Activity: Peer Essay Review

- Distribute: Marvel Comics Presents #74

Week 4

9 September  

            - Due: Revised Essay #1

            - Discussion: Essay #2 Prompt Due Sept 18

            - Discussion: Elements of Narration: Plot, Story

            - Reading: Little Seagull Handbook pages 21-22 and 46-49

11 September

- Warm-Up: “Narrate (TBD subject)”

- Discussion: Blog Posting Assignments; Students may start posting at this date

- Discussion: MLA Electronic Citations

- Readings: Little Seagull Handbook pages 116-123 and 123-130 (more like Browse through, and these are more important when referenced)

- Reading: Marvel Comics Presents #74

Week 5

16 September

- DUE: First 2 Pages of Essay #2, bring TWO copies and TWO print-outs of the Writing Rubric (posted at the website)

- Discussion: Sentences:

- Discussion: Topic Sentences, Transitions

- Readings: Little Seagull Handbook pages 230-237

- Writing Activity: Peer Edit of First 2 pages of Essay #2

             

18 September –

- Discussion: MLA Print Citations

- Discussion: Group Reporting Assignments of Issues of Popular Culture (plus handout)

- Readings: Little Seagull Handbook pages 103-116

- Readings: (just bring Signs of Life Book to class)

- Writing Activity: Group Meeting/Choosing Topics  

- Sign-ups: Group Reporting Presentations

Week 6

23 September – 
 - DUE: Essay #2

- Discussion: Essay #3 Prompt: Compare and Contrast Due: Sept 30

- Discussion: How readings work towards turning

- Readings: Little Seagull Handbook pages 32-41,

            - Pre-writing for Essay #3:  Compare and Contrast   

25 September –

- Discussion: Literary Analysis  

- Discussion: Great Gatsby Chap 1, Historical Context of Great Gatsby

- Reading Little Seagull Handbook pages 50-53

- Readings: Great Gatsby Chap 1

- Writing Activity: On first impressions of Great Gatsby

Week 7

30 September:

- DUE: Essay #3: Compare and Contrast first 3 Pages, bTWO copies and TWO print-outs of the Writing Rubring (posted at the website)

- Discussion: Great Gatsby Chap 2

- Readings: Great Gatsby Chap 2

- Writing Activity: Peer Edit of First 3 pages of Essay #3

           

2 October:  

            - DUE: Essay #3 Compare and Contrast

- Discussion: Great Gatsby Chap 3

- Discussion: Constructing a Paragraph

- Readings: Great Gatsby Chap 3

- Readings: Little Seagull Handbook pages 14-26

Week 8

7 October:

            - Distribute: Midterm Study Guide

- Discussion: Great Gatsby Chap 4

- Readings: Great Gatsby Chap 4

- Reading: Signs of Life (Whatever Article is associated with today’s presentation)

- Writing Activity : TBD

- Group Reporting Presentation Slot: 1

9 October: 

            - Discussion: Great Gatsby Chap 5

- Discussion: Questions for Midterm Study Guide

- Readings: Great Gatsby Chap 5

- Reading: Signs of Life (Whatever Article is associated with today’s presentation)

- Writing Activity : TBD

- Group Reporting Presentation Slot: 2

Week 9

14 October:

            - Midterm Exam:

16 October: 

            - Discuss: Essay #4 Prompt: TBD

- Discussion: Great Gatasby Chap 6

- Reading: Great Gatsby Chap 6

- Reading: Signs of Life (Whatever Article is associated with today’s presentation)

- Writing Activity : Essay #4 Prewriting

- Group Reporting Presentation Slot: 3

Week 10

21 October:

            - DUE: Essay #4 Topic and Thesis Statement

            - Discussion: Great Gatsby Chap 7

- Readings: Great Gatsby Chap 7

- Reading: Signs of Life (Whatever Article is associated with today’s presentation)

- Writing Activity : Write and Present your topic and thesis statement for Essay #4

- Group Reporting Presentation Slot: 4

           

23 October: 

- Discussion: Great Gatsby Chap 8

- Readings: Great Gatsby Chap 8

- Reading: Signs of Life (Whatever Article is associated with today’s presentation)

- Review for Midterm: Little Seagull Handbook pages TBD

- Group Reporting Presentation Slot: 5

Week 11

28 October:

- Discussion: Great Gatsby Chap 9, Concluding Great Gatsby

- Readings: Great Gatsby Chap 9

- Reading: Signs of Life (Whatever Article is associated with today’s presentation)

- Writing Activity : TBD

- Group Reporting Presentation Slot: 6

           

30 October: 

- Discussion: TBD

- Discussion: TBD

- Readings: “Where Are you Going? Where Have You Been?” By Joyce Carol Oates

- Reading: Signs of Life (Whatever Article is associated with today’s presentation)

- Writing Activity 

- Group Reporting Presentation Slot: 7

Week 12

4 November:

- DUE: Essay #4, at least half, and works cited page bring TWO copies and TWO print-outs of the Writing Rubric (posted at the website)

- Discussion: TBD

- Discussion: TBD

- Readings: TBD

- Reading: Signs of Life (Whatever Article is associated with today’s presentation)

- Writing Activity: Peer Edit Essay #4 and Work Cited Page   

- Group Reporting Presentation Slot: 8

6 November: 

            - DUE: Essay #4

            - Discussion: Essay #5 Prompt: TBD

- Discussion: Business Letter Format, Writing a cover letter, Writing a Resume’

- Discussion: TBD

- Readings: TBD

- Writing Activity  TBD

Hello Everyone,

For those who do not have the Little Seagull Hanbook, here's scans of the MLA formatting for the essay. 

For now, you can disregard the citation/work cited stuff, particularly on the visual guide.  We will get to that later in the semester. 

Also, a clue to the Essay #1 Prompt:

This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.


- Hamlet, Act 1, scene 3 

Anyone wanna take a gander at the prompt? 

A relevant article in two ways:

1) It relates to the topic we were talking about in the beginning of class. 

2) This article is also a very well-written SATIRE, though it does get its message across.

http://www.theonion.com/articles/let-me-explain-why-miley-cyrus-vma-performance-was,33632/

For those interested, the website, theonion.com, is a very good source of satirical article that contan a lot of relevant news... sometimes more relevant than even CNN and other things like that since they say stuff that other networks are afraid to say.  

Good News everyone:

the Signs of Life book are now available at the Student Bookstore. 

There are also a lot of copies of the Great Gatsby (Scribner Ver) if you have not gotten them yet.  The SCribner edition is very helpful because you can follow along the actual pages, but if you have a different edition and you can follow along based on the chapter and paragraphs, you may also do that... though i will say that way is a tad harder to do.

Only book not at the bookstore is the Little Seagull Handbook, which I will keep scanning until we get aa good delivery of them at the bookstore.... or until after Labor Day, at which time you should have the books anyway even if it's from an online store.

Scans Complete.  Read and Bring on Monday:

Little Seagull Scan:

Signs of Life Page24:

 

Page 29

:

                                                                       Page 30:

 Pagw 31:

 Page 32

Here's a link to Swift's "A Modest Proposal."  Just copy and paste on a word document and print. Then BRING TO CLASS ON MONDAY!

Click Here

or copy and paste this address:
http://art-bin.com/art/omodest.html

This is an update on the Syllabus for what is happening next week and the week after.    Print it out if you can, but not necessary.  I will discuss it in class.

Week 2 – Primarily Prewriting, Preparing, and a Proposal

26 August –

            - Reading for this class: -  Jonathan Swift: “A Modest Proposal.” (available on class blog)

- “Writing Contexts” Little Seagull Handbook, p 2-3)

- “Active Reading Questions” (Signs of Life, p 24 also available on class blog)

- “Questions for Conducting a Semiotic Analysis” (Signs of Life, p 30 also available on class blog)

            - Warm-Up : Reaction to the Reading

- Discussion:   About the reading, about CONTEXT, and other things to think about when getting started.

- Writing: Describe an event, a celebration, or a hobby in detail to someone who might not otherwise know about such an event. 

           

28 August –

            Discussion:  Writing Prompts: Discuss, Describe, Analyze

            Essay #1 Prewriting:  Clustering, and freewriting

                        Subject:

Essay #1: Due September 4

Week 3 – Assaying and Essay

2 September – NO CLASS! LABOR DAY!

4 September –

- Due: Essay #1, BRING TWO COPIES.

            - Peer Essay Review: By Groups

            - Readings: To Be Determined

            - Writing Activity: To Be Determined (or incorporated into the Peer Essay Review)