DWRL Lesson Plans - Software

Assignment Length:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Style

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Annotated Bibliography

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

This assignment is a precursor to Essay 2, Rhetorical Analysis. At this point, they have gathered data on the contexts of their controversy, made observations and intepretive claims about their chosen text, and articulated their own opinions. This outlining process is meant to help students who have a particularly hard time with organization or who are strongly visual learners.

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

Each student needs a computer, but they could also bring in laptops for the same activity in a standard classroom. Each student needs to have an free account with Prezi.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Full Assignment Description:

Before class, students were asked to pull out their notes from each source and to write down their thoughts in list-form. I asked students to create Prezi accounts by inviting them with a link.

Students read through their notes, labeling each with a major idea or point of argument as they go. They can have as many labels as they need, but they should be alert to group notes under the same label. For example, a student writing about the US's involvement with Mexico's drug culture might have separate labels for "Military Involvement," "Police Corruption," and "Imports."

Once this task is complete (about fifteen minutes with the size of the paper these students were drafting), ask students were list each of their major categories (these will also signpost topic sentences later).

As a group, log into Prezi and chose basic layouts. The students generally like choosing visually-pleasing platforms. Ask them to spread out the categories they’ve come up with over the space so that each label takes up its own visual area.

Next, ask students to group their notes--which in this case include quotations from sources, their own commentary on their chosen texts, and any synthesis or transition statements--around each of the categories/points of argument. This can take a while if students do not have their notes in digital form, so it may help to ask that they bring in Word documents with their notes typed up. Basically, they will copy/paste their notes around each of the clustered headings.

When students finish, they end up with wide mind-map. Ask them to spend some time resizing. Which categories are most important? Which seem to be floating out there with only one note or so? This is a way for them to visualize the strongest points of their argument, to cut pieces that might seem interesting but aren't pulling their weight, or to recognize where further research could be done at home.

For the rest of class, I asked students then to zoom out of Prezi and to add large numbers next to each category and subcategory. That’s their outline, in visual form. Some of them will probably want to animate the Prezi so that they can see how they will jump from idea to idea, but I will allow mine to keep it two-dimensional, if they choose.

Once they review each of the steps to their analysis (including context and controversy), students should able to see which transition statements topic sentences, and so on would connect each of their points.

The first time I did this exercise, since I wasn't interested in using Prezi for presentation purposes but rather as a freer-form mind-map, I just had students do this labeling visually. But when we finished, I thought I probably should have asked them not to just label the sections with numbers, but actually to then add the presentation steps into the prezi and just gone ahead with presentation. Sort of a writing-workshop in digital form.

Those that prefer to then reverse-outline from the Prezi can do so in Word; those who are okay with only the visual guide can use it while they write their first drafts.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Make sure you are familiar with Prezi's interface, including the zoom in/zoom out functions.

It would also help to have done this exercize personally.

Instructions For Students:

1. Read through every line of your notes. As you do this, label the topic or category of each one. You will probably end up with multiple labels; this is a good thing!

2. Once you've read through all of your notes, including your own analyses, list each of your labels/categories/topics on a separate sheet of paper.

3. Sign in to your Prezi account and choose a new template. You may choose one that thematically matches your analysis or one you just find pretty/elegant/cool-looking.

4. Create new text boxes for each of your labels, spacing them out accross the canvas. Try to make them the same size.

5. Going back to your notes, copy/paste them into the categories you labeled. You should see your notes arranged visually next to their topics. Guess what will become your paragraphs?

6. Spend some time resizing your topics and your notes. Make the more important topics or points larger. Which categories are the most important? Which seem to be floating out there with only one note or so? (This might be an indication that you should do more research).

7. Look through all of your topics, and try to determine an order for them. What kind of logic connects each of these ideas? Do certain clusters of topics/notes have to come before others?

8. Label each cluster of data/analysis with a number. This is your outline. Now that you can see all of your notes at once, you should be able to determine the best order in which to present them.

9. If you want, animate the outline so that Prezi zooms in on each cluster individually, in order. If you'd rather just have the visual, go for it. You may reverse-outline into a more standard form if you prefer, or you may write your first draft using this guide.

Evaluation Suggestions:

I like asking students to screen-shot their Prezi and hand it in with their assignment, but I grade this only on participation.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

It's important to ask students to sign up for Prezi and perhaps even to watch the introductory video before this class; otherwise, you'll end up spending half the class teaching the software.

Course Type:

Course Description:

Rhetoric 306 is a course designed to introduce students to the fundamentals of research and argumentation. They are asked to research a controversy, summarize and analyze the arguments of the major stakeholders in that controversy, and then develop their own arguments.

Tags:

Annotation and Analysis with Genius.com (Formerly Rapgenius)

Emily Lederman — Tue, 30 Sep 2014 22:02:18 +0000

Author:

Emily Lederman

Image Credit:

Genius.com

Brief Assignment Overview:

This lesson plan builds on Andrew Uzendoski's lesson on teaching close reading using Rap Genius (now called Genius), focusing on teaching students the process of annotation, as well as how to articulate the building blocks of their close reading practice. Students receive feedback from the instructor on a close reading assignment in the form of annotations. They work both individually and in groups to close read and then annotate excerpts from a text using the interactive online knowledge project, Genius.com.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

Oxford English Dictionary (OED)

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Rhetorical Analysis

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Close Reading

Historical Context

Literary Criticism

Poetry

Structure and Form

Textual Analysis

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Annotation

Writing Process

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Collaboration

Visualization

Media Requirements:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Required Materials:

-Computer for each students

-Projector to present

-Texts

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Early in the Semester

Full Assignment Description:

Prior to the Genius lesson, I assigned students a close reading activity for homework. They had produced one-paragraph close readings from selected short lines of poetry--their first fully independent close reading work. They were asked to make an argument about the meaning and importance of the lines that included both the how and why of literary analysis. In other words, students needed to identify something they found important about word choice, structure, etc. (this was the what) and then explain how they knew this was true (finding evidence), and finally articulate why the author made this choice. (These pieces of writing were used as building blocks for full close reading--skills we had been working on in class; I had previously given them several examples of complete analytical thoughts). I then annotated their written paragraphs to identify the "hows" and "whys" or to point out the missing evidence and explanation. We went over several examples using the projector. As we discussed my comments and ways to improve their close readings, I introduced the term "annotation" and we talked about how annotating can be used to improve their reading comprehension. This mini-lesson was useful in making sure that students both understood my feedback and began to learn the skills of active reading.

At the end of this class I had students make accounts with Genius, read their introductory page, and explore the website. Genius allows students to see a public community of annotators at work and in conversation, as well as understand how the annotations can enhance meaning. I was glad that the text we were reading, Junot Diaz's Drown, was not up on the site and annotated, as I wanted my students to engage their own critical thinking skills before they read other people's criticism.

During the next class I assigned students to five small groups (4-5 students) and asked each student to login to Genius. Each group had a different short excerpt (1-2 paragraphs) from the previous night's reading to annotate. Students were asked to look up words in the OED or by using other resources (as they were often looking up Spanish and Dominican slang) and explain these, as well as provide succinct close reading paragraphs that made an argument about the meaning and importance of certain words, phrases, sentences (building on the previous assignment). They began by doing the work individually, but enjoyed seeing one another's comments appear on the page, and I encouraged them to engage in conversation as they annotated, as well as afterward.

The groups presented their annotations to the class. Each group member was required to present at least one annotation. As a class, we discussed methods for strengthening each of the close readings and I explained how these paragraphs might be incorporated into their upcoming papers on the text. Because of the genius of Genius, students were able to comment on or revise one another's annotations. They are also aware that their work exists in the public sphere and may be edited by any member.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

-Introduce the building blocks or steps of close reading over the course of several classes

-Grade a close reading assignment using annotations that identify different aspects of the student's close reading (evidence and explanation, or "hows and whys")

-Prepare several examples of this completed assignment to show to the class (ask students for permission if projecting their work)

-Prepare students for the activity in a previous class by having them join Genius, read the introductory material, and explore the website

-Upload 5-6 excerpts from the next reading assignment to Genius (feel free to contact Jeremy Dean, Education Czar and alum, for help or advice: jeremy@genius.com)

-Split the class into groups

Instructions For Students:

HW Assignment (close reading building blocks--I provide an example of each of the following steps. I also provide them with a packet on close reading that we review as a class prior to this assignment):

1. Choose 2 lines from "Howl." Follow the steps below to produce a well-supported argument about the meaning of these lines.

2. Paraphrase. First you will need to make sure that you understand all the words in these lines (use the OED). Next, state what is said and/or what happens in your own words.

3. Make a list of observations about these lines. What's important? Refer only to details from these two lines. This will be your evidence.

4. Analyze. Now you need to consider the meaning of these observations. In at least two seperate complete sentences, describe how and why two of the above observations/details contribute to the meaning of this selection.

5. Argue. Produce a one-paragraph argument about the meaning of this selection. Each of your explanatory claims must be supported by evidence from these two lines.

Genius Group Activity

-Read over my feedback on your close reading hw assignment

-Find your assigned excerpt in Drown and reread this section to familiarize yourself

-Sign-in to Genius.com and search for the excerpt

-Begin by looking up any words you do not immediately understand, using the OED or other databases

-Next, annonate these words, explaining their meaning and situating them within the passage

-To Annotate: highlight the selection and click the "annotate" button that pops up, then enter your text into the textbox. Note: if someone has already annoated this selection, you may add your own text by highlighting the selection from right to left.

-Now, begin to close read the passage, adding annotations that provide context or further explanation

-Finally, choose a phrase or sentence that you find integral to the excerpt's meaning. Using the close reading steps, produce a one paragraph annotation of this material

-Discuss your annotations as a group and prepare to report back to the rest of the class

Evaluation Suggestions:

I did not grade this assignment (except as a contributing factor to students' participation grades) but students will soon submit a short paper on the text that will showcase their active reading and close reading skills--skills that hopefully further developed through their use of Genius. We did evaluate almost every annotation as a class, considering ways to improve students' articulations.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

Students seemed excited about this assignment and were generally very positive about the results of their work. Several of them told me they loved using Genius (and most were learning about it for the first time). Next time, I think I would annotate an excerpt as an entire class (to go over process and discuss best practices) and maybe spend more time introducing the website rather than letting students explore individually, as it took a while for some students to start their annotations. I would also prefer smaller groups and more excerpts, so that each student had the opportunity to provide a substantial close reading, rather than one or two students from each group dominating the annotating!

Course Type:

Course Description:

The banning of books continues today in the United States, speaking both to the fear of certain ideas and the power of the written word. In this course, students will read banned novels, short stories, and poems across cultural and temporal contexts, pursuing the following questions: What causes a text to be labeled “indecent” or “dangerous”? How is literature connected to political and social movements? How do these texts contribute to our understanding of what constitutes American literature?

The primary aim of this course is to help you develop and improve the critical reading, writing, and thinking skills needed for success in upper-division courses in English and other disciplines. You will also gain practice in using the Oxford English Dictionary and other online research tools and print resources that support studies in the humanities. You will learn basic information literacy skills and models for approaching literature with various historical, generic, and cultural contexts in mind.

Tags:

Reading Text in Context

Laura Thain — Tue, 10 Dec 2013 06:00:42 +0000

Author:

Laura Thain

Image Credit:

NY Times

Brief Assignment Overview:

This in-class exercise encourages students to explore context for texts they are analyzing (rather than receiving such context from direct instruction) and then use visualization software in order to present their findings to their classmates.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Arrangement

Audience

Delivery

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Cultural Context

Genre

Historical Context

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Pre-Writing

Research

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

This exercise aims to empower students to define textual context that seems important to them at any stage of their encounter with a text.

Media Requirements:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Required Materials:

Students need to have at least briefly encountered the textual object they are trying to contextualize. I usually conduct this exercise after their first section of reading.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Late in the Semester

Full Assignment Description:

The purpose of this exercise is to empower student to explore useful historial context by giving them clear guidelines by which to conduct preliminary research and to introduce visualization tools to implement in presenting that research to their peers. This exercise works best if the instructor has already provided context for class readings on several occassions, giving students an idea of what such a presentation looks like.

I begin by passing out a handout that describes different types of context that students may explore. I then randomly assign students to one of five groups in order to explore and assemble that context into a presentation. Pasted below is a version of this context handout created for Ian Fleming's From Russia With Love:

Context-Building Exercise

GROUP 1 Historical Context

As a group, situate From Russia With Love (1957) within its historical context. What is important to our reading of the novel in the world of politics, science, culture, social movements, or national identity? Is gender important? Is race important? Is sexuality important?

You may use dipity (www.dipity.com) to make a historical timeline that includes pictures or other visuals to present to the class.

Useful Resources: Gale Virtual Reference Library, Wikipedia, scholarly websites/blogs

GROUP 2 Genre/History of Genre

The Bond canon belongs to the genre of the spy novel—but also, arguably, to the history of pulp fiction, thrillers, and adventure novels. How do you see this novel fitting into a genre history?

Useful Resources: Wikipedia, Gale Virtual Reference Library, Johns Hopkins Guide to Lit Theory and Criticism (http://litguide.press.jhu.edu/cgi-bin/search.cgi), scholarly websites/blogs

GROUP 3 Adaptations

The Bond canon has been adapted into many media, including radio, television, film, and comic books. Explore different adaptations of From Russia with Love or other Bond novels and report to the class your findings.

Useful Resources: Wikipedia, YouTube, Google

GROUP 4 Consumer Culture

James Bond is a popular character in consumer culture (that is, culture revolving around things we buy). From video games to artwork to memorabilia, Bond is alive and well in the marketplace. Find objects of consumer culture throughout the history of Fleming’s novels to present to the class, especially objects related to From Russia With Love.

Useful resources:

Google image search, Ebay, Amazon, Etsy

GROUP 5 Reception and Publication History

How was From Russia With Love received? Did it remain in print? How do different printings differ (for instance, how does the cover art change)? Did audience attitudes toward the novel change over time? Find some original reviews and later commentary that tells you something about the reception history of the text.

Useful Resources: Use the Newspaper/Reviews tab here to find original reviews: http://www.lib.utexas.edu/subject/english/index.html

Amazon, Google, Goodreads

I then briefly present Dipity and Prezi to the class and encourage them to use these tools to create an informal presentation in the latter half of class. I also suggeted that Google Docs might be a useful tool in collaborating on the materials they researched to better ease the translation of that material into a final product. I then divide them into five groups--with a full class, this means three or four students per group. Be sure to instruct the class on how long you will give them to complete their presentation and give warnings as that time elapses. Our class is 70 minutes, and so I allowed 35 minute for assembly and 35 minutes for presentations.

In a shorter class, you may ask students to prepare presentations in class one day and present them during the next class period. In a classroom where each student does not have a lab computer, you may ask them to bring their own laptops or give this assignment out in advance, asking students to compile their materials as homework (over Google Docs and/or Prezi, a web-based collaborative presentation software) and present them to each other in class.

As they worked on their presentations, I walked around and checked their progress, answering questions or offering suggestions. When 35 minutes elapsed, I invited groups to the main proctoring station to access their projects and present them to their classmates.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

You may want to have some materials ready to suggest for each category in case your students get stuck--but letting students express their own contextual interests in their presentation is crucial to this exercise.

Instructions For Students:

Students need only be familiar with the text they are contextualizing, although you might ask students to familiarize themselves with the visualization softwares above before class.

Evaluation Suggestions:

Because empowering student research and presentation is central to this exercise, be cautious to criticize what students find; rather, praising innovative or clearly relevant material helps demonstrate to them that the details they present are appropriate.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

If students feel rushed, emphasize that the exercise is informal and encourage quality collaboration over quantity of information.

Course Type:

No Classroom Technology Required

Course Description:

I teach a ninety-minute class period of Literature and Popular culture, which is a varient of Literature Across the Disciplines (E314J). The course seeks to explore the intersections of literature and popular culture from the point of view of mass readership and other forms of mass media. The course requires students to consider mediation through the lens of culture, history, and media theory as they engage in close reading and analysis.

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Setting Up a Studio Environment for Multimedia Projects

Scott Nelson — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 02:27:16 +0000

Author:

Scott Nelson

Image Credit:

Matt Jones CC BY-NC-SA 3.0

Brief Assignment Overview:

Whenever I teach, I always assign some form of multimedia project, and these practices have helped to set up a studio environment where collaborative multimedia projects can thrive. Rather than post an explicit lesson plan to our site, I thought I’d run through a set of practices that have been successful for me over a few courses.

Type of Assignment:

Major Course Project

Semester-long Project

Assignment Length:

Multiple Class Periods

Course Unit

Semester-long Project

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

The pedagogical goals for this assignment are to have students think about what multimedia production skills they already possess and what skills they'd like to develop. Further, these practices foster a collaborative environment where studetns learn to work together toward common goals.

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

Since these are a set of practices rather than a specific use of a technology, what follows can be adapted to any classroom. Because most of the classes I teach are in rooms with computers for the students, I'll assume such a setup. Mainly, the students need some way to communicate with each other outside of class. I use PBWorks wikis for this aim, but a class blog or even email can be used to coordinate student skills.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Late in the Semester

Full Assignment Description:

While each course's specific assignment may vary, I've sucessfully implemented these practices in many student projects. These projects have ranged from creating infographics to video games to ebooks. What I hope to achieve from these practices is a form of student autonomy that places responsibility for their work squarely with students.

For this aim, it's important that the assignment's product have some form of value outside of the classroom. Digital media needs a real audience, one beyond just the teacher in a particular course. With this in mind, I require that any multimedia project that students create have some venue in which it is showcased. This can be something as simple as posting it to Facebook, or something more complex such as publishing an ebook in Apple's iBookstore. Hopefully, by having an audience beyond the classroom, students will attribute more value to the rhetorical work they do. These projects aren't just for a grade in a self-contained course, but instead rhetorical practices that work upon the networks they inhabit.

Secondly, I set up a type of Craigslist for student skills. Early in the semester, I have students post a brief biography detailing their current skills in multimedia production and skills they'd like to develop. I normally create a new wiki page for students to populate, but this can be done via a course blog or a mass email. This particular stage in setting up the studio environment requires that students think about their relationships to multimedia and the ways they can create in these modes. Undoubtedly, I have students who begin this stage thinking they have no skills in multimedia whatsoever, but a brief class discussion usually gets students thinking about the digital discourse communities they already belong to. Some may be avid social media prosumers, while others may keep Twitter or Instagram accounts.

A further advantage to these Craiglist-style bios is that students can self-select collaborative groups. If, for example, one student has a great idea for a video game, but no skills with Photoshop, the bios are a first step to making those need-based connections. Plus, because students are shopping for skills among their classmates, they tend to create more organic groups with a common goal. This practice seems to reduce the occurances of group members who refuse to contribute to a project and let others "take up their slack." Common interests drive group formation, so individual students are less likely to be bored with the project.

As a final bonus from this practice, because groups are formed based upon skills, sudents tend to create affinity groups that share knowledge. Students teach each other their skills, and thus all participate in the production of the project. While there is the risk that students will only practice what they are already good at, experience has shown me that this isn't the case. Students are genuinely interested in the common goal they've set, and hence, they all work to create a quality product.

The final practice I do in the classroom is to give students time to play. Multimedia takes some time to create, and scheduling in-class time to experiment is extremely important. Digital technologies ask that we manipulate them, to try out hypotheses regarding their rhetorics and grammars. Groups need time to teach each other skills, and studio work days are important for this task.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

As I've indicated above, this is more a set of classroom principles rather than a specific lesson plan. However, they've worked well for my students, especially when they are working with multimedia. A familiarity with programs like Photoshop, GIMP, Illustrator, Inkscape, inDesign, iMovie, Audacity, or GarageBand can help, but I've found the single most important skill to have is flexibility. No instructor can possibly know all there is to know about these multimedia creation applications, so a willingness to learn from students is paramount.

Instructions For Students:

Since this is a set of practices rather than a specific lesson, there aren't any explicit instructions to students beyond what I've outlined above. However, the following may be helpful when attempting to set up a Craigslist-style skill listing:

In a brief paragraph, outline your interests in the upcoming project, listing any type of multimedia you would be willing to work in or learn. The aim here is not necessarily to give only those programs you're already confident in, but instead your interests in creating multimedia using some applcations.

Evaluation Suggestions:

Because I use the Learning Record Online for all of my courses, the practices outlined above aren't assessed in the traditional sense. I circle the room on studio days, talking with students about what problems they may have run into and to get a general sense of the project's progression. The Learning Record allows for these documented processes to be used as evidence for learning, so the multimedia product is much less important than the processes students go through to create their project.

A successful project is one where students learn new ways of communicating in multimedia, and learn to collaborate with likeminded individuals toward a common goal.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

As I've indicated above, these pracitces have been sucessful in a variety of group projects. I've used this with an infographic assignment, a video game prototype assignment, an actual working video game assignment, an interactive image assignment, and an ebook assignment.

Course Type:

Advanced Writing Course

Course Description:

I have successfully used this studio environment in RHE 306, RHE 309K, RHE 312, and ENGL 314J. I'll give each course description below.

RHE 306:

This course is designed to prepare you for the academic writing you do at the University of Texas and writing you will do in your careers and personal lives beyond UT. It is a course designed to teach you not what to think, but how to think on your own. Ultimately, you should learn to be a better thinker, who is able to think critically about topics, other people, and yourself; a better rhetor, who is able to analyze a specific situation and adjust your writing to fit accordingly; and a better communicator, who is able to express ideas effectively.

It will include three units with each unit culminating in a composition and including writing instruction that supports the drafting of that composition. Composition is a broad term including symbolic efforts in a variety of media (including video, audio, and web-design, to name just a few). Many lower-division RHE courses (such as RHE 315 and 312) encourage or even require composition outside of the traditionally imagined prose essay. Nevertheless, the written component of every lower-division RHE class must meet the writing flag requirements as stipulated by the college. These written assignments may include a variety of genres, including narrative, argument, analysis, or critical reflection. (“Creative” writing assignments—plays, fiction, poetry—are not suitable genres for formal writing assignments.) As required by the college, each major writing assignment includes a peer review process. You will also complete informal writing exercises that prepare you to do the writing necessary in your formal assignments.

RHE 309K: The Rhetoric of Video Games

This course seeks to explore video games as a modern discursive medium. Far from being mere “mindless entertainment,” many video games make explicit or implicit arguments about gender and sexuality, economic systems, corporate practices, geopolitics, and both real and imagined societies. What arguments do these simulations and simulacra mount about how the world is? What arguments do they mount about how the world should be?

Much of the past and current study of digital rhetoric seems to look at the content of computers through applying older means of rhetorical analysis, looking at the text and images contained on computers rather than the processes through which this content is represented. What we seek to explore is a relatively new field—procedural rhetoric—and the ways this new field can inform video game criticism. How do the procedures inherent in video games make arguments about the world?

The course will include three major units with each unit culminating in a composition and including writing instruction that supports the drafting of that composition. Composition is a broad term including symbolic efforts in a variety of media (including video, audio, and web-design, to name just a few). Many lower-division RHE courses encourage or even require composition outside of the traditionally imagined prose essay. Nevertheless, the written component of every lower-division RHE class must meet the writing flag requirements as stipulated by the college. These written assignments may include a variety of genres, including narrative, argument, analysis, or critical reflection. (“Creative” writing assignments—plays, fiction, poetry—are not suitable genres for formal writing assignments.) As required by the college, each major writing assignment includes a peer review process. You will also complete informal writing exercises that prepare you to do the writing necessary in your formal assignments.

RHE 312: Writing in Digital Environments

This course explores rhetoric across a variety of modes: verbal, visual, aural, procedural, haptic, and kinesthetic. “Writing,” in this sense, refers to a variety of inscription technologies. For example, it can be communicating through text on a screen, through the rules of a game, or through the layout and colors in an image. In this course, we will create a variety of digital communications, most with a purpose of persuasion. In doing so, you will learn about digital discourse communities and will eventually present an argument to a chosen digital community.

Each form of media brings with it a set of affordances and constraints. Much of digital media relies upon the logics and metaphors of earlier forms of media, but does present new avenues of distribution and production to a wider range of people. In this course, you will analyze various forms and communities of digital communication and reflect upon these affordances and constraints. Hopefully, you will leave the course with a greater awareness of not only the communicative power of digital media, but also some of the limitations it imposes upon its users and producers.

The course will three major units, with each culminating in digital composition and textual reflection. Throughout the process, you will participate in peer review of your compositions and maintain evidence for use in your Learning Record.

ENGL 314J: Literature & Video Games

In the popular press, literature and video games are frequently positioned as enemies fighting over time. In a recent Slate article, for example, journalist Michael Thompson states that in the time it takes to play one modern video game, “You could read War and Peace, for instance, then follow it up with Thus Spoke Zarathustra and a few starter courses in a new language” (par. 1). Further, the often-cited 2004 National Endowment for the Arts’ Reading at Risk report places video games among other forms of electronic media as “competing” with literature. But both of these sources (and countless others) fail to examine the more complex connections video games have had with literature over the past sixty years. What at first began as a parasitic relationship of video games borrowing, adapting, or extending literary themes, characters, and plots has now become more symbiotic, with both media now remixing each other.

Rather than view video games and print literature as contenders for precious time, this course seeks to explore the ways literature and video games impact one another. That is, this course looks at literature as a practice and not merely a collection of artifacts. Using video games as a frame through which to study literature, we will work our way through a variety of genres, including fables, fantasy, epic poetry, historical fiction, science fiction, mystery, and gothic fiction. This course helps students prepare for upper-division English classes (as well as a wide range of upper-division courses in other UT programs and departments) by focusing on close reading and critical writing, and by introducing formal, historical, and cultural approaches to literary texts. Students will learn how to use the online Oxford English Dictionary as well as other resources essential to literary study.

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Teaching Audience and Stakes With the Colbert Report

Mercier — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 20:30:01 +0000

Author:

Aaron Mercier

Image Credit:

David Shankbone

Brief Assignment Overview:

This exercise asks students to work in groups to move past a working summary of a text's rhetoric to consider the goals of an author and their strategic approach to audiences. It uses PBworks' collaborative potentials to bridge the gap between two connected class discussions.

Type of Assignment:

Class Discussion

Assignment Length:

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Cultural Context

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Collaboration

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

Encourage students to think flexibly about the stakes of any given argument and the various goals an author might pursue.

Get students thinking about the relationship between rhetorical goals and persuasive strategies.

Continue to emphasize the central role of research in developing sound rhetorical analyses.

Begin thinking about transitions and their rhetorical function as a critical reader (anticipates later lesson on transitions considered as authors).

Media Requirements:

Media Console/Projector

Required Materials:

One clip of the Colbert Report, digital projector, computer classroom, PBWorks or some other collaborative website to which all students have access.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Full Assignment Description:

This exercise incorporates elements of full-group discussion, small-group work, collaborative writing, and oral presentation.

I used the 10/2/2012 episode of the Colbert Report as the assigned reading for the first of these class periods. I asked my students to watch the opening segment, paying particular attention to the way Colbert set up for his interview using punchlines as transition sentences to string together several topics having to do with the presidential election, campaign finance, special interest advocacy, and religion. This episode is a particularly rich one, but you can use any more current episode that features a "hostile" or oppositional-type guest.

At the beginning of class, I led a brief discussion of the clip, asking: what is Colbert's argument? What is Garlow's argument? What were they trying to acheive with their audiences? Were they addressing the same audience? Once we had agreed upon some very basic answers to these questions, I replayed the segment. I then started asking about transitions. How did Colbert's monologue prepare the audience to react to Garlow? How does Colbert link Garlow and his Pulpit Freedom Sunday movement to other political operatives like the Koch brothers, and what are the implications of such a connection?

Once we've got these questions resolved at a fairly basic level, I break the class down into 5 groups of four and ask them to

Use internet research to get context on Garlow, his movement, and the argument that he and Colbert have. The references to political figures, laws, the constitution, and the US tax code fly thick and fast in this segment, both before and during the interview, so there's plenty for them to pick out and focus on.

Come up with a coherent summary of Colbert's argument and Garlow's argument, each considered as separate texts. Use direct quotation to support the summary.

Getting to this point takes most of a 75 minute class. For homework, I ask each group to post a page of text to the PBworks website. In this page they must make a claim about both Garlow and Colbert with regards to what audiences they are addressing, what they want those audiences to do/think/take away from the interview,and support their claims with both direct reference to the Colbert segment as well as secondary information. On the following class day, each group presented their work to the class in a two minute prepared talk, outlined collaborative via pbworks.

The students seem to get quite a lot out of Colbert's humor, and are consistent in surprising themselves by discovering additional nuance in his argument. Four out of the five groups concluded that Garlow "wanted to convince more people that preachers should be able to talk politics from the pulpit" and supported their claim with direct quotation from Garlow on the issue of free speech. These groups invariably concluded that the appearance was unsuccesful for Garlow because Colbert won the argument, capitalizing on his friendly audience and attacking the obvious gaps in Garlow's logic and evidence.

One group, however, found that Garlow's organization had edited his appearance and put up a clip of just the interview portion of the segment, with none of Colbert's introductory monologue. This editing, together with the caption beneath the embedded video, led the fifth group to conclude that Garlow's goal in appearing on the Colbert Report was simply to gain exposure for his upcoming protest event by any means necessary. They point out that Garlow's whole intention, as he states on the Colbert Report, is to antagonize the IRS by preaching politics from the pulpit in unison with other preachers on one Sunday in October. This antagonism is meant to force the IRS into a legal showdoqwn with the Pastors in which the Pastors can show the government attempting to limit free speech and challenge the conditions of tax code's religious exemptions in the Supreme Court. The fifth group, then, concluded that Garlow was just as successful as Colbert in this segment, because his goal was never to win the argument, but to win more attention for himself. This idea led to a full class discussion about the various possible payoffs of "exposure for exposure's sake" in today's news environment.

This in turn led back to Colbert's transitions/punclines in the opening monologue. Using the quotations and summarized evidence transcribed by the various groups, we spent the rest of the second class period creating an outline of Colbert's argument from opening joke to introduction of Garlow, placing particular emphasis on how Colbert's jokes stimulate a process of association in the audience's mind that links Garlow to superPACs and wealthy conservative donors like the Koch Brothers. One student proposed we think of Colbert as attempting to undercut Garlow's "rhetoric of victimhood" and re-construct the preacher-activist as a plutocrat.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

This is a fairly low-prep lesson. You'll need to select and take notes on a Colbert segment, follow through on a couple of the research opportunities before class, and that's about it.

Instructions For Students:

For watching the video as assigned reading before the first clas period:

watch the opening segment, paying particular attention to the way Colbert set up for his interview using punchlines as transition sentences to string together several topics having to do with the presidential election, campaign finance, special interest advocacy, and religion.

For small group work:

Follow up on as many references and "factual" claims made by Garlow and Colbert as you can. Give yourself context and check to see how and to what purpose each speaker is deploying evidence. Evaluate what kinds of evidence are being used, and try to locate gaps or assumptions in the logic of each speaker. Generate a summary of each speaker's argument that accounts for how they deal with problematic evidence or cover over holes or assumptions in their reasoning.

For homework

Based on what you have now found out about Garlow, Colbert, and the issues they discuss, make an argument about what each speaker is trying to accomplish with the segment, amongst which audiences, and how they go about accomplishing it.

Evaluation Suggestions:

No portion of this assignment is graded, it is meant to stimulate conversation about a complex text and to provide low-stakes practice in invention, research, and the organization of an argument.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

This exercise generated some of the best conversation we'd had so far in the term, and a lot of students seemed to turn a corner in their struggles with "analytical vs. topical argument" when they ran up agains the idea that rhetorical goals can be specific, narrow, and complex.

Course Type:

Course Description:

Rhetoric 309k: Rhetorics of Truthiness takes most of its material from the news cycle as it emerges week to week. Using core theoretical readings assigned early in the term and selections from a writing textbook, students are asked to develop expertise on a timely, compelling, controversial topic through independent research and several interconnected writing assignments that move from summary to synthesis to rhetorical analysis. Much of the focus of the course is on teaching students to develop a tolerance for and facility with conceptual complexity, and to explore complex issues without attempting to generate a reductive, totalizing "answer" to questions of rhetoric and policy.

Tags:

Introducing iMovie

Jenny Howell — Thu, 11 Oct 2012 07:07:33 +0000

Author:

Jenny Howell

Image Credit:

Brief Assignment Overview:

This activity introduces students to iMovie software and reveals the range of rhetorical possibilities and effects that the program provides.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Accessibility

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Video

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

This activity not only introduces students to a useful software program but also allows them to see the effects that simple decisions--transitions, music, editing, etc.--can have on a visual text.

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

iMovie, computers

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Useful Anytime

Full Assignment Description:

I used this activity late in the semester, just before my students began editing the material they had filmed for their own documentaries. Although some of my students were advanced film majors, many were completely unfamiliar with editing programs, and I felt that a brief introduction would be productive. However, because this activity is designed with an eye toward that larger project, the more detailed instructions (see below) include ideas for using the program for their final projects in addition to using the program in class. I chose iMovie because it is mostly intuitive and user-friendly, and I narrowed down the activity to the tasks that I thought would be most useful and most impactful in editing a film. I handed out the following instructions, and I let the students use the entire 75-minute class to work their way through them:

Your iMovie film should include:

(1) At least one film clip (a screencast, a film downloaded from the Internet, or footage from your computer’s webcam).

(2) At least one still image (a picture downloaded from the Internet, or a photo you take with your computer’s webcam). To take a photo using the computer’s webcam, open the program Photo Booth (use the eyeglass icon in the upper right hand corner of your screen to find it), and take a photo. When you’re finished, simply click and drag the image into your workspace in iMovie.

(3) A voiceover.

(4) Nondiegetic music (a song or a sound effect). Since we don’t have any songs in the iTunes library on our lab computers, you can find free music by going to jamendo.com. Find a song you want to use, click “Download,” and it should appear automatically in your computer’s iTunes library. It should also appear in iMovie when you click on the music notes on the right side of the middle bar.

(5) At least one transition.

(6) At least one title and end credits.

While they worked on these tasks, I walked around the room, helping and offering advice as I was needed.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

I familiarized myself with iMovie (mostly by watching YouTube videos) in order to prepare the instruction sheet (copy-and-pasted below). Certainly, though, an instructor doesn't need to master iMovie for this activity to be useful. Following the step-by-step instructions the day before and playing around in iMovie (1-2 hours) should be enough to prepare.

Instructions For Students:

Once you open iMovie, follow these instructions to create your own film:

Step 1: Obtaining Video

There are three main ways to acquire video for your film.

Shoot film yourself. Clicking the camera button at the far left of the middle bar will automatically connect iMovie to any recording device (iPhone, camera, etc.) plugged into your computer. If no device is connected, it will default to the computer’s webcam. The video you record or import should automatically appear onscreen in iMovie in your “Events Library.”
Download film from the Internet (YouTube, Vimeo, etc.).
1. Go to KeepVid.com, and enter the web address of the film you want to use. Click “Download.”
2. You may have to “enable” this website, which can be done by clicking the arrow that appears next to “inactive plug-in.” Then click “Allow” when prompted.
3. Save the file as an mp4 file. (On lab computers, it should save automatically to the desktop.)
4. Take a screencast (a screencast is like a screenshot but with moving images; it records whatever is happening on your computer screen). The screencasting software we have access to is Camtasia.
  1. Find the program on your computer (use the eyeglass in the top right-hand corner).
  2. Follow the directions to record what’s on your screen. To finish recording, press shift + command + 2.
  3. Then, in Camtasia, export the screencast you just created. Go to “Share,” then “Advanced Export.” Under the “Export” menu, choose “Export to QuickTime Movie.”

To import film from the Internet or a screencast from Camtasia into iMovie, go to “File” in iMovie, then “Import,” and choose “Movies.” Select the film you want to import.

Step 2: Cutting & Editing

Your videos should now all be visible in your Event Library. To edit them and begin making your film, simply drag them into your workspace (the large "timeline" part of your window in iMovie). If there are major sections of the clip that you don’t want to use, click and drag over your clip while it’s still in your Events Library, using the yellow box to select only the sections that you want to use in your film. If you want to use the whole clip, you can right click, choose “Select Entire Clip,” and then drag it into your workspace.

Once you’ve dragged a clip into your workspace, you can click on the gear icon in the lower left-hand corner of the clip (it appears as you scroll over the selected clip) and select “Clip Trimmer” in order to more carefully choose which section of this clip you want to include in your film.
You may also want to divide your clip into parts (for example, if you wanted to separate two sections of the same clip to place in different parts of your film or if you wanted to apply video effects to one small section of a clip but not the entire thing). To do this in your workspace, select the section of the clip that you would like to split by clicking and dragging the yellow box. Then right click and hit “Split Clip.”
Now that you’ve adjusted the content of your clip, edit it in other ways: select the clip and then the “Inspector” icon (the “i” with a circle around it in the middle of the middle bar).
Play around with all the settings here: Under the “Clip” tab, you can add video effects and adjust the speed of your video. In “Video” you can adjust what your film looks like (brightness, exposure, etc.)
You can also crop the frame in your video (or in a still photo) by clicking on the gear icon and selecting “Cropping and Rotation.”
Also experiment with adding transitions between clips. Click on the rectangular icon (between the “T” and the globe) in the middle bar. Select your transition and drag it into your workspace. Adjust its duration by clicking on the “Inspector” icon or on the gear icon that appears in a blue box in the lower left-hand corner when you scroll over the transition. (Remember, though, that transitions can be jarring, so you’ll want to use them very carefully in your final film project.)

You may also want to insert still photographs. To do so:

Find an image (on the Internet, on your phone, etc.) or take one on the computer’s webcam using the program Photo Booth.
If you want to edit it, import the image into iPhoto and make your adjustments using that program.
Add your image to your project: You can easily import photos into iMovie from iPhoto by clicking on the camera icon on the right side of the middle bar. To add them to your workspace, simply click and drag. You can also just drag photos from your desktop or from a folder on the computer into the workspace in iMovie; it will automatically import them.
Note that iMovie automatically adds animation to your photos. Its default setting is the “Ken Burns effect.” To make any adjustments to the effects (e.g. to delete it, to change where in the frame the effect stops and starts, etc.), scroll over the photo in your workspace and click on the gear icon that appears in the blue box in the lower left-hand corner of the photo. Go to “Cropping, Ken Burns & Rotation” and play around with the options. Selecting “Fit” will remove all effects from your photo.

Step 3: Audio Editing

You’ll want to think about adding audio to your film through voiceover, sound effects, and/or music.

To add voiceover:

You will probably want to lower or silence the sound in the particular clip you’ll be talking over so that it doesn’t distract from your voiceover. To do that, select the clip and click on the “Inspector” icon. Select the “Audio” tab at the top and make the necessary adjustments to the volume of the clip.
Click on the microphone in the middle bar, and follow the instructions on the preview screen to create your voiceover.

To add sound effects and music:

Click on the music note located at the right of the middle bar. You should have iLife sound effects, iMovie sound effects, and whatever is in the iTunes library.
Click and drag the sounds you want to use into your workspace. Again, select the clip and click on the “Inspector” icon to edit the audio. Select the “Audio” tab at the top and make the necessary adjustments to the volume of the clip. Note: “Ducking” is a way to privilege certain sounds over others. Play around with the settings in this feature to achieve effects like decreasing the volume on a song just before an interview starts playing and then increasing it again as soon as the interview ends. (To achieve this, you would edit the audio of the clip or the audio track you want to privilege and choose “ducking” there so that the other audio tracks quiet down.)
You can also click on the gear in the lower left hand corner of the audio track and select “Clip Trimmer” to edit which parts of the song you want to use. (iMovie will automatically start from the beginning of the song.)

Step 4: Titles

A “title” refers to any words that you place in your film. To insert a title:

Go to the “T” icon underneath the preview window.
Click around for different styles (to see a preview of the effects, scroll over a title).
Note that at least 3 of these options are particularly relevant to your documentary film: the opening credits, the “Lower Third” to introduce words that enter at the bottom of the screen (to identify an interviewee’s name, for instance), and the ending credits.
To insert a title into your film, simply click, drag to the point in your workspace where you would like your title to appear, and drop. Decide if you want it to appear between clips or over a clip.
Click on your title and enter the text in the preview screen.
Double click on the title (or click the “Inspector” icon) to adjust the duration of your title sequences. You can also drag them around in your workspace and extend them manually so that they are on screen during a number of clips.

Step 5: Saving Your Work

Make sure to save your work on an online storage system or to a USB drive. (Lab computers will erase anything on the hard drive as soon as you restart the computer.)

Evaluation Suggestions:

I did not grade this assignment, but in retrospect I should have at least assigned a completion grade in order to keep them focused during class time.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

The activity went well. I think students were genuinely surprised at how editing, music, transitions, titles, etc. can completely change the meaning of a piece of raw video. As I mentioned above, I think I should have raised the stakes a bit, giving out a grade for completion because the temptation to watch YouTube videos or listen to music was too great. I also would have liked to screen a few of the completed films in class to use as the basis of a discussion about how and why the student made certain rhetorical and visual choices.

Course Type:

Course Description:

I teach RHE 309K: The Rhetoric of Documentary Films. The course considers both the rhetoric about documentary films (e.g. "what is a documentary?") and the rhetoric within documentary films. In the final unit, the students make their own short documentary film in groups.

Tags:

Film

IMovie

Video

Creating OED Word Constellations

Roberts — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 17:53:24 +0000

Author:

Michael Roberts

Image Credit:

Magnifying Glass by chrisjohnbeckett on flickr

Brief Assignment Overview:

In this assignment students use the Oxford English Dictionary to make individual mindmaps of the multiple definitions of related words, then the class together creates a constellation of meanings surrounding a seemingly simple topic that becomes more and more complex.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

Oxford English Dictionary (OED)

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Commonplaces

Invention

Kairos

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Textual Analysis

Word Choice

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

The main goal of this exercise is to get students familiar with using the OED, and to increase their awareness of the multiple overlapping meanings of words. The secondary goal is to get the students thinking complexly about a seemingly simple concept through an elaboration of the many words associated with that concept. The more they describe and map the intersections relating to a concept, the more complex the concept becomes.

Media Requirements:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Required Materials:

Computer classroom, access to the OED.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Early in the Semester

Full Assignment Description:

I ran this assignment in my class on the literature of disgust, so we began the assignment right after a reading from a book about the sociology and anthropology of disgust, early in the semester. In general, though, I think this would be best assigned after any reading about one particular concept or word.

At the beginning of class, we began with a discussion of the definition of the word in question (in this case disgust). As a part of this discussion we developed, as a class, a list of synonyms and related words and concepts. I had already prepared a list at home and made sure we got most of the words I thought would be most useful; many of these words also came from the reading. For example, for disgust we also came up with: gross, horror, sloth, terror, fear, loathe/loathing, hate/hatred, nausea, etc. Using the overhead, I then led the class through the basic uses of the OED, using disgust as the example. We talked about the various historical meanings of the word, how you can find examples, and how the different meanings might be in conflict or otherwise related to each other. The opening discussion took about 10 minutes, and the following demo/discussion took about 10 more.

I then split the class into pairs and assigned each a different word from our synonyms list. I showed them the mindmeister mindmapping website, and told the class that they should research their words and each create a mindmap explaining its multiple meanings, being sure to historicize each definition and include the relationship to disgust. The class did this for about 15-20 minutes. We then reconvened and went around the room, with each pair showing and explaining their map to the class. Finally I imported the different maps and created one larger constellation, all related to the one central word. This took the rest of the class.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

It is best to have a relatively full list of words prepared that would be fruitful for the students to research. This means looking up the suggested related words beforehand on the OED. Also come to class with a general idea on how the words might be related or overlap.

Instructions For Students:

Using the OED and mindmeister.com, create a mindmap for your selected word, linking its multiple meanings and explaining their relationships to each other. Be sure to historicize each definition and give examples of its use. Also be sure to relate the meanings to our central word; please use your own words and do not copy/paste. We will later combine these mindmaps to create a larger meaning constellation relating to our central concept; keep that in mind. You have 20 minutes to complete your map with your partner.

Evaluation Suggestions:

This is a research exercise, and doesn't require any explicit participation. The goal is to get the students familiar with the dictionary as well as the multiple meanings of words, so it is best to keep things informal and fun.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

In general this went pretty well, and the students had fun. I think a large portion of the fun came from us "investigating" such fun/gruesome topics, and words that had interesting backgrounds, so I would suggest doing the research before to make sure the assignment goes well. In general, though, I would definitely use this assignment again.

Additional Resources:

http://www.mindmeister.com/

Course Type:

Oxford English Dictionary

Course Description:

This course was for E314: Banned Books, but could be used in any literature course that emphasizes a historical/complex understanding of key words and teaches the OED

Tags:

OED

Mindmap

Research

Literature

Creating Visual Models of Rhetorical Concepts with Adobe Illustrator

detweiler — Tue, 25 Sep 2012 11:53:10 +0000

Author:

Eric Detweiler

Image Credit:

adapted from Avital Ronell's Stupidity

Brief Assignment Overview:

I’ve often found that writing about rhetorical concepts and theories only takes students so far. This assignment allows students to create concrete visual representations of concepts and theories in order to approach and think through them in a different manner.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Invention

Visual Rhetoric

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Literary Criticism

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

To help students consider how rhetoric and particular rhetorical concepts function in another medium. A way to move conceptualization, at least momentarily, out of the written word and into a more visual medium designed to complement/supplement/interrupt students implicit or unthought assumptions about rhetorical concepts and theories. Also to familiarize students with the interface of one of Adobe’s increasingly ubiquitous design and production softwares.

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

Student computers with Adobe Illustrator installed. (Alternatives: more basic image creation programs like Microsoft Paint, or drawing utensils and paper.)

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Full Assignment Description:

In the course, I assigned a number of theoretical readings about how irony functions (selections from Soren Kierkegaard, Wayne Booth, and Stanley Fish, among others). The second paper of the semester requires students to apply one of those readings’ theories to a piece of ironic discourse. One student’s paper incorporated and drew heavily on a visual model of irony from Booth’s A Rhetoric of Irony. Having the model at his disposal really seemed to help the student grasp and challenge Booth’s concept of irony as it applied to the assignment at hand. For subsequent iterations of the class, then, I decided to have students mock up their own visual models of irony. I give some advance notice, telling students a class period in advance that they’ll be responsible for creating a Booth-esque model of irony, and ask them to bring a hand-drawn or lo-fi digital mock-up to our next class meeting. I spend little time offering any sort of tutorial on Adobe Illustrator (which I chose for its breadth and relative popularity), as there are a great number of good ones online. Having students search for and locate useful web tutorials can itself be a good sub-lesson. On the day of the actual assignment, I show them where to find the program on their computers and let them have at it for roughly an hour. I mostly circulate, troubleshooting particular issues and questions as they arise. Students are required to turn their models in with their final versions of the paper assignment referenced above—roughly a week after the in-class Illustrator workshop. We revisit these models at the end of the semester as a way of thinking how students’ concept of irony has changed or gotten more complicated as the course has progressed.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Familiarize yourself with Illustrator (or whatever program you plan to use). You don’t need to know it thoroughly, as the models need not be more than shapes, arrows, and labels. I prefer to over-prepare when it comes to technology, however. Adobe has some tutorials available on their site. Also, notify your students a day in advance, as mentioned above. Learning the software is a useful and substantial challenge, and it’s easier if they’ve done some of the conceptual work of drafting the model in advance. That way they can practice “illustrating” with something concrete.

Instructions For Students:

The day before the assignment: We’ve discussed and applied Booth’s model of irony in class. To help you approach irony in a different medium than writing, you’re going to be responsible for crafting your own visual model of irony. You can use Booth’s as a starting point, but should not just copy it. Try to think of this in relation to your second paper: Even if you’re using Booth as your theorist, in what ways does the text you’re analyzing complicate or twist his model? If you’re using Stanley Fish as your theorist, how might what he sees as the “foundation” of irony differ from what serves as the foundation for Booth’s model. Bring a rough sketch (hand-drawn or computer-generated is fine) with you to our next class meeting. Next time, you’ll be using Adobe Illustrator, which is installed on the lab computers, to flesh out your models. If you are familiar with Illustrator, you can use it to mock up your rough draft. You will have an hour to work on it next time, however, so leave yourself something to do, and potentially be prepared to help out your classmates.

Day of: [after showing students where to locate Illustrator] You have an hour to work on these today. There are plenty of tutorials online, so feel free to search for them, or ask me or one of your classmates who’s familiar with Illustrator, if you need help. Your models are due with your final draft of paper 2. Save them as jpgs, gifs, or pngs and upload them to the appropriate folder on our course wiki [I prefer digital to hard copies in most cases]. If you need additional time, remember that PAR 102 [another computer lab with Illustrator] is available to you. Have at it.

Evaluation Suggestions:

I use The Learning Record, so this assignment isn’t evaluated in and of itself. If you wanted to grade it in isolation, the cogency and aptness of the model is certainly a consideration, as is the facility the student demonstrates with Illustrator. Balancing between those two would depend on your pedagogical purposes. In my case, I let students reflect on their model in conjunction with their papers, thinking about what approaching irony visually added to how they wrote about it and vice versa. I expect students will prefer one over the other to varying degrees for various reasons, and I’d rather put the focus on reflection than on the specific object they create, especially since we return to the models as a point of discussion much later in the course.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

I’ve been a bit disingenuous in using the past tense above, as I will actually be piloting this assignment in a couple of weeks. Feel free to contact me for after-the-fact details.

Additional Resources:

The Adobe tutorials also linked to above: http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/exchange/index.cfm?l=-1&o=desc&cat=212&event=producthome&s=5&exc=17
Google or another search engine

Course Type:

Course Description:

RHE 309K: A writing course focused on stuying and practicing methods of rhetorical analysis within the contexts of disputed issues of academic, political, or cultural significance. My particular course was entitled "Rhetoric of Irony" and looked specifically at the ways irony and its satellite concepts function in political and popular discourse.

Tags:

Using Photoshop to Create Persona-Avatars for Class Blog

OyP — Thu, 06 Sep 2012 18:00:32 +0000

Author:

Chris Ortiz y Prentice

Image Credit:

Chris Ortiz y Prentice

Brief Assignment Overview:

This lesson uses Photoshop to manipulate creative commons images found on the Internet into an avatar which represents the persona or ethos from which the student will write on a course blog.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Creative Commons

Multimedia

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

Allow students to develop a sense of self on the class blog; an ethos-creation project which facilitates better (because more committed) class conversation.

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

Adobe Photoshop

Google Images

Timeline for Optimal Use:

First Day/Week

Full Assignment Description:

First, I deploy a little litmus test and ask the students, “Who has used photoshop before?” A couple hands go up. I ask of these, “Who knows how to use the selection tool and how to select layers?” Most hands lower, but about four or five stay up. I distribute these students evenly amongst the class. The beauty of this lesson (as with many which involve teaching students how to use a new program) is that it depends upon peer instruction.

I give a short (fifteen minute) lesson to start class. I discuss creative commons, point towards the GoogleImage filter “labeled for reuse” and the condition “modification,” and show the students some online resources to find images (such as, http://archive.org/). Then I show them how to save the image to the desktop, bring it into Photoshop, rasterize if necessary, select what they want, and delete the rest.

I tell the Photoshop-familiar students that in addition to creating their own avatars they must also address their peers’ problems and help them learn the Photoshop basics. I say that I hereby deputize you to act as mini-instructors for the day, and then I encourage the other students to make use of their peers’ knowledge, not to let these deputies “do it” for them but rather make the deputy show you how to do it yourself. After

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

I recommend that the instructor have some familiarity with Photoshop before attempting this assignment. Best way to do that is to make an avatar of your own; once you get selecting, rasterizing, and sizing (and maybe some theme manipulation), you’re good to go! You’ll also need a course blog. You can check mine out here: http://texastalksvideogames.wordpress.com

Instructions For Students:

Today's assignment is to create a ‘gravatar’ for your profile. Think of this image as your calling card on the blog. (If you'd prefer not to make a gravatar--since it links up to your email and shows up anywhere you post to the internet while signed into that email--make an avatar image, but don't upload it to your profile. You should still complete the second part of the assignment.) You'll need to use Photoshop to combine at least two images, resize the image, and upload it on your profile.

Next, write a post and tell us, in about one hundred words, why you selected and made your avatar as you did. Title the post with your username, and upload an image of your avatar in the body.

Click here if you'd like some more pointers on selecting images in photoshop.

Evaluation Suggestions:

I grade this assignment on the basis of completion. I require all students to upload the image in a post which explains its significance to them.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

My class is composed of juniors and seniors and were very responsible about helping one another with the new technology. I myself learned some things about Photoshop as concerns arose (such as why you need to rasterize certain images to manipulate them). The students stayed on task and really got into making persona for themselves. The class I use this for is about the rhetoric of video games, so my students are probably predisposed to like the idea of creating an avatar, but the lesson should port well to any class with computers in the classroom, which uses a blog and is interested in digital rhetoric.

Additional Resources:

Computers in the classroom; Adobe Photoshop (CS4, CS5); should also work with opensource photoshop programs

Course Type:

Course Description:

RHE309K, The Rhetoric of Video Games investigates how video games make arguments. For instance, does BioWare’s 2010 Mass Effect 2 argue that as long as cultures remain distinct, constant warfare is a law of nature? Does the game then suggest that a more peaceful world can come only through the assimilation of all cultures into one? Or does the game argue, conversely, that a multicultural nation’s greatest resource is its capacity for tactical alliances between identity groups, and that the assimilation of one culture by another therefore weakens the union? As these questions indicate, even commercial video games make serious arguments about the world in which they are produced, exchanged, and played. In this course, we use the skills of rhetorical analysis to investigate how and what video games argue. We will pay special attention to procedural rhetoric in games and analyze how games model economies, geopolitics, war, even interpersonal relationships. In order to better understand the effects as well as premises of games’ arguments, we research the critical controversies about video games, and we consider the audiences games address. Finally, students use the skills developed over the course of the semester to conceive of and propose persuasive games of their own.

Tags:

Using Mind-Maps to Make Modular Arguments, MASS EFFECT Style

OyP — Thu, 06 Sep 2012 17:28:36 +0000

Author:

Chris Ortiz y Prentice

Image Credit:

Chris Ortiz y Prentice

Brief Assignment Overview:

This lesson is best used in conjunction with “Using Mass Effect 1 to teach critical situations," which can be found under that title on this site. One of the primary purposes of the Mass Effect lesson is to get students to think about how persuasive essays are “modular:” decisions a rhetor makes early on in an argument afford other rhetorical options later but at the same time take some options out of play. This lesson plan uses NovaMind Pro to help students create modular arguments of their own.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Presentations

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Visualization

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

To develop in students an understanding of persuasive speech and writing as rhetorical decision making.

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

NovaMind Pro. (Note that Mac and PC versions of this software differ significantly. The concurrence seems to be that the Mac version is more user-friendly.)

Other mind-mapping technologies should work as well.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Early in the Semester

Full Assignment Description:

In preparation for the class, students read three persuasive essays. The student’s task is to read each essay and break it down into its rhetorical steps: i.e. the author starts by doing x, then she makes y claim, then she makes z claim, and concludes with w. The class begins with discussion of the steps, until we’re all settled on how each argument proceeds. Then the instructor brings up a NovaMind map that visualizes each argument as its own “arm.” While it would be possible to have students make their own maps of the arguments, I recommend completing this preparation work for the students, to save time. You may ask students to make changes to the map depending on what came out of our discussion of the articles. You should also devote a little time to familiarizing the students with the software.

The instructor asks the students to get into small groups and then collaborate to combine the three arms of the map. They should do so by, 1) finding nodes in each arm that are similar, 2) taking the arm that follows from such a node and attaching it to the similar node on another arm. These steps are intended to be performed recursively, and while it is not necessary to end up with one big argument, arms should lead off of arms that lead of off other arms. (See instructor preparation below on how to facilitate the rather complex cognitive work this lesson requires.)

I ask students to think about what they come up with as a sort of “potential” argument. It could be navigated, from beginning to end, in a linear fashion. I ask students to traverse the map, making decisions at “crossroads” nodes that put you on a new track, which in turn brings further options “down the line.” Depending on decisions you make, the persuasive purpose of the argument may change.

In my class, students present a mind-mapped modular version of their persuasive essays as their final presentation. Instead of giving a persuasive speech, they tell us what options were available for them as they wrote their final essay, and why they chose to go one way as opposed to another.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

This is a heavy preparation lesson because the instructor must first make a map that contains lots of possible connection points. When students pull up the main map, they can click over to the connection points map, which I color code to emphasize possible connections. I do this because NovaMind can be a bit cumbersome to work with, and I want my students thinking about rhetorical decisions rather than how to untangle one arm from another (a common occurrence, once maps get bigger. I recommend using the auto-arrange feature liberally: “Command =” in the Mac version.)

Instructions For Students:

Instructions for reading homework:

Read the following each of the following articles.
After reading each, make a bullet-point list that enumerates each “step” in the article:

How does the author start? What does the author claim next? What’s the following move, etc.? How does the article conclude?

3. Bring your list with you to class. You’ll use it to construct a mind map in class.

Instructions for in-class NovaMind exercise:

Use the possible connections point map to find nodes that are similar on two different arms. Notice that arms are color-coded to emphasize similarity, but do not feel constrained to connect where suggested only. I recommend that you start by filling out one of the original argument arms, and then developing other arms if you have time.
Connect arms from similar nodes, wherever possible. Select the node from the connection points map from which the arm you want to connect begins. Push Command/Control C. Then select the node on the modular argument map, from which you want to attach the copied arm. Push Command/Control V.
If the arms get tangled, push Command/Control = sign. Remember that you can always push undo if something undesired occurs. Be patient and deliberate.
Follow argument paths and eliminate redundancies while preserving the greatest possible number of options.

Evaluation Suggestions:

I use this assignment to prepare my students for their final presentations. I encouraged experimentation and thus wanted to create a low-stakes environment; so I didn't grade the in-class exercise.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

My students seemed to really enjoy making larger argument structures, but I found one class doesn't provide enough time to get to the second part of the assignment, in which you step back and consider how you might traverse the map from start to finish. I'd recommend you use two classes for this lesson, and I'd also recommend you provide the starting materials for the students. The materials I provide below could be improved upon: as one of my students pointed out, the exercise works best if you break the articles down into the rhetorical decisions that went behind the progression of each argument. In the materials below, I do the much easier task of listing the steps in each argument. There's a fine but real distinction there

Additional Resources:

Course Type: