Course Syllabus

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ENG 3010 Common Syllabus
Winter, 2022

 

Instructor and Section Information

Instructor: Richard Reyes
Office: 5057 Woodward Suite 10406
Email: af1145@wayne.edu

Office Hours : Arranged
Section: 3010---016 CRN 20526
Class Meetings: MW 118 State Hall
Class Times: MW 2:30—3:45 PM

 

Department of English Description

 

Building on students’ diverse skills, ENG 3010 prepares students for reading, research, and writing in the disciplines and professions, particularly for Writing Intensive courses in the majors. To do so, it asks students to consider how research and writing are fundamentally shaped by the disciplinary and professional communities using them. Students analyze the kinds of texts, evidence, and writing conventions used in their own disciplinary or professional communities and consider how these items differ across communities. Thus students achieve key composition objectives: 1.) learn how the goals and expectations of specific communities shape texts and their functions; 2.) learn how writing constructs knowledge in the disciplines and professions; and 3.) develop a sustained research project that analyzes or undertakes writing in a discipline or profession.

 

To achieve these goals, the course places considerable emphasis on analytical and critical reading and writing as well as the development of research skills. It typically requires genres like the research proposal, literature review, research presentation, and researched argument and the use of varied technologies for research and writing. ENG 3010 follows a Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) approach to teaching Composition at the intermediate level. WAC approaches guide students to investigate writing in their fields and to develop a holistic awareness of communicative practices in their disciplinary discourse communities. In order to develop this awareness, ENG 3010 leads students to identify and analyze commonly used genres, writing conventions, and audience expectations in their disciplines. Then, based on this work, students develop a research proposal designed for readers in their own disciplines. Through group work, class discussions, and peer review, students consider how texts, research, and writing practices in their disciplines compare to those of other disciplines.

 

WSU Undergraduate Bulletin Description

 

Cr 3. Prereq: grade of C or better in ENG 1020 (or equivalent course) in reading, research and writing for upper-level students. Emphasis on conduct­ing research by drawing from the sciences, social sciences, human­ities, and professions in preparation for Writing Intensive courses in the majors.

Course Placement for ENG 3010

To enroll in ENG 3010, students must have completed their WSU Basic Composition (BC) requirement (ENG 1020 or equiv.) with a grade of C or better. Students who have not completed this requirement will be asked to drop the course.

General Education Designation

With a grade of C or better, ENG 3010 fulfills the General Education IC (Intermediate Composition) graduation requirement.  Successful completion of an IC course with a grade of C or better is a prerequisite to enrolling in courses that fulfill the General Education WI graduation requirement (Writing Intensive Course in the Major).

 

More information on the General Education requirements is available from the Undergraduate Programs office: http://advising.wayne.edu/curr/gnd1.php

Learning Outcomes

A passing grade in ENG3010 indicates that students are able to demonstrate the following course outcomes:

 

Read

Analyze genres from the student’s discipline or profession, including their associated discourse community, audience(s), rhetorical situations, purposes, and strategies.  

 

Write

Use a flexible writing process and varied technologies to produce texts that address the expectations of the student’s disciplinary or professional discourse community in terms of claims, evidence, organization, format, style, rhetorical situation, strategies, and effects by drawing on an explicit understanding of the genre(s) being composed.  

 

Research

Write research genres, use research methods, and conduct primary and secondary research to produce an extended research project relevant to the student's discipline or profession.

 

Reflection

Use reflective writing to describe developing knowledge about writing (especially writing in one’s discipline or profession) and about oneself as a writer (including one’s ability to plan, monitor, and evaluate one’s writing process and texts).

Required Text

All required readings for this course will be provided on Canvas.

Assignments

Students are required to write 32 pages or more (approx. 8,000-9,000 words) in ENG 3010 (NOT including drafts and informal writing). However, reading responses, student-generated primary research artifacts, and other formalized “minor” assignments may count toward this goal. This course will feature a minimum of 5 major projects along and less formal writing for in-class activities and homework. Students are required to submit at least 1 formal project that is between 10-15 pages in length, not including any associated requirements for works cited and/or reflective writing.

 

The major projects for the course are intended to scaffold together, building upon students’ emerging writing capacities, discourse community awareness, familiarity with a central research focus, and a body of written content. Taken together, these emerging competencies and artifacts should lead students to develop a longer, higher-stakes project ( that is, Project 3)which not only models an effective process for research and writing in their professional/disciplinary discourse communities, but also resembles an important genre of that community (Project 3-- formal research proposal).

There will be FIVE MAJOR Projects to be completed in this 3010 course. In addition, there will be shorter Homework assignments  ( 1-2 pages) based on class readings and to help prepare  for the Major Projects.
There will also be 3 short (1 page) Reflection Letters which are self-evaluations and reflections on Projects 1, 2,and 3—so, each of these Projects will also need a Reflection Letter submitted with the Project.
The Canvas Discussion Board will also be open, and everyone is encouraged to post comments on the class readings regularly each week @ 5 points per post.

 

Major Projects--

1.  Personal Research Guide  (3+ web pages, 1,500-2,000 words)=100 points

2. Secondary Research and Synthesis (8+ pages)= 100 points

3. Research Proposal with Literature Review (10+ pages)=200 points

4. Genre Analysis  (3-4 pages)= 100 points

5. Reflective Letter (4-5 pages)= 100 points

 

Homework: 17 HW assignments @ 20 points each=340 points
Reflection Letters : 3 reflection letters @ 5 points each=15 points
Discussion Board: each discussion post@ 5 points …one post per week-…=45 points

 

 

 

 

 

 

Project Formats and Submission
All Assignments will be submitted to Canvas.
DiscussionPosts will be submitted to the Canvas DiscussionBoard.
Follow the Instructions listed in each assignment regarding how the assignment should be organized and formatted.

Grading

ENG 3010 is graded on a points-based system totaling 1000 points.  Each assignment will be worth a specified number of points. The final grade will be determined by the total number of points accumulated from all assignments. To receive a passing grade of C, a student must have 730 points.
In addition,  in order to pass the course, students must have submitted each of the 5 major Projects.

 

The Final Grade for this Course will be based on the following scale:

 

Grade:

Percent:

A

93-100%

A-

90-92%

B+

87-89%

B

83-86%

B-

80-82%

C+

77-79%

C

73-76%

C-

70-72%

D+

67-69%

D

63-66%

D-

60-62%

F

<60%

 

Attendance Policy

 

Class attendance is required, and attendance will be taken at each class session.
For In-Person class sessions: Arriving more than 20 minutes late will count as an absence.
For Zoom class meetings: Everyone is required to join the Zoom meeting and remain for the entire meeting. If Instructor calls on a student and he/she is not available  to respond, it will count as an absence.

All assigned Readings are expected to be done before the assigned class session. Please come to the class ready to discuss the day’s assigned readings.

Students are allowed 5 excused absences—no documentation needed.
Students are allowed 5 late arrivals.
After these excused times, each absence will deduct 5 points from student’s Total Course Points. Each additional late arrival will deduct 3 points.

In cases of emergencies and/or extended sick time, student MUST inform Instructor AHEAD of TIME that  he/she expects to be  absent for a certain length of time. If the student gives Instructor such advance  notice, the Instructor has the option to modify Absence penalties.BUT IF NO ADVANCE notice is given,  the absent penalties will apply.

The Instructor will work with students in cases of serious illness/hospitalization, but such extensions must be reasonable and cannot be given for more than one incident of illness.

For example, it would not be reasonable for a student to get so far behind in assignments that he/she needs extensions for 2 or more consecutive assignments. This would mean that this student was basically on a different schedule, doing their own work of catch-up while the class was moving on—and that is unreasonable for the student  and Instructor.

An absence DOES NOT change the due dates and times of assignments.
Since all assignments are available online in Canvas and submitted to Canvas, an absent student can still access and submit assignments---see Late Assignment Policies.

 

Last day for Add/Drop: for Winter 2022, Jan 24.

Last day to withdraw (no tuition refund): for Winter 2022, Mar. 27.

 

Late Assignment Policies

 

All assignments are required to  be submitted to Canvas by their due dates/times.
In order to Receive a Passing final grade for the course, a student MUST complete all of the 5 MAJOR PROJECTS.

For the Projects 1,2,3, and 4, students have the  option to do a Revision of the original submission.
No revisions for Homework, and Project 5 will be too late ( last day of class) for a revision.

 

The following Late Policies will apply:

For Projects 1, 2, 4:  5 Points deducted for each day late
For Project 3: 10 Points deducted for each day late

LATE POINTS CARRY OVER FROM ORIGINAL VERSION TO ANY REVISED VERSION
Revisions are also subject to the same late policies
For HW: 3 Points deducted for each day late

Reflection Letters : 2 Points deducted  for each day late
Discussion Posts—No credit given after the Closing Date/time of that week’s Canvas Discussion—You can post on Discussion Board  up to 9 times during the whole semester---one post per week @ 5 points per post….It is best to post often ,since  a” no Post” will count as a Zero score for  that week.

Late Pass Policy---You will have a LatePass of 2 days for TWO Major Projects 1,2, 3,4 and /or their Revisions—This means that you can turn in the assignment UP TO 2 days Late with  no penalty, BUT Late POINTs start on the3rd day—You  can do this  TWO TIMES with regard to the MajorProjects 1,2,3,4 and/or their revisions

For HWs—You have a Late Pass of 2 days for THREE HWs—This means that you can turn in the HW UP TO 2 days late with NO late points---BUT Late Points start on the 3rd day…You can do this 3TIMES for HWs

For Reflection Letters---You have a Late Pass of 2 days for 2 Reflections

A Revision will not be acceptable unless the Original version of  that assignment was submitted prior to the Revision

Plagiarism Policy

 

Plagiarism is the act of copying work from books, articles, and websites without citing and documenting the source. Plagiarism includes copying language, texts, and visuals without citation (e.g., cutting and pasting from websites). Plagiarism also includes submitting papers (or sections of papers) that were written by another person, including another student, or downloaded from the Internet. Plagiarism is a serious academic offense .
In this English 3010 section,  Plagiarism on any assignment will result in a failing grade ( zero points) for that assignment, and no Revision allowed for that assignment.  If a student submits plagiarized assignments (in whole or in parts of any given assignment) more than 2 times during the semester, the Instructor has the option to  submit a Failing course grade  for that student, or allow the student to drop the course.

 Instructors are required to report all cases of plagiarism to the English Department. Information on plagiarism procedures is available in the Department.

 

A Note about Research Ethics

Within the academic community, we divide the practice of research into two separate kinds of tasks. Research that involves looking at sources authored by other people, often found in a library or on the internet, is called secondary research. You may already be very familiar with this kind of work and you’ll be doing it for several projects in this class. The other kind of research we call original (or sometimes primary) research. Instead of reading someone’s else’s presentation of knowledge, original research creates or gathers knowledge together in a way that was not done before. For instance, a biologist might conduct an experiment to test the effects of a drug or a fertilizer and write an article to explain her research process and results—again, you’re probably familiar with this kind of research. But some academics, especially those in the social sciences, do original research by gathering stories and knowledge from human participants through interviews, focus groups, surveys, or other methods. You won’t be doing biological experiments in this class, but you may end up using some of these other methods of original research in your projects. As you involve other humans in your research processes, you must respect their rights to maintain their privacy and to choose how and when their information or stories get shared. As members of the academic community, we expect you to be responsible researchers as you gather and disseminate this data, as well as any data obtained through secondary research.

 

Incomplete Policy  

A grade of Incomplete will be issued only if the student has attended at least 75% of the class sessions, submitted and signed an Incomplete Contract (using the English Department’s recommended form) and obtained the instructor’s signature on it. Incompletes are granted at the instructor’s discretion. A student requesting an Incomplete must have completed the majority of course assignments. The Incomplete contract is intended as an emergency measure to  help students complete the course when serious illness or catastrophic events interrupt the final 2-3 weeks of a student’s participation in the class.

In this English 3010 section, an Incomplete contract cannot include Project 1,2, or 3.
An Incomplete contract cannot allow for a re-submission of an assignment that has already received a score/ grade in the course.

Incomplete Contracts cannot include more than 2-3 unfinished assignments.
Incomplete Contracts will not override the Late Assignment Policies of this English 3010 course.  

 

Other Course Policies

  • During the Winter, 2022 semester, the course delivery mode for this course may alternate from  In-Person to Remote as the University Administration determines the best policies for community health.
    Since all assignments for this course will be submitted through Canvas, there  should not be any disruption to the plans and schedules of class work even if a change of course mode occurs.
    All assignment requirements and submission dates as stated in this Syllabus will continue to be followed unless your Instructor announces any change.
    Stay current by checking your Canvas Home Page Weekly Overviews, your  Canvas Assignments, plus Canvas Announcements, and your WSU email daily.

  •  Students should ensure that all pagers, cell phones, watches, etc., won’t sound during class time. Students should not take or make calls, text message, or otherwise use electronic devices during class, except to access course-related materials.
  • When the class meets virtually using a Zoom format, students are required to join the Zoom meeting and remain actively joined for the entire session. Students are encouraged—but you are NOT required—to turn on video cameras, especially for the first few class sessions  so that everyone in the class can interact more personally with each other.
    If the Instructor calls on someone during the class Zoom meeting, and he/she is not present to respond , at least  through audio, it will count as an absence.
  • When the University is in remote course mode, students can arrange one-on-one conferences with Instructor by way of a Zoom meeting.
  • The best way to contact your Instructor is through your WSU email. Please use your WSU email to communicate with your Instructor—as we are  not allowed to respond to other email systems for University business.

 

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Wayne State Writing Center

 

The Writing Center provides individual tutoring consultations free of charge for graduate and undergraduate students at WSU.  Tutoring sessions are run by undergraduate and graduate tutors and can last up to 50 minutes.  Tutors can work with writing from all disciplines. 

 

Tutoring sessions focus on a range of activities in the writing process – understanding the assignment, considering the audience, brainstorming, writing drafts, revising, editing, and preparing documentation.  The Writing Center is not an editing or proofreading service; rather, tutors work collaboratively with students to support them in developing relevant skills and knowledge, from developing an idea to editing for grammar and mechanics. To make a face-to-face or online appointment, consult the Writing Center website.

 

For more information about the Writing Center, please contact the Director, Jule Thomas (email: au1145@wayne.edu).

 

 

Student Disability Services

 

Students who may need an accommodation based on the impact of a disability should contact the instructor privately to discuss specific needs.  Additionally, the Student Disabilities Services Office coordinates reasonable accommodations for students with documented disabilities. The office is located in 1600 David Adamany Undergraduate Library and can be reached by phone at 313-577-1851. Please consult the SDS website for further information:  http://studentdisability.wayne.edu.

 

Additional resources include the Academic Success Center http://www.success.wayne.edu and Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) http://www.caps.wayne.edu

 

 

 

 

 

II. Assignment Descriptions

Project One: Personal Research Guide

 

Introduction/Rationale: 

The personal research guide is an opportunity for you to begin to explore a professional or disciplinary discourse community you are joining or intend to join. Using primary and secondary research methods, you will explore the ways your disciplinary or professional discourse community knows and does by identifying significant genres, key experts, important publications, professional organizations and conferences, online presence, commonly employed research methods in the field, major topical or conversational trends from the last 5-10 years, and broad disciplinary values. You will use this exploration of key disciplinary and/or professional literacies to begin to develop a research guide for the course that will aid you in your exploration, research, and writing within your academic discourse community.  

 

Assignment Prompt: 

Begin by identifying the disciplinary or professional discourse community you wish to enter and the knowledge you already have about your disciplinary or professional discourse community. Then, using Swales’ six characteristics of discourse communities as a heuristic (bulleted below) generate questions about the field’s purposes, discursive practices, genre conventions, etc. based on your knowledge gaps. What do you need to know or want to find out?

 

From there, meet with your disciplinary librarian, advisor, etc. to investigate the library’s reference guide for your field of study and the key databases, journals, and research tools appropriate for your disciplinary or professional discourse community.  You should plan on composing between 6-10 interview questions for your interviewee.  This primary research will provide you with key research tools for exploring  the academic moves of your discourse community.   

 

Minimum Requirements:

From your primary and secondary research, your research guide should include at least three web pages with 1,500-2,00 words total.  The research guide should present a description and analysis of least three major communicative practices used by members of your discourse community to accomplish their goals.  Of the three, one must be a research article from a peer reviewed journal in your disciplinary discourse community.  The other two can be academic or professional examples of communicative practices.  These communicative practices should reflect, or at least connect to, reading, writing, and research values uncovered during your research of your disciplinary or professional discourse community.  They should also show analysis of how the genre conventions of those communicative practices demonstrate how the field knows and does through writing and interaction.  

 

If you decide to conduct your interview with a librarian, you will need to view research guide videos created by librarians at Wayne State University.  These videos will help you to reflect upon research best practices and develop your own research and writing questions for the interview:

 

Once, you’ve viewed the videos, you’ll need to complete a short assignment to help you think through the questions you should be asking the librarian.  The required videos and short assignment can be accessed here. 

 

Remember that your librarian will not have specific knowledge of your discourse community in regard to needed education, training, experience in the profession, etc.  However, they will have knowledge regarding research best practices, top databases and journals, and citation formats used within your discourse community.  Therefore, you need to plan your questions in mind of the audience who you are interviewing.  

 

Web-Based Research Guide

 

Once you have conducted your primary and secondary research and answered your initial questions, compose a web-based research guide that includes the following information:

 

  • Swales’ six characteristics of discourse communities as a heuristic that organizes the information you’ve gathered and formats the guide for easy reference
  • A definition of the discourse community in terms of its “common public goals” as understood both by a practicing member as well as any professional organizations associated with the specific discourse community.
  • At least three major communicative practices used by members of the discourse community to accomplish the above goals (one being a peer reviewed research article and two being academic or professional examples).
  • A list of prominent “participatory mechanisms” or venues where members publish, share, and discuss information. This includes the field’s major journals, conferences, databases, and other forums for important conversations in the discipline. 
  • A description of significant “mechanisms of intercommunication” or genres typically used by members of the discourse community to share, discuss, and critique new disciplinary information. This section should include specific examples, not just broad categories like “articles” or “websites” or general statements of topics like “issues in medicine.” Thus, for each genre described, students should reference a specific example and briefly highlight the major genre conventions, issues or topics addressed by the specific “mechanism” under review. 
  • A description of contemporary major topics of conversation as well as any significant changes in your chosen field of study that have taken place over the last 5-10 years. This section should also identify a short list of the most important terms, acronyms, and key words that make up the disciplinary vernacular. 
  • 2-3 of your own research questions about the contemporary major topics of your discourse community (as identified above). These questions and their revisions will continue to drive your research over the course of the semester.
  • A bibliographic list of all pertinent resources you have uncovered during your search (even if uncited), using the citation method appropriate to the field.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Project Two: Secondary Research and Synthesis

 

Introduction/Rationale:

In this project, you will use your findings from your research guide and your genre analysis for an exploration of a research question that is current and appropriate for your disciplinary or professional discourse community.  Using your peer-reviewed, academic article from Project One as a launch text, you will locate and explore a research question by finding and annotating eight sources, analyzing and color coding those eight sources, and produce a synthesis map of your eight sources.  

Assignment Prompt:

Building on your work in Project One, you will use a launch text and explore the launch text’s reference page as a resource for finding research that explores a similar research question or problem.  During your exploration and review of the research, you will create annotations that focus your analysis of the research question or problem to a particular scope or focus.  In order to help you annotate your research, an annotation template with specific categories will be developed in class.  

 

Your research and annotations will explore a topic of interest connected to your professional/academic discourse community. In order to answer these questions, you’ll need to find, follow, and organize a sustained research agenda consisting of multiple searches and myriad texts. Your first goal here is to secure one core sources (which should be the academic peer reviewed source that you found and used for completion of Project One) that significantly address your research questions. From those sources, you will continue to build your answers by forging a research path using the keywords, footnotes, and citations gleaned from your launch texts. Follow your research path through at least seven sources for a total of eight sources.  

 

For each successful research source, you will compose a Cornell annotated bibliography entry. These entries will help you to track and summarize the information you’re gathering as well as begin to establish relationships between ideas and texts. Each entry should both reflect on your research process as well as begin synthesizing your gathered information into useable prose for the literature review. These Cornell annotations will help you to sort, evaluate, and compare your research materials by topic, position, or concept in order to analyze emerging relationships between authors’ ideas. The point of these annotations is to help you develop relationships between sources that move from broad to more specific categories of a clear and concise research question and gap, which will be used to structure the body of your literature review and your solution in the research proposal in Project Three.  

 

Learning Objectives:

Read

  • Identify, annotate, and synthesize academic research of a discipline or professional research topic that is current and of interest to your field and to you.

Analyze

  • Analyze the research and develop a research gap that is present within the research and needs to be addressed/answered/fixed/etc.

Write

  • Work through careful research, analysis, and synthesis of your sources in order to explore a research question/problem that you will continue to explore in Project Four
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Project Three: Research Proposal with Literature Review

  

 

Introduction/Rationale

When people conduct research in disciplinary and professional contexts, they do so in order to answer questions related to a specific need or problem. Literature reviews, as a research genre, collect, organize and synthesize the relevant secondary research in a systematic way that provides highly condensed and heavily documented information related to your particular question or problem. The primary purpose of the review is to provide your audience and/or collaborators with an overview of what experts have said about the problem or research question under investigation. This assignment requires you to move through the messy and recursive stages of researching, analyzing, organizing, and writing in order to draft a formal literature review. Throughout our work on this project, you will draw upon the research and your synthesis of that research in Project Two for this Project. This will also require exercising your critical and creative thinking capabilities to draw parallels, connections, and solutions between the problem/context of your question and information from the sources you find. The conclusion of your literature review will propose a solution to the research problem that you present within your literature review.

 

Assignment Prompt

Literature reviews synthesize information, compare and contrast ideas, and clearly describe relationships between well-cited texts so that readers get a sense of a broader conversation and its importance to a particular discourse community. Literature reviews are organized topically with frequent citations and dense prose that is frequently signposted to help readers navigate both conceptual and structural complexity (we will unpack all this - don’t worry). Generally, you should show readers how experts have approached the problem or question, what has already been said about it, where contradictions or discrepancies occur, and what still needs be to learned about a topic.

 

To complete this project, we will move through several smaller, yet still formal scaffolding steps. Not only will these steps aid you in successfully using the research and synthesis you conducted in Project Three to write a literature review for this assignment, where you will conclude with a proposal that critically reflects upon how the research problem/question might be answered. You will begin by revisiting and revising your research questions you created and researched in Project Two.  

 

You will use the analysis and synthesis of research conducted in Project Two in order to develop relationships between sources that move from broad to more specific categories of a clear and concise research question and gap, which will be used to structure the body of your literature review and your solution in the research proposal.  Research proposals present a solution and justification for resolving the research question/problem. The proposed research must be at least “semi–realistic.” 

 

Learning Objectives

Read:

  • Draw upon research conducted, coded and synthesized in Project Two.

Write:

  • Deploy a flexible process for planning, drafting, and revising that responds to the rhetorical contexts of different writing situations in academic and professional discourse communities
  • Emulate genre conventions of Literature Reviews such as synthesizing multiple sources, situating diverse perspectives, and reproducing the stylistic, formatting, and citation practices of specific academic/professional discourse communities
  • Produce a proposal solution to your research question/problem appropriate for you field of study and audience.

Research:

  • Deploy a formal process for defining and revising a specific topic of inquiry (question or problem), research goals (outcomes and artifacts) as well as various ways of addressing those inquiries (methods and solutions).
  • Identify and emulate diverse research genres such as research journals, literature reviews, and research proposals

Reflect:

  • Plan and evaluate appropriate procedures for writing about a clear and focused research topic of inquiry for professional/academic audiences
  • Identify and implement needed adjustments to research and writing processes and products
  • Describe, with predicted examples, how skills, procedures, and knowledge acquired in this unit might apply to future contexts

 

Minimum Requirements

Each step in the process will include scaffolded assignments in order to help guide you through the process safely and securely.

 

  • Introduction
    • Follows Introduction Template
    • Integrates research
    • 2 pages in length (double spaced)
  • Literature Review:
    • Features correct in-text and bibliographic citation of 8 scholarly sources
    • Uses section headings to organize and sign-post content for readers
    • Disciplinary/Professional formatting
    • 5+ pages in length (double spaced)
  • Proposal:
    • Suggests a solution to research question
    • Draws upon research presented within literature as justification for the proposal
    • Limitations to proposal
    • Conclusion
    • Uses section headings to organize and sign-post content for readers
    • 2+ pages

    

 

 

 

 

 

 

Project Four: Field-Based Research

Introduction

The Field-Based Research (FBR) project asks you to conduct primary research within your professional field of study.  Your primary research will require you interview a professional in your field in order to gather, discuss, and analyze three typical genres used within the field on a daily basis. You'll gather the information you need by interviewing someone in your discourse community, observing writing-related activities in that discourse community, and analyzing texts from three genres used in that discourse community.  You'll collect data, begin analyzing it using a process called coding, and draft a description of your research methods. You'll use that work to present your findings in written and presentation form by coding, analyzing, and reflecting upon your findings.  Steps and due dates for conducting your interview, observation, and genre analysis are listed below.

Assignment Prompt

Locate three short texts (or sections of texts) that represent three different genres used in your discourse community. Start by asking your interviewee(s) for examples of texts read, written, or otherwise used by professionals in the field. For instance, if you're investigating a medical discourse community, you might examine the introduction of a research article, a patient medical history form, and an article from a newsletter for doctors, nurses, or other medical professionals. Other places to seek texts are on the websites of professional organizations for your field.

 

Your goal is to explain the genres you're analyzing in terms of Beaufort's five knowledge domains (genre knowledge, rhetorical knowledge, subject matter knowledge, writing process knowledge, and discourse community knowledge). To do so, you'll draft a description of your research methods and a list of three to four genre convention themes you developed by coding your data. Use your analysis of the genres to show what features characterize each genre, how it functions in your discourse community, how it seems to be produced, how it uses or adds to subject matter knowledge in the discourse community, and how it enacts the values and attitudes of the discourse community

 

 

 

 

 

 

Project Five: Reflective Letter

 

Introduction/Rationale:

In this letter your goal will be to reflect on the work you have completed throughout the course of the semester. In other words, you are being asked to think and write about your research and writing practices.  A good way to begin framing your reflection letter is to think through the following questions:

 

  1. Prior to this class, what did I know about writing and researching in my discipline?
  2. When enrolling in this course, what did I want to learn about writing and researching in my discipline?
  3. What did I actually learn about writing and researching in my discipline?
  4. How have my own writing and researching practices changed throughout the semester?
  5. How does what I learned connect to the ENG 3010 Learning Outcomes?

 

“Writing and research practices” include any part of the process we’ve been using this semester:

  • Brainstorming, organizing, and pre-writing strategies
  • Drafting, scaffolding, and revising methods
  • Narrowing topics, generating research questions, and framing scholarly conversations
  • Navigating databases, selecting and tracking resources, reading strategies
  • Practices associated with genre and/or discourse community standards
  • Much more

 

Feel free to discuss any of these practices (or others) in your reflection essay.  In order to organize and connect the letter to our course in the most productive way possible, you will use the course learning outcomes to guide your reflections. This doesn’t mean that your letter can, or even should reference the entirety of each learning objective for the course. Instead, choose one or two specific items from each objective that align most directly with your own experiences and growth throughout the course.

 

Assignment Prompt:

Between our last class meeting and the submission date, spend time brainstorming, pre-writing, and drafting a 4+ page (double-spaced) reflective letter that describes to me, in detail, how the course has helped to produce changes in your knowledge, skills, and practices as evidenced by the writing and researching you’ve completed throughout the semester. Letters should be addressed to me, and, while they are formatted as letters, they should be formal in both tone and structure.

 

You may choose to emphasize whatever specific skills, behaviors, or knowledge you wish, but, keeping in mind the objective of the letter, the following guidelines must be met:

 

1) Make direct reference to at least two of the projects you wrote this semester – one of which must be the Formal Research Proposal. You may also reference any informal writing or class assignments we’ve done in the course. However, any activity, essay, journal, post, or reading MUST be correctly cited.

 

2) Have a clear goal for the reflection. In other words, be clear about what you feel you’ve achieved and how the work you’ve done in ENG 3010 has produced changes in your writing and researching. It is usually best to specifically show how you will use the skills/knowledge from this course to successfully work in other classes and your professional life outside of the classroom. Remember, it is not enough to simply claim you learned how to do something or achieved a learning objective – you must provide *evidence* of that achievement using specific descriptions of work completed throughout the course!