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10.16.16

Designing Writing Assignments

Purpose

Composing, as we know, is central to the composition course. But the question we have to ask is: what are we going to ask students to write? what relationship do I want to create among my assignments? Then once we have addressed these question, we have to ask ourselves how are we going to articulate the assignment in a way that makes it understandable and accessible to all of our students? During today's class we will work on answering these questions.

Before Class

• Read Wardle "'Mutt Genres' and the Goal of FYC" [College Composition and Communication, 60.4]
• Read Reid & Kroll, "Designing and Assessing..." [Journal of Second Language Writing, 4.1]
• Read Evans, "An Afrocentric Multicultural Writing Project" [Google]
• Submit Blog Entry #5 on Blogger by the beginning of class

FreeWrite

What are the outcomes for the assignment you are designing? What are you asking the students to do to achieve these outcomes? How will you use Reid & Kroll's criteria to shape your assignment? In what ways is this assignment a "mutt genre"? Use this time to be as specific as you can.

Presentation–Composing Writing Assignments

The instructor will present "Composing Writing Assignments" as a way to think about multiple aspects of this process.

Discussion: Literacy & Academic Discourse

The discussion today will address the following questions:

• What questions do you have about the readings?
• What is a "mutt genre"? According to Wardle, why are mutt genres problematic? How does Wardle suggest that we address the problems of assigning mutt genre assignments? Would an assignment designed to produce 5-paragraph essays be asking students to produce a mutt genre?
• Evans is clearly angry. What is he specifically angry about? In what ways does his argument address the problem he is angry about? How can we build an assignment relevant to other populations from what Evans advocates?
• What is Reid & Kroll arguing for? Do you agree with their individual analysis? If one of the goals for the composition class is to prepare students for academic writing in other disciplines, what can we learn from the authors' analysis that we can apply to the way we design and compose assignments in the composition class?

Activity: Designing Writing Assignments

As a class we will work together to...

• articulate the course goals and desired outcomes for the assignment
• develop an assignment idea
• outline what we, the instructors, will do to get the students from the point of assigning the project to the point of collecting the final draft
• composing the actual assignment sheet (if time allows)