Thanks to the COM352 students for contributing a bunch of new pages! I'll be moving these pages into the main area of the wiki soon.

From UMassWiki

Advice to beginning writers from John Steinbeck:

From a story by Geeta Kothari:

If You Are What You Eat, Who Am I?"

The Text-Wrestling Book, 2005 (p. 29)

From a story by Gloria Anzaldua:

How to Tame a Wild Tongue

The Text-Wrestling Book, 2005 (p. 173)

Penguin Points

Hey all - there are five steps for each category to earn back the baseline grammar points from the Unit One Identity papers.

1. Label the category of error (such as contractions, commas, diction, etc)
2. Find one example of this kind of error in your paper and write/type it in the original, incorrect form.
3. Find this category in the Penguin Handbook, identify the page number, and explain the reasoning.
4. Rewrite your original sentence.

"Crunk" defined

Confused? So was I! Thanks Tom! :-) steph (COM) 22:02, 13 March 2007 (EDT)

Extra Credit earned

by Tom (above) and phane88, for proactively posting a rough draft of the Unit Two essay. :-)

John? too

Posted his Unit Two rough draft. Anyone else? steph (COM) 12:39, 23 March 2007 (EDT)

Editorial Teams

WikiTeam

Congratulations to Annerrs, John?, and Tom (maybe TheFlyingScotsman, too). Feel free to talk with them about the coursewiki.

MagazinaTeama

The IceCreamMan, phane88, and Jessica have stepped up to edit our class magazine. Yahoo! If you have talents or ideas you would like to offer them, don't be shy!

Withdrawing

This is serious! From the English Department: "Students have until Tuesday, March 27 to drop a class with a 'W'." If you have any question about your performance to date, please be assertive and contact me. steph (COM) 21:39, 11 March 2007 (EDT)

Lesson Plans and Homework

Current: Upcoming class lesson plan for 29 March 2007. Homework due was posted on 27 March 2007.

Previous: Lesson Plans and Homework

Course Quotes

Day 1: James Carey
Day 4: Text-Wrestling
Day 8: Penguin Handbook

Interacting with Texts: Unit Two

The class voted on Geeta Kothari's If You Are What You Eat, Then What Am I?" and Gloria Anzaldua's "How to Tame a Wild Tongue" to read for the second unit essays on interacting with Texts.

Identity Narrative: Unit One

The English Department has, over the years, refined five different formal assignment criteria for this particular personal essay. It is an essay in that there should be some "point"; it is a narrative in the sense that your life needs to provide the support for that point.

Here are descriptions of the five formal choices for your identity narrative/essay:

“The Contexts that Make Me” or

“The Self as Writer” or

“The Self in Contradiction” or

“Blowing Things Into Proportion” or

“My Self in Words”

Unit 1 Reflection Letters

Written by students about their own learnings during writing this essay. Some posted their letters for your edification (and extra credit).  ;-)

Unit 1 Example: Stark Steph (draft 1)

My first serious draft identity piece is a response to the movie, The Jacket. Students are yet to be impressed. :-) Check out their feedback to me.

Unit 1 Example: No Bullshit (draft 2) Dan, this is for you, man!

The second draft describing my Identity has benefitted tremendously from student feedback. Is it done? No...it is still short (572 words), but where is expansion necessary? For extra credit, please critique me again! steph (COM) 01:06, 8 March 2007 (EST)

Quizzes

Quiz 1 was assigned on Day 2 about "a proposed course wiki."
Quiz 1 Results
Quiz 2 Prep
Quiz 2 Results
Quiz 3 Directions
Quiz 3 Results

anonymous feedback

How is this class proceeding? Students wrote informal feedback on the tenth day of class in response to two questions, What isn't working? and What is working?

We persist in order to build this feedback into an actual conversation.

Syllabus and Grading Policy

The general requirements and syllabus for all sections of English 112, including this one (#71) are available from the English Department's webpage. The required course texts are listed, along with an introduction, goals, and philosophy of this course.

The specific grading schema for Section 71 is two tiered. Half the credit revolves around points you lose for not doing the basic assignments and other commonly accepted elements of being a committed learner. The other half of credit involves the actual quality of your writing, with a particular emphasis on improvement.

more on curriculum

The University Senate authorized a committee of faculty to spend all of last year reviewing the Writing Program. I pulled out a few excerpts: Writing Program Background.

not play: plagiarism and online research

There are questions about the reliability of [wikipedia].

The Instructor

Find out more about the teacher from her UMassWiki user page.

mythic origins of that mullet

Students demonstrate their creativity: target - Steph.

Play

The instructor occasionally writes about teaching (you!) in her weblog: reflexivity].

too cool for school

I wrote about you being too cool for school. (Actually, I am already impressed with your potential as writers. This is good.) :-) steph (COM) 09:13, 7 February 2007 (EST)

laying groundwork for research

This post is specific to the Identity Narrative but the principle applies to each and every paper that you want to have taken seriously by its audience. steph (COM) 00:42, 2 March 2007 (EST)

the future...who? Doing what?

We are making progress with two distinct conversations: one about learning & teaching; and another about the meanings of identity. The skill of critical thinking is being developed through both these conversations. I wrote in my blog today about the relation of the future to/with

a) concepts about and

b) the construction of

Introducing...

The Wiki. Yep. I am poking a wee bit of fun at those of you who are shy of technology. We can learn this together. :-) Meanwhile, I don't think I ever posted a link to The Machine is Us/ing Us, which is a fancy sales pitch for Web 2.0 technology but ALSO seriously questions what all this online interaction is doing. Finally, I really want you to watch Did You Know, a video about projected trends. steph (COM) 22:09, 5 March 2007 (EST)

why belief evolved

As if you need another example! I wrote this for today's blogpost and thought it might serve as an example of how to read an article, research a few points, frame the larger conversation, and then position oneself (as author) through an explicit claim. steph (COM) 20:55, 6 March 2007 (EST)

inclement weather

Will UMass close?

Homepage Archives

First Homepage built from Day 1 to Day 4 (January 3 - to February 9, 2007)
Second Homepage from Day 4 to Day 7 (February 9 - 20, 2007).
Third Homepage from Day 8 to Day 10 (February 22 - March 1, 2007).
Fourth Homepage from Day 11 to Day 13 (March 6-8, 2007).
Fifth Homepage from Day 14 to Day 15 (March 9-28, 2007).