DWRL Lesson Plans - Multimodal

Assignment Length:

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Style

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

Microsoft PowerPoint

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Useful Anytime

Full Assignment Description:

In film and live performance, the use of time allows a writer/designer to show the reader/viewer/audience precisely what s/he wishes when s/he wishes. Kinetic typography is fundamentally different from static typography on a page, and those differences are explored in this project. In order to understand and appreciate the implications of using time as an available means of persuasion, students will create a kinetic type animation using PowerPoint, to accompany a quote of their choice.

Students are to find a brief quote to animate. The quote can be selected from poetry, music, stage, or screenplay, but the best quotes are often the ones that offer a range of emotions. Students will visually represent their selected text by expressing the content with typographic elements sequenced over a span of time. Students will carefully consider relationships between the spoken word and the visible and dynamic word, attending to variables like, typeface, typesize, weight, color, texture, focus, orientation, entrance, performance, exit, sequence, speed, pacing, transition, transformation, timing, tone, emotion, feeling, atmosphere, and interpretation.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Traditionally, shorter quotes work better for beginning animators. So, instructors may choose to provide a fixed list of quotes from which students may select their text for this project.

This lesson plan would work well in tandem with lessons related to visual rhetorics in which students build visual analysis skills by examining the visual features of texts.

Instructions For Students:

Having seen the examples in class, you will complete a short piece of kinetic typography. Choose a favorite quote and animate it using Microsoft PowerPoint. You may want to start by learning how to use PowerPoint's animation features. YouTube features a number of tutorials like this one that you may find useful.

Next, pick a quote. Write it down. Begin brainstorming what you might do with it. Think of ways to visualize the content of the quote using only text and shapes. Think about how the timing and/or motion of the elements might function rhetorically, or work together with the quote's content. Questions to keep in mind as you work: How difficult will this be? Will it add much to the final product (compared to the amount of work it will take)?

Then, get to animating! Try to take the quote apart so that the kinetic typography offers us a kind of visual analysis, showing something that wasn’t immediately obvious about the quote.

Course Type:

Advanced Writing Course

Using Prezi for Outlining Papers

Plourde — Wed, 01 Oct 2014 22:53:58 +0000

Author:

Aubrey Plourde

Image Credit:

Aubri Plourde

Brief Assignment Overview:

Students will synthesize their own rhetorical analysis with background research on their selected controversies using the visual-spatial format mimicked by Prezi's software.

Type of Assignment:

Homework Assignment

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:

Introductory Writing Course

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:

Video Remixing with Jon Stewart

Bohmann — Tue, 08 Apr 2014 21:51:53 +0000

Author:

Axel Bohmann

Image Credit:

Wikimedia Commons

Brief Assignment Overview:

The assignment introduces students to some very basic video editing techniques (cutting clips, detaching audio, inserting new audio) and gets them thinking about how the visual and sound channel in a video composition play together to create rhetorical effect. It's also fun as hell.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

Partial Class Period

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Multimedia

Multimodal

Remix

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

Every student needs to be able to access a computer with video editing software (I use iMovie since that is available on DWRL machines, but Mozilla Popcorn Maker is freely available and will work for this assignment too (see Beck Wise's LP post). A pair of headphones for each student is strictly not required, but without them there will be a lot of noise distraction. I just ask my students to bring their own headphones along with them to class and try to have a couple of extra ones available.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Late in the Semester

Full Assignment Description:

In March, 2104, Jon Stewart took this campaign ad from Kentucky senator Mitch McConnell (R) and developed a number of remixes from it (see for example the segment from the show or just search #mcconnelling). This practice quickly developed into a wide-spread online phenomenon. Apart from being hilarious, it is remarkably simple to do, yet can teach students a good deal about video composition. I developed a standalone exercise out of it that just introduces some basics of video composition, but you could easily fill a whole class period or even two with it (for example, I don't ask my students to analyze the McConnelling videos others have made, since at the point in the semester I'm doing this exercise I mainly want to lower their affective filter/anxiety about doing their own multimedia projects and help them acquire some skills to do so).

The first thing I do is simply show students the segment from the Daily Show, which has several examples of McConnell remixes. Most of my students this semester knew it already (although that's going to be different as the trend fades away), but everybody still enjoys watching it. Towards the end, there is a point when Stewart says "we're calling it #mcconnelling and I think everyone can play" (03:48). This is where I cut in and tell students that now it is their turn to play. To make it interesting, I make a competition out of it: the best McConnelling student video (by popular vote) gets to be handed in in lieu of their remixing assignment due a couple of days later.

I provide written instructions for a) downloading video and music from youtube, b) importing material into the event library in iMovie, c) starting a project in iMovie, and d) detaching audio from video in iMovie. In addition, students have found it helpful if I walked them through the entire process once on the instructor station. Once that is done, they need time (ca 20-25 min.) to get their materials in place and work with them. During this I hover around the classroom and try to answer any questions, help fix issues, etc.

One thing to be aware of is to leave yourself and your students enough time to make sure they can save their project, and save it in the right format (i.e. they want to 'share', not just save the iMovie project). In the trajectory of my class, it makes sense to withhold the finished #mcconnelling remixes from classmates until the next class session, when I use them as a segue into more advanced video editing. But there is no principled reason you should not watch the films as a class right after finishing the exercise.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

The most important thing you want to make sure is that you know your way around the functions in iMovie (or whatever program you choose) that students will be working with. I suppose the easiest way to do this would be to make your own #mcconnelling video. As an added benefit you can then show that to your students and give them another thing to compete with - works quite well in my experience.

Also, be sure to let your students know in advance that they should bring headphones to class. Else it will get distractingly loud.

Instructions For Students:

McConnelling in iMovie

This exercise will get us started on working in iMovie and thinking about remixing sound
and moving images to create new arguments.

If you haven’t seen it yet, watch http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/s4z9il/-mcconnelling

Find the original McConnell spot at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrdTX8m5G98 (or youtube search “McConnell original video”)

Download the video using http://www.clipconverter.cc/

Start iMovie (the little star symbol in your program bar on the Mac side of the computers, or use the search ('magnifying glass') function and type in "iMovie")

It will tell you you can start a new project by dragging and dropping material into “this area” (the project window), but that’s a lie

In fact, you will first need to import that material (File -> Import -> Movies) into the Event Library

Then, select the section you need from the library and drag and drop it into the project window

Select the entire project, right click on it, and choose “Detach Audio”

Now, you can simply delete the original audio

Choose an audio file that will work well with the video (remember you can use www.youtube-mp3.org to grab audio off youtube)

Unlike videos, the audio file will need to be directly dragged and dropped into your project from its location on your file system – don’t ask me why.

Have fun.

Evaluation Suggestions:

I work with the Learning Record (highly recommended), so there is no direct evaluation attached to this project. But even if you use a more traditional grading system, I would refrain from putting a number to this assignment. Since it is in-class work under time pressure and with all sorts of potential software issues built into it, this would seem unfair towards students. The only thing I do in terms of evaluation is let the class pick their favorite remix and give that a reward (in my case, having this work stand in for an otherwise additional remixing exercise).

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

My students generally loved this exercise.It's always fun to make someone else (especially a Kentuckian senator) look stupid, the cognitive load seemed just right so they were learning something new but not overwhelmed by it, and the sense of competition between classmates really spurred them on. The results look/sound great.

One student, however, could not successfully import video into iMovie and I was unable to fix the issue. So this exercise was a little frustrating for her. Some steps to take to prevent this from happening are a) making sure everybody works with the same version of the program that you use to demonstrate the steps, b) checking lab computers for bugs/issues.

Course Type:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Facilitating Multimedia Composition

RMazique — Sat, 05 Apr 2014 06:33:14 +0000

Author:

Rachel Mazique

Image Credit:

Rachel Mazique's "Disability in Pop Culture" Class YouTube Channel

Brief Assignment Overview:

This lesson helped students begin composing their final rhetoric assignment: a Multimedia Argument Project (MAP). I encouraged students to work with each other during the planning process and to collaborate with one another as they developed their digital literacy skills.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

Multiple Class Periods

Course Unit

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

In addition to the goals above, students were to:

-become familiar with the range of digital resources available for multimedia composition projects

-practice composing in multiple modes (visual, aural, alphanumeric)

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

--Please Note: all of the links below were organized onto appropriately titled pages in a folder titled "Final Project Help" on our class wiki--

1. samples of student-authored multimedia projects:

either from The Journal for Undergraduate Multimedia Projects (TheJUMP) or past student work from my class YouTube channel,

2. KeepVid website (best run on Safari),

3. a Google Doc for class brainstorming on “Beginning the Final Project,” (stored on a class PBworks wiki page)

4. Internet Archives,

5. Creative Commons for songs,

6. Disability song list,

7. Animoto website, instructions for Animoto video production, More Animoto Help,

(beneficial, though not required):

8. Digital Writing and Research Lab (DWRL) rental equipment,

9. our class PBworks wiki Homework page

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Dr. Rodrigue's Digital Writing Resource Page

Late in the Semester

Full Assignment Description:

Adapted from Justin Hodgson’s Multimedia Research-Argument Creation

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________

Multimodal Argument Project Prompt:

Using your prior knowledge, that of your peers’, and the skills you will gain during this unit, you will create a multimodal researched-based argumentative "document." These multimodal arguments should demonstrate a significant research effort as well as showcase your abilities to write, think, and express yourselves via the integration of multiple media. This research will include the time you spend with “how-to” guides/tutorials with the aim of improving your digital literacy skills. But, unlike the common approach to this type of "writing," where students/researchers write a traditional paper and then try to remediate that into multimedia forms, these projects will be "born digital." Composing digitally requires you to think, draft, design, and revise in multimedia, not engage in a text-to-multimedia practice.

The multimodal project is fairly open, but its breadth is necessary as each project will be different and take a different shape depending on the intent, skills, and risk-taking strategies of each student-author. I am open to your creative input and ideas!

Your controversy or the pop culture source that you’ve analyzed should shape your creations and the varying rhetorical strategies that you employ. For example, if you’ve analyzed a cartoon or comic in Paper 2.1, you may want to create your own. If you analyzed a documentary, consider creating your own documentary. We will more fully discuss the flexibility of this project in-class, both on the day this project is assigned and throughout the unit, to ensure that you have a solid grasp of how to navigate these guidelines.

That said, here are some concrete guidelines.

Minimum Requirements:

Must take a stance with relation to your controversy and attempt to persuade readers/viewers;

Must clearly be framed as an argument of conjecture, definition, ethics, value, or policy

Must engage your analyses of representations in pop culture by either supporting certain representations, subverting stereotypical representations and/or transforming an argument made in pop culture.
Must integrate and/or utilize multiple media (both the visual and alphanumeric modes are required) for rhetorical purpose (audio is encouraged, but optional—depending on your medium);

The video is not the only medium open to you; you can also compose a comic, be creative and innovative with PowerPoint, create a website, a video game, etc.
Feel free to run an original project idea by me for approval.

Must rebut/refute at least one counterargument/position with the presentation or production of counter-images, words, and/or voices.
Must include at least 5 quality sources and "Works Cited" details (in MLA format) within the MAP--not in a separate document:

At least 2 must come from scholarly resources (you should use the research you gathered for your Annotated Bibliography; you may also use the scholarly class readings)
If your project is nearing the maximum length, you may go over the limit (if you need more time/space to add in the Works Cited and make it readable). Note, this exception to the length requirement applies only for the Works Cited. If you want to discuss another exception, please see me. See the length requirement below.

Length requirement:

Create a 2-3 minute video if you’re working alone.

If you’re working with a partner or two, the video's length requirement increases based on the number of people involved: 4-6 minutes, or 6-9 minutes, respectively.
Group size max: 3 people
If you’re not composing a video, the length requirement still applies with relation to an in-class final presentation of your project. So, if you’re using PowerPoint, it should run 2-3 minutes long in a presentation.
If you’re making a comic strip, the strip should be about 2 pages long--or however long you need to make your argument and be able to present it to the class in 2-3 minutes.

Accessibility requirement:

Make your project accessible to a deaf audience (captions/a transcript)

I can work with you on captioning your video in the Open Lab (PAR 102) on Wednesdays from 5pm-8pm.
I can also point you to some guidelines I created and work with you during class.
Fyi: if your submission to TheJUMP is accepted for publication, you will also need to make your project accessible to a blind audience (descriptions of visual features). If you did this work in advance of publication in TheJUMP, I would consider this evidence of going above and beyond in the argumentation/digital literacy course strands.

For a variety of digital resources, see the link below:

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Plan for at least five weeks of in-class time to work on this multimedia argument project. Students need in-class time to familiarize themselves with the various technologies available to them and to learn how to compose in a digital medium besides the alphanumeric programs they are used to composing in (i.e. Microsoft Word).

If feasible within your department, sign up for at least a "plus" account with Animoto. Here in the Digital Writing and Research Lab (DWRL), instructors are fortunate that the lab will renew or subscribe to digital services like Animoto--as long as they serve a pedagogical function. I communicated with the supervisor in the DWRL, who renewed our plus account so students could create a video up to nine minutes long, which was what I required if a group had three students working together.

Below are the major steps I used for this day's lesson plan on "Facilitating Multimedia Composition":

Review vocabulary important to beginning students' composing process: topic, controversy, position and stakeholder. Ask students: what do these terms mean? What is the difference between a topic and a controversy? Explain how students should organize their arguments.
Have students review what their classmates are doing (on a Google Doc students filled in at the start of today's class: “Beginning the Final Project”) and consider who they may want to collaborate with in a co-authorship of this final project.
Introduce students to KeepVid as a way to export videos from YouTube.
Discuss Copyright laws.
Introduce the Internet Archives and Creative Commons.
Point students to “Disability Songs” list.
Have students use the rest of class time to talk over ideas with classmates they want to work with, review samples of student-authored multimedia projects on TheJUMP/previous work from our class YouTube channel, plan their final project with a rough outline, and look for images, videos and/or songs they may want to use.
Remind students to not only look for images, videos and songs that they agree with or those that could support their argument but also images, videos, and/or songs that they disagree with and will refute/rebut in their final project.
Review the definitions of refutations and rebuttals.
Point students to instructions for Animoto (on the wiki) but also mention that I can help students with this program.

Instructions For Students:

As a starting point to today's class, I had students go to the “in-class activities” folder on our class PBworks wiki.

From there, they went to the Google Doc folder and clicked on the “Beginning the Final Project” page.

Here's what they needed to write out as a starting point to the composing process. (The page also functioned as a class resource that would allow students to determine who they might want to co-author a project with.)

Please write:

1. Your topic;

2. Your controversy;

3. The pop culture source you will remediate

4. At least three positions that stakeholders take with regards to your controversy

5. The position that you saw your pop culture source taking

6. The position that you yourself take. (I explained that for this final unit, students were invited to share their viewpoint and to tell us where they stood with regards to their controversy.)

7. Possible multimedia project ideas you are considering (website, comic, documentary, photoessay, stop motion animation, etc).

Evaluation Suggestions:

For information on how I assessed students' final projects, please see my blog post on the topic: "Multimodal Writing: How do we Assess New Media?" at the Digital Writing and Research Lab's Blogging Pedagogy website

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

Students had the choice to author a project alone or to work in groups of two or three. The number of students involved in a project affected the length requirement. Longer projects were expected of group-authored multimedia arguments.

Most students felt that their controversy was unique and would not merge well with fellow classmates' controversies or topics. (These final projects were the result of a semester-long process researching a single controversy). Those who did choose to co-author a project chose to work with only one partner rather than two (for logistical reasons apparently). One group started with three members, but one member eventually decided she wanted to work on her own due to creative differences. She had a specific argument she knew she wanted to pursue.

Students who were interested in co-authoring a project needed extra guidance from me on how to coherently weave together an argument on two distinct controversies. With these students, I encouraged the student groups to start from a broader standpoint--to work from our class topic "Disability in Pop Culture"--and to use research from their specific controversies to determine an argument they wanted to make about their particular topics within our class's "umbrella."

Several students were anxious about multimedia composition.

Several others were excited about this change of pace.

In the end, through in-class guidance and collaboration amongst peers, students who were anxious about composing in iMovie for the first time (for example) were eventually proud of their final product and the new digital literacy skills they gained throughout this composition process. Several students creatively went above and beyond the requirements to create a project they would be glad to publish in a public forum such as our class YouTube channel.

One student even composed an entirely original music video; another student drew and created an original stop-motion animated video; several others drew their own comics (either by hand on paper, or online with digital drawing tools/comic software).

Additional Resources:

Recommendations from Justin Hodgson:

Bump Halbritter's recent book Mics, Cameras, and Symbolic Action: Audio-Visual Rhetoric for Writing Teachers talks about audio and video work,

Sean Morey recently had his textbook The New Media Writer come out with Fountainhead Press,

and Kristin Arola, Jennifer Shepard, and Cheryl Ball recently published their Writer/Designer: A Guide to Making Multimodal Projects.

According to Professor Hodgson, those three texts provide a nice (but not comprehensive) avenue into conversations about multimedia composition and some particular strategies for writing (with) media.

Beyond that, he recommends that instructors peruse the Computers and Composition (and Computers and Composition Online) journals for works that might resonate with your class's particular focus.

And, as always, the Blogging Pedagogy site and TheJUMP are useful resources!

Course Type:

Introductory Writing Course

Course Description:

In this course, students focus on analyzing the relationship between pop culture and rhetoric. Their analyses examine public disagreements about various issues such as: How do popular (mis)representations of "the supercrip" convince us to make political decisions regarding accessibility, advocacy, education, and/or social policy? How can we evaluate arguments that not only depict (dis)abled people as "heroic" but also those that portray the converse: the "grotesque unfortunate" deserving of "pity" and "help"? How do these arguments address questions of basic human rights, needs, drives and "eugenics rhetoric"? Will children (and adults) make political decisions based on recurrent thematic representations of "disability" in pop culture, and, is that a good or bad influence?

Tags:

Practicing Visual Invention

Eatman — Fri, 07 Mar 2014 17:44:15 +0000

Author:

Megan Eatman

Image Credit:

Via SubmitInfographics.com

Brief Assignment Overview:

This in-class assignment asks students to construct a visual version of a written or spoken argument. By asking students to first translate an existing argument into a visual form, the assignment eases students into processes of visual invention to prepare them for a more substantive multimodal composition.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Arrangement

Visual Rhetoric

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Adaptable For Use Without Classroom Technology

Pre-Writing

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

This exercise introduces students to the process of multimodal composition, asking them to begin thinking about how images can persuade a particular audience.

Media Requirements:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Required Materials:

Ideal:

A projector and media console for the instructor
Computers for each student
Photoshop

This exercise could also be adapted to use pens and paper rather than Photoshop.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Introductory Writing Course

Full Assignment Description:

Students will read through a brief argument about an issue with which they are already familiar. I like to use opinion pieces from the Daily Texan, the University of Texas student newspaper, because they are short, simple, and do not require students to have a great deal of background knowledge. Students read through the piece, then, in small groups, use Photoshop to build a visual version of the argument. Depending on the piece, the visualization might be in the form of an infographic, a printed PSA, or a collection of related images. Groups then share their pieces with the class and discuss the choices they made.

While I was initially reluctant to ask students to translate an argument from one medium to another, I think that this activity, particularly early in a multimodal composition unit, helps students begin to understand how arguing in other media works differently than arguing in text. Asking them to think in images without having to generate an argument independently can both show the limits of translation and offer an opportunity to practice visual invention. Additionally, students have the opportunity to experiment collaboratively with Photoshop.

Prompt for Students

Read through the article and then, in groups, use Photoshop to produce a visual version of the author’s argument. This argument may contain a small amount of text, but should rely primarily on images, and should target the same audience (UT students) as the original argument. Be prepared to share what you have made and talk about your choices.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

This activity is designed for students who are already familiar with rhetorical analysis of alphabetic texts and, to some degree, visual and multimodal texts. Students should be able to describe how a written argument persuades its audience so that they can translate it more effectively. Additionally, it would be helpful if students had a brief introduction to Photoshop before beginning this exercise. The instructor could do a hands-on introduction for some or all of the previous class.

Instructions For Students:

In addition to the prompt above, I ask students to take turns "driving," or actually making the Photoshop edits, so that each student has time for hands-on practice.

Evaluation Suggestions:

For a course that has classwork grades, this exercise could be given a completion grade. Since the exercise is supposed to provide a safe space for experimenting with visual invention, I would not advise giving letter grades.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

This exercise could be adapted for a classroom without technology if students were given pens or markers and paper and asked to translate an argument into a poster. Students have fewer options in this version (since they cannot alter images the way they could in Photoshop), but they would still have the opportunity to think in images.

Course Type:

Course Description:

RHE 309S, Critical Reading and Persuasive Writing, teaches students how to analyze and write arguments, but it also introduces students to rhetoric as a civic art, one that prepares them to write to and for specific publics. My version of this course asks students to look at arguments within and about online communities. The course is designed for students who have credit for the department's introductory Rhetoric and Writing course, but who still need or want a lower-division rhetoric and writing course.

Tags:

Visual Rhetoric

Photoshop

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:

Adaptable For Use Without Classroom Technology

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:

Talking Heads, Remain In Light

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:

Literary Studies Course

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.

Tags:

Teaching Context with Album Covers

Rhiannon Goad — Fri, 15 Nov 2013 22:42:58 +0000

Author:

Rhiannon Goad

Image Credit:

Brief Assignment Overview:

This lesson plan uses album covers and music to help students (1) utilize vocabulary and (2) consider the importance of context in rhetorical analysis.

Type of Assignment:

Homework Assignment

Assignment Length:

One-Two Class Periods

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

handouts, Internet, screen projection, audio, and computers for students groups (optional), website/Spotify for posting images and music (optional)

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Full Assignment Description:

In this assignment, students examine a group of album covers twice: first without the music and then along with. Examining album covers one step at a time allows students to see the payoff of careful analysis. This exercise also helps students understand the importance of context when analyzing a piece.

Pro tip: My students were more responsive when asked to analyze new album covers that they had not yet seen for music they had not yet heard. To find new albums for this, I found this guy is pretty useful.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Prepare a sideshow with album covers (I used 5)
Prepare a playlist of songs corresponding to the album covers (I used spotify)
Prepare a packet of handouts for students. For each album cover you show, have a sheet with the same questions on both sides. Label one side A and the other side B. On mine, I asked: What emotions might this artist invoke? How? What does this album cover suggest about the artist? How? What values does the audience hold that this artist might appeal to? What kind of style is used and for what purpose?
Distribute packets and explain to students the exercise
Have students answer the questions the on “Side A” as you show the album covers without music
Have students flip their packets over to "Side B" and repeat slide show for students (I spent about 1 minute or show per album cover)
Put students into small groups to discuss their findings
Discuss findings with students; ask: How did your responses differ when you heard the music?

Instructions For Students:

Use packet of handout to take notes
Answer the questions the on “Side A” when we look at the album covers without audio
When you reach the end of your packet, flip it over to “Side B”, now answer the questions again
Get into groups of 3 to 4, discuss some of the differences you found between your notes

Tags:

Compiling Context with Digitized Periodicals

Coleman — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 01:29:53 +0000

Author:

Catherine Coleman

Image Credit:

Accessible Archives

Brief Assignment Overview:

Students examine and manipulate digitized page images in order to consider the presentation of serialized texts. “Compiling Context” is a versatile introduction to periodical print culture suitable for literature and rhetoric courses.

Type of Assignment:

Homework Assignment

Assignment Length:

Adaptable For Use Without Classroom Technology

One-Two Class Periods

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Multimedia

Multimodal

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

Database and periodical research

Media Requirements:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Required Materials:

Digital access to periodical with original page images -- ideally with downloadable image files

USEFUL: A forum (e.g. a blog or wiki) where students post and comment on textual or visual compilations

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Useful Anytime

Full Assignment Description:

1. Access original page images of the source text. Library (subscription-based) newspaper databases often include original images, as do some free online services like Cornell's Making of America Collection.

2. Provide access to students by

a) downloading images of all or pertinent issues featuring the primary text (emphasizing the publication itself). High resolution images can be uploaded and selectively shared on Dropbox or Google Drive. The file viewer in Google Drive/Docs allows for high-resolution zoom while maintaining image quality and readability.

b) Create a guide for students to access issues (emphasizing research techniques). See 'Instructions for Students' below for a sample guide to accessing Uncle Tom's Cabin in the National Era through Accessible Archives. This can allow students to familiarize themselves with databases and practice the necessary steps for retrieving and saving page images.

3. Have students visually examine digital images of the issue(s) containing the source text. In engaging with the serialized version of the text they can be encouraged to

a) Consider relevant content published simultaneously with the primary text

b) Trace the evolution of political and social discourses across several issues or selected issues

4. Students then engage in the process of interpretive selection through either

a) Visual manipulation of the digitized source -- selection, cropping, digital mark-up, collage-making, etc.

AND/OR

b) Textual summary of the digitized source

5. Have students submit or post their compilations of context (image files, short write-up) -- ideally in a forum that allows commenting or other forms of feedback.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Secure access to page images in advance. You may wish to limit or direct the attention students devote to the original publication. You might

Limit students to front pages, especially if the primary text customarily appears on this page. This is the case with Uncle Tom's Cabin.
Have students access issues and then peruse textual (OCR) lists of content rather than page images
Have students select a topic ahead of time and run limited searches on the periodical to trace how discourse shifts across a broader range of issues

Instructions For Students:

I provided the following instructions for accessing Uncle Tom's Cabin in the National Era through the University of Texas at Austin's subscription to the "African American Newspapers: The 19th Century" series of the Accessible Archives primary-source database to students in my English 314L: Banned Books and Novel Ideas -- "Citizens and Censors" course:

1. Go to Google Drive where high quality jpeg images of the first ten installments of Uncle Tom’s Cabin are posted.

2. With a partner (where possible) note any significant headlines accompanying the installment you’re assigned.

3. If there are no significant headlines on the first page, or if you’d like more information:

a. navigate in a browser to http://lib.utexas.edu/

b. Click on the tab for ‘Databases’ and click the small link ‘Browse by type’ c. ‘Historical Newspapers’ > ‘African American Newspapers: The 19th Century’

d. On Accessible Archives, click the ‘Show more search boxes’ link.

i. ‘Stowe’ (AND) ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’

ii. Under Source, click and highlight ‘The National Era’

iii. 1851-06-01 to 1852-05-01

iv. Sort by Date

v. Scroll down to your installment date.

vi. Click on the installment or another article from your issue.

vii. Click ‘Issue Contents’ in the top menu

viii. Browse articles searching for anything relevant to Stowe’s novel.

Once students have access to issue images (and content lists, if need be) they can compile and present pertinent elements either visually using Photoshop and/or other image manipulation software to cut out specific articles or headlines. They may then unite these texts in the form of a collage or a written exposition interspersed with clippings from the digitized issue.

Evaluation Suggestions:

This assignment can be designed to target specific skills (research, visual manipulation and creation, etc).

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

I would ideally preface this assignment with an Archive or Library day where students can at least see old periodicals and recognize how publication size/design standards have shifted over time.

Students were intrigued by the material elements of these publications (varying text sizes, different conceptions of "headlines" and emphasis, fading and blurring, markings suggesting provenence) even when they were only working with digitized images.

Course Type:

Literary Studies Course

Course Description:

E314L: Banned Books and Novel Ideas -- "Censors and Citizens"

Tags:

Database

Literary research

Shifting Focus from Content to Medium

Laura Thain — Sun, 06 Oct 2013 02:05:07 +0000

Author:

Laura Thain

Image Credit:

Blancomoleon

Brief Assignment Overview:

Using various records of the Hindenburg disaster, this assignment encourages students to engage with medium over content, especially in terms of literary studies.

Type of Assignment:

Class Discussion

Assignment Length:

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Arrangement

Rhetorical Analysis

Visual Rhetoric

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

This assignment encourages students to think beyond their preconceptions of what "medium" is and view all things as mediated--especially text.

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

Instructors will need to assign an orienting theoretical piece on medium and assemble an applicable archive of media for students to analyze. I used the first chapter of McLuhan's Understanding Media ("The Medium is the Message").

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Useful Anytime

Full Assignment Description:

Assign the students a piece of media theory that you think well supplements their primary text reading in a literature class or your chosen archive of materials in a rhetoric class. Some potential candidates include Raymond Williams, Marshall McLuhan, or Bolter and Grusin. You may also ask your students to watch a lecture such as this one in order to gain some grounding for talking about media. We spent a full class period discussing McLuhan's argument before engaging in this activity.

I then assembled an archive of media artifacts around our primary text, War of the Worlds. I asked the students to approach this archive mostly through affect, which I defined as "the way media objects make us feel."

I began by handing out a transcript of Herbert Morrison's famous radio broadcast account of the Hindenburg disaster. I asked the students to read this transcript to themselves and circle words or phrases that made them feel a certain way. Then, I asked them to account for their experience in terms of the medium in which they experienced it. Next, I played an audio file of Morrison's radio broadcast and asked them again to recount their reaction, again accounting for medium. Finally, I asked them to watch a YouTube video that superimposed a Universal news reel of the explosion over the audio of the broadcast. Students were generally most moved by either the radio broadcast or the YouTube video and discussed why.

I then explained that Orson Wells wanted to capture the "spirit" of the Hindenburg broadcast (1937) in his own adaptation of War of the Worlds (1938). I played a ten-minute portion of the radio broadcast and asked them to relate the two radio pieces to each other, again, paying attention to how the medium of radio attempted to make its audience feel a certain way.

By this point, the students generally agreed that radio, rather than "lacking" the visual, capitalized on conveying information chiefly through an aural medium. We talked a little bit about McLuhan's view of "hot" vs. "cold" media, and I then asked them to think about how text itself also function as a medium.

We then read a selection from Book II, Chapter 4 ("The Death of the Curate") in War of the Worlds as a class. I asked them to each read a paragraph of the text as dramatically as they felt comfortable doing. Again, I asked them how the text as a medium tries to inspire suspense in the audience.

Finally, we watched an analagous clip from Steven Spielberg's 2005 War of the Worlds, in which the Martian alien, like the passage from the book, is probing the basement while the protagonist hides in fear. I asked them how the visual medium attempts to create suspense in the same plot arch. After students practiced analyzing the two very different methods, I reiterated that that content of the two pieces was somewhat irrelevent to their analysis--the medium was what mattered.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Make detailed notes on the orienting piece of media theory you assign your students and spend time working through that piece with them. Our class spent an entire day on "The Medium is the Message" and read it in terms of our current text (War of the Worlds) before engaging in detailed analysis of other media.

Instructions For Students:

Students need to read and discuss a secondary media text in addition to primary course materials for this lesson.

Course Type:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Literary Studies Course

Course Description:

Student Digital Activism as Rhetorical Advocacy/Analysis

Hoag — Sun, 04 Aug 2013 21:05:39 +0000

Author:

Trevor L. Hoag

Image Credit:

Graphic posted on xomariee.wordpress.com

Brief Assignment Overview:

This assignment challenges students to become digital activists/advocates for a cause of their choosing, and aids them in developing a portfolio of work in the service of that cause.

Type of Assignment:

Semester-long Project

Assignment Length:

Semester-long Project

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Close Reading

Textual Analysis

Word Choice

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Media Requirements:

Timeline for Optimal Use:

First Day/Week

Full Assignment Description:

This ambitious assignment challenges students to become digital activists/advocates for a cause of their choosing, and aids them in developing a portfolio in the service of that cause. Students begin the class by researching a cause to advocate for such as vegetarianism, marriage equality, or gun rights. Students then produce a series of compelling “media artifacts” for that cause such as social media websites, blog sites or websites, an image or infographic/meme, an “anti-artifact” in the form of information deletion/lockdown, a digital map or timeline, and finally, a collaborative project. Instructors can also ask students to “justify” their artifacts by theoretically analyzing them and by comparing them to other analogous artifacts.

Note: Many other options for artifacts exist such as games, videos, and more.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Not for the faint of heart, instructors who wish to employ this assignment arc must familiarize themselves with a number of different technologies including, for example: Facebook, Twitter, Wordpress, tumblr., Wix, easel.ly, Wordle, quickmeme, Storify, and many other applications. However, instructors should not fear discovering and learning new technologies alongside their students as it encourages a more “horizontal” classroom structure. An instructor who attempts such an assignment will learn much!

Instructions For Students:

In this course on digital writing/humanities, you will become a digital activist in the service of a cause. You will develop a portfolio of work in the service of this cause that you will present at the end of the semester. You are also responsible for theoretically analyzing the “media artifacts” that you create by applying course readings as well as comparing the rhetorical strategies you have employed with other similar (or different) media artifacts.

Step #1: Research a cause to advocate for across the arc of the semester. You have a lot of options, so make sure you care deeply about the cause for which you are advocating. Students in past courses have become digital activists regarding, for instance: body image, disability, cheating in sports, net neutrality, vegetarianism, cyber-bullying, women’s health services, marriage equality, and much more!

Step #2: Once you have an exciting/fulfilling cause to advocate for, you will now begin producing and analyzing “media artifacts” in the service of that cause. In this particular course, you will produce six different types of digital media/humanities writing: a social media website (or sites), a blog site or website, an image or infographic (which can include a series of memes), an “anti-artifact” in which you will delete or lock down information online, a digital map or timeline, and finally, a collaborative project with others in the class. You do not have to have any prior knowledge of the technologies that you employ to develop your artifacts—a big part the assignment is just exploring! So take a look at the following examples, create accounts on whatever sites you think will work best, and go to town!

P.S., It’s a big help to find others in the class who are using similar sites/technologies or advocating for similar causes at any given time. Start collaborating as soon as you can, and you’ll find it eases your classroom tasks immensely!

REMINDER: Every artifact is accompanied by a 1-page theoretical analysis. For example, one might discuss one’s Twitter feed in reference to, say, Denis Campbell’s Egypt Unshackled: Using Social Media to @#:) the System. Likewise, all deletions should engage Viktor Mayer-Schonberger’s Delete: The Virtues of Forgetting in a Digital Age. Analyses are also encouraged to include comparisons/contrastings of rhetorical strategies with other similar artifacts, whether those of student colleagues or “outsiders.”

Artifact A (Social Media—Facebook, Pintrest, Twitter, etc.)

https://www.facebook.com/veggiedc?ref=hl

https://www.facebook.com/NoSpecialTreatmentofReligiousOrganization?ref=hl

http://pinterest.com/pin2891/rhe312/

http://pinterest.com/gendernorms/genders-created-by-society/

https://twitter.com/kidsaresponges

https://twitter.com/ChurchesTax

Artifact B (Blog or Website—tumblr., Wordpress, Blogspot, Jux, Wix, etc.)

http://loverealyou.tumblr.com/

http://lgbtmarriagenow.tumblr.com/

http://fucknoqueerfetishization.wordpress.com/

http://healthstartfoundation.wordpress.com/

https://aforactivism.jux.com/

http://copywritecopy.wix.com/copyrightorwrong

http://getyourkidsoffline.blogspot.com/

Artifact C (Image—easel.ly, quickmeme, Photoshop, Paint, etc.)

http://i.imgur.com/1vX9GVx.jpg

https://s3.amazonaws.com/easel.ly/all_easels/92675/Drugusage/image.jpg

https://s3.amazonaws.com/easel.ly/all_easels/94299/Queerfetishization/image.jpg

http://www.quickmeme.com/meme/3t8ws8/

http://www.wordle.net/

http://www-958.ibm.com/software/analytics/manyeyes/

Artifact D (Deletion)

Note: The deletion is in some ways the hardest artifact to produce. Essentially, your goal is to “become-imperceptible” by removing yourself from the Web, or by blocking access to content that’s related to you and/or your cause. You can also find a website or application to analyze that “deletes” something for you. Be creative and try your best! (See also: http://lessonplans.dwrl.utexas.edu/content/becoming-imperceptible-or-how-disappear-completely)

https://duckduckgo.com/

http://suicidemachine.org/

Artifact E (Map or Timeline—Google Maps, Text2MindMap, Storify, Zeega, Tiki-toki, ManyEyes, Wordle, etc.)

https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msid=210792301150685076515.0004d98cf1fb8dcdd07a1&msa=0

http://www.text2mindmap.com/vBL47F

http://storify.com/Dopeandsports/drug-enhancement-in-professional-sports

http://storify.com/ryleegonzalez/queer-fetishization-and-gay-marriage

http://storify.com/dawn1/women-s-sports-uniforms-across-time

http://zeega.com/103969

http://www.tiki-toki.com/timeline/entry/115265/Idiot-Nerd-Girl-Meme/#vars!date=2012-01-04_21:28:09!

http://www-958.ibm.com/software/analytics/manyeyes/

Artifact F (Collaboration)

Note: The collaborative artifact can be approached in a couple different ways. One is to use a familiar technology but in tandem with others. Another is to find a wholly new technology and try it out. It’s up to your group—what matters is that you’re writing and advocating/analyzing with others!

http://i.imgur.com/kCTt3xF.jpg

https://twitter.com/kidsaresponges

Other (Video, Reddit, etc.)

http://vimeo.com/63134670

http://www.reddit.com/r/occupyaustin/

Step #3: Now that you have produced a series of sophisticated media artifacts (that is, various forms of digital media/humanities writing), it’s time to show off your work to your classmates in the form of a presentation. Keep in mind that this presentation isn’t merely show-and-tell, but yet another opportunity to rhetorically advocate for your cause. Aim to persuade!

Note: Your instructor will be extra impressed if you use a presentation platform other than Powerpoint!

Presentation Examples:

http://prezi.com/2w58dqz1nlm0/untitled-prezi/

http://prezi.com/wwjfvklxd8wx/untitled-prezi/

http://prezi.com/uz0fbnnbqb_l/genders-game/

Evaluation Suggestions:

There are many ways to approach evaluating the above assignment(s). The simplest is via “completion” grades, but what “completing” the assignment means may vary widely from instructor to instructor. I would recommend developing a rubric for evaluating each artifact. For instance, one might have a ten-point scale where the following criteria are considered (I use the following rubric myself):

Does the artifact make a clear argument (or series of arguments)?

Does the artifact provide evidence for any claims it makes (e.g., by citing any and all sources)?

Does the artifact respectfully engage an opposition and an audience?

Is any written text on/in the artifact clearly and carefully composed?

Is the artifact accompanied by a theoretical analysis/comparison that is sophisticated (that is, considers/cites either the readings for the course or similar artifacts)?

How well does any analysis grasp the theoretical texts it employs?

Does the artifact employ good design (for instance, color, arrangement, etc.)?

How persuasive is the artifact in terms of rhetorical appeals? Does it contain any fallacies?

Has an “appropriate” amount of effort been exemplified by the student (e.g., number of posts on a social media site, number of pages on a website, and so on)?

Has the artifact been peer-reviewed twice?

Have peer and instructor comments been integrated following peer review?

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

This assignment arc has been employed to great success at the University of Texas in a “Writing in Digital Environments” course. The students seemed to really enjoy the work, though were sometimes frustrated by how surprisingly hard it is to get outsiders interested in what they are/were producing. However, whether a particular student project is getting feedback from outsiders is often an opportune moment to discuss kairos. If I would recommend anything, it would be: get students to really think about and research their topics, make sure to show students lots of examples, don’t be afraid to let a student use a technology no one is familiar with, encourage theoretical analysis of artifacts, assign whatever media types you like and don’t be confined by what I’ve listed above, stick closely to a rubric and encourage students to pay close attention to whatever rubric is provided. This will better the life of all involved!

Course Type:

Advanced Writing Course