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Pedagogy Project & Rationale


Purpose

To give you the opportunity to create a usable curriculum after studying various writing and distance learning pedagogies and to demonstrate that you can apply what you have learned. This project asks you to design and justify a pedagogical practice for a specific writing class or context.


Instructions–Invention

Choose a specific writing class or context that you are teaching in or would want to teach in. This project will give you the opportunity to rethink your current practices and/or develop a proposal for a new instructional opportunity.

Choose what you want to focus on in this context. For example, you may decide to...

  • descriptively outline the entire course or workshop
  • provide a detailed outline of a specific unit or project
  • include teaching tools you develop

As you make these decisions, consider the 2000- (MA)/2500- (PhD) word, single-spaced scope of the project.

You will want to develop an informed understanding of the instructional context by drawing upon the research that you did this semester. Also, if you plan to develop your pedagogical project for a specific context–which is encouraged–do some field research to get a better sense of this context.

Instructions–Writing Pedagogy Project

Develop a 50 word abstract that briefly explains the pedagogical situation.

Compose a description of what you will be doing for this pedagogical situation. The instructor or your peers in this class, if the situation arose, should be able to use this document to teach what you have proposed with very few questions.

The choices that you make about the context and the scope of the project will determine how you structure this document and how much detail you use. As you make these decisions, think about how you want to actually use the document that you produce beyond this course.

Instructions–Writing Rationale

In addition to designing the pedagogy, you will also justify the pedagogical decisions that you have made. Therefore you will include a 2000- (MA)/2500- (PhD) word rationale with your pedagogy project. In this rationale you will address...

  • what is your instructional goals for the pedagogy you developed?)
  • what are the pedagogical issues that informed your design? what have scholars said about these issues? (use the assigned readings, the readings that you did for the wiki, any other relevant scholarship that you read, and personal experiences–although this support should not be used to the exclusion of engaging with the theoretical discussion)
  • how does your pedagogy reflect your position on these issues? (point to very specific practices in your pedagogy to illustrate your point)
  • how might the practice of the pedagogy you developed contribute to the larger conversation about teaching writing from a distance in this context? (your response to this will probably draw upon everything above; you may also choose to use your personal experiences as support, but again not to the exclusion of the theoretical support)
  • sources that you reference should be cited using a MLA, APA, or another appropriate citation format.

Note
The project is articulated in a way that prompts you to write up the pedagogy and the rationale separately. You are, however, not confined to this format. If another format works better for your purposes, you are encouraged to talk with the instructor about your idea.

e-Poster

On the last day of class, you will be given the opportunity to present your pedagogy and rationale on an e-Poster. At its most fundemental the e-Poster is self-progressing presentation (e.g., PowerPoint, video) that an audience of other students and instructors can stop by, experience, and ask you questions about. As your presentation runs, you will want to be occasionally present to talk about your work with your audience. Students at a distance will email their e-Poster to the instructor and be present through a video chat program, like Skype or gChat. Note that the purpose of this part of the project is to give you an opportunity to talk to others about your idea, but you will not be graded on this part; therefore take this into consideration as you design your poster.


Criteria

Logistics:

  • 50 word abstract
  • 2000- (MA)/2500- (PhD) for pedagogy project; additional 2000- (MA)/2500- (PhD) words for rationale
  • will probably be single-spaced
  • This document is due on June 23, 2010 as a hard copy at the beginning of class
  • 250 points

In addition to the general evaluation criteria, the instructor will be looking for evidence of...

  • a sense of audience–is the pedagogy project written so another person could teach what you have proposed with little trouble? is the rationale written to the instructor to demonstrate how the pedagogy project is the application of current scholarship in a specific pedagogical situation?
  • an informed understanding of sound writing pedagogy as it pertains to the distance learning context you have chosen
  • an ability to articulate your pedagogy to another audience, as well as explain why you will (or they should) adopt this approach
  • a well-supported rationale that clearly connects to the pedagogy you designed
  • appropriate use of conventions, including MLA, APA, or an appropriate citation formatting