DWRL Lesson Plans - Research

Assignment Length:

One-Two Class Periods

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Cultural Context

Historical Context

Literary Criticism

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

Scavenger hunt worksheets, enough for each student (should be created by the instructor prior to the class; see "Suggestions for Instructor Preparation")
Computers for student research (since the exercise takes place in the library, using the library computers works just fine or even better)

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Mid-Semester

Full Assignment Description:

There are a variety of ways an instructor could set up for this activity, but here's what I did (and found successful):

We met in our regular classroom, where I distributed my twenty-question worksheet and broke them into teams (see "Suggestions for Instructor Preparation"). After everyone had a chance to read over the sheet, we walked over to the PCL together, whereupon I showed them where I’d be waiting on the ground floor in case they had any questions or when they were ready to submit their worksheets. I emphasized that they needed to submit their worksheets by the end of the class period, whether or not they were finished. Thanks to our 75-minute class period, they all had plenty of time to complete their work.

I did not require my students to stay with their team members at all times. I said they could remain together, or they could split up if they found it more efficient to do so, as long as they each turned into me a worksheet with answers that matched those of their teammates, to prove that they'd discussed their findings with one another.

For the first portion of the following class period, we reviewed their findings and discussed the commonly missed answers.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

First, I would strongly recommend having discussed digital research strategies and research goals for the class prior to this activity. We had already done these things, which was helpful because the digital research components of the exercise were much-needed practice but not first-time efforts (which undoubtedly saved time), and because they had a better understanding of why exactly I'd be encouraging them to find resources about Nigerian history, for example, when we were discussing a coming-of-age novel set primarily in Lagos (Chris Abani's GraceLand).

More immediately prior to the library scavenger hunt day, the instructor should create the scavenger hunt sheet. Because my own questions were so tailored to our specific class, I don't want to lay out our exact set of questions here, but here are some of the types of questions I found most productive:

Questions about relevant library resources. For example, I asked them how they'd obtain a copy of a certain book of which I knew UT didn't have a copy. Some of them already knew about Interlibrary Services, others decided to ask someone at the Help desk, etc.
Questions for which the answers could be found either digitally or physically. For example, I asked them to decide which chapter of a particular history book seemed like it would offer the most relevant context for a story we'd been analyzing in class. I chose this book purposely both because it was pertinent and because I knew it was available both via Google Books and in hard copy at the library. In our subsequent class discussion, we compared/contrasted strategies for tracking down digital vs. physical resources.
Questions that require students to consider the library's physical layout. That is, I asked them to find a particular book (the collection of short stories from which we had read) and then identify two others on nearby shelves that seemed relevant and interesting. A lot of them later indicated that even if they'd tracked down a book at the library before, they'd never thought to look around for pertinent titles in the area.
Questions that require just one extra step of Googling and/or that are solveable by using a series of different research strategies. For example, I asked them to find an article in Research in African Literatures about the novel we were reading. (I knew the journal had published several articles on the novel over the last ten years or so.) Most of them didn't know what Research in African Literatures was, but they all came up with an appropriate article, some because they'd Googled the journal title, others because they used library databases, and so forth. The various strategies they deployed to answer this question led us to an especially fruitful conversation later.

Ideally, the instructor should also assign teams in advance of the scavenger hunt. What worked well for me was to create an even distribution of English/Rhetoric majors, students with different class standings, etc., among the teams.

The instructor should also take into account questions of student mobility, disability, etc. I conferred with my students beforehand to make sure that the walk from the classroom to the library and the movement around the library was not at all burdensome for them.

Instructions For Students:

You have until the end of the class meeting to complete the library scavenger hunt worksheet. If you have any questions over the course of the scavenger hunt, you are welcome to come find me, but of course I can't give much away. You do not have to remain physically with your team members, but if you choose to split up research tasks, you must reconvene at the end to discuss your answers with one another. When you submit your worksheets, I will check to make sure that your sheets all have matching answers, to confirm that you've gone over everything with each other.

Evaluation Suggestions:

I scored their worksheets after class. The teams earned between 16.5 and 19 points out of a possible 20 points, so I was pretty happy with that result.

We also had a follow-up class discussion during our next meeting, which was a good opportunity to compare/contrast their various research strategies and to review the answers to commonly missed questions.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

My students seemed to enjoy and learn from the activity. Among the gains they later mentioned were that they had mostly never thought about looking around the shelves for similar titles, that they got a better sense of the library's layout, that they were less anxious to ask for help from a librarian, and that they learned from each other's research strategies (ex. brainstorming different search terms). It also didn't hurt that getting out of the classroom for a day seemed like a novel experience for many of them.

Course Type:

Course Description:

Violence, social inequality, anarchy, authoritarianism, poverty, disease, natural disaster, manmade disaster: what makes a place truly dangerous, and for which people? And how can books that merely depict dangerous places seem so threatening that they themselves are deemed too risky for certain audiences? With a broad understanding of what might constitute “danger,” we will investigate these and other questions through reading banned fiction set in dangerous places around the world.

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

This course contains a writing flag. The writing assignments in this course are arranged procedurally with a focus on invention, development through instructor and peer feedback, and revision; they will comprise a major part of the final grade.

Tags:

Introducing Rhetorical Analysis with the 1491s

Grewe — Fri, 03 Oct 2014 16:45:11 +0000

Author:

Lauren Grewe

Image Credit:

Image from the 1491s, "I'm An Indian Too," youtube video.

Brief Assignment Overview:

This lesson plan uses the 1491s' youtube videos "I'm an Indian Too" and "Lincoln Was a Douche" to introduce students to rhetorical analysis.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Rhetorical Analysis

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Historical Context

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

Learning how to research on computers for contextual, historical and biographical information.

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

Preferably a computer for each student group. However, if students bring in tablets or laptops, this lesson plan could be adapted to classrooms without computers for each student.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Mid-Semester

Full Assignment Description:

Recently, the 1491s appeared on Jon Stewart's The Daily Show to address the controversy over the name of the Washington football team. I have based this lesson plan on the assumption that students perhaps saw The Daily Show episode, but probably do not know who the 1491s are. I want to use this assignment to introduce them to the 1491s and to rhetorical analysis at the same time. After reviewing the chapter on rhetorical analysis and upcoming assignments, I would have the students watch the 1491s' "I'm an Indian Too" on youtube. As a class, we would discuss questions about speaker, audience, situation, and argument. For example, who is the audience for this youtube video? Are they explicit or implicit? Who are the speakers in this video (which doesn't have any obvious speakers, aside from the singer). Next, I would have them get into groups and watch the 1491s' "Lincoln Was a Douche" youtube video. Then, in their groups, I would have them answer the questions on the 1491s worksheet about audience, speaker and text. After they've completed that task, we would discuss their groups' answers. Then I would ask them to think about how researching the 1491s and the historical context of Lincoln's hanging of the Indians would change how they view the video. They would then get on their individual computers and try looking for contextual, historical and biographical information about the 1491s and the historical event they reference in the "Lincoln Was a Douche" video. After giving them some time to research, we would discuss as a class their findings.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Familiarize yourself with the 1491s through their youtube channel and appearance on The Daily Show. Also review questions about audience, speaker, and text.

Instructions For Students:

Once you have watched the 1491s' "I'm an Indian Too" on youtube as a class, engage in a discussion about the speaker, audience, situation, and the text's argument. Next, get into groups to watch the 1491s' "Lincoln Was a Douche" and answer the questions on the worksheet about audience, speaker, and text. Finally, get on computers, and try looking for contextual and biographical information about the 1491s.

Evaluation Suggestions:

Go around to the different groups and check in during the group work about how they're doing and if they're understanding the breakdown of rhetorical analysis. When the students are working individually researching on the computers, again go around the class checking in with the students and suggesting key terms to look up about the 1491s and the hanging.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

I think the students were challenged by the 1491s, but in a productive way. Thinking about the audience, speaker and text and possible arguments the 1491s might have been making with these videos led to interesting discussions about representations of Native Americans in the media.

Additional Resources:

The 1491s: “Lincoln Was a Douche” Exercise

After watching the 1491s’ sketch “Lincoln Was a Douche,” answer the following questions in your group about speaker, audience, situation and text.

Who is the speaker?

Is it a single person? A company? An ad firm?

Is there a difference between the “ostensible” speaker, the “real” speaker, and the “implied” speaker?

Who is the audience?

Is it implicit? Explicit? Ideal? Real?

What values does this audience have?

What concerns them?

What is the situation?

What contextual evidence? In which venue does this source appear?

What is the history behind this text?

What is the exigency?

What is the text arguing?

The text argues that____________________________________________.

Is this argument implicit or explicit?

What reasons does the author give for this argument?

What evidence does the author provide in support of this argument?

Course Type:

http://nypost.com/2014/02/09/sugar-daddy-website-has-coeds-rationalizing...

Course Description:

This lesson plan was designed for a Rhetoric 306 course.

Tags:

Rhetorical Analysis of "Sugar Dating" Ads and Audience(s)

Wiedner — Wed, 12 Mar 2014 19:59:46 +0000

Author:

James B. Wiedner

Image Credit:

Brief Assignment Overview:

Students work on argumentation techniques, rhetorical fallacies, and other concepts via reading a heavily-biased article from the New York Post discussing the relatively new but quickly growing phenomenon known as "sugar dating," which consists of web sites that pair older men (sugar daddies) who are willing to pay money for the company of young girls ("sugar babies"). The amount that any potential sugar daddy can range from several hundred to several thousand dollars.

While sugar dating sites seem to be happy to recruit young girls of all stripes, they are clearly most interested in attracting students, as evidenced in part by the fact that membership fees are waived for any potential sugar baby who registers with a .edu email address. The banner ad above is illustrative of most common underlying technique found on these sites. That is appealing to the fact that the typical undergraduate student is cash-strapped, and that being a sugar baby is an easy way to solve the problem. The titillating subject matter and the fact that half of the classroom are part of the demographic being so narrowly marketed towards caught everyone's attention from the get-go.

After they finish reading the article, displaying and bouncing through one of the sites on a projetor is great in a classroom that is equipped to do so, but it is by no means necessary.

The class is divided into two groups who assemble their respective arguments as to the propriety of selling such a product using the rhetorical appeals employed and the audience to which they are marketing (primary and otherwise); a loosely-moderated class debate/discussion ensues.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

One-Two Class Periods

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

No Classroom Technology Required

Social Media

Visualization

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

Increasing Classroom Participation, Building Rapport Between Students, Building Rapport Between Instructor and Individual Students, Building Rapport Between Instructor and Class as a Whole

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

Nothing other than copies of the article distributed by the instructor at the beginning of class.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Useful Anytime

Full Assignment Description:

The instructor distributes copies of an article taken from the web site of what is generally regarded as a reputable source for news. The class has no access to the article beforehand. The instructor asks the class if any of them are familiar with “Sugar Dating;” calling on student(s) with raised hands to explain what sugar dating generally refers to. The instructor then elaborates on the definition provided, paraphrasing points that might have been lost in the student’s explanation, adding any aspects of the concept that were not mentioned in the process. (5 minutes)

Students read the article individually. (5-10 minutes) phenomenon

The class then divides into two equally-sized groups, and discuss positive and negative aspects of the concept of sugar dating in general, along with the article’s presentation of the concept. One group is identified as the “pro” group, with the other identified as the “con.” However, the instructor does not articulate a specific question upon which they are taking sides. The two groups each work to flush out and organize what they believe to be their most salient points. (10-15 minutes)

An open discussion in a point/counterpoint format is the conducted, with the instructor keeping the discussion from straying to far afield, while casually interjecting to emphasize and elaborate upon the concepts that are relevant to rhetoric and/or law as they arise during the discussion. It is important that the instructor is as unobtrusive as possible throughout the ensuing discussing, to the extent that the collective “personality” of a particular class will allow. (30 minutes for a class meeting twice a week)

The instructor wraps up the debate and the class by highlighting some of the most important substantive points and the most effective argumentation techniques from each side of the discussion. Students are informed that there is a discussion prompt related to the day’s discussion; each student must submit one original posting, along with at least one response to another student’s original posting before the next class meeting. (5-10 minutes)

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

To prepare for the class, the instructor should spend time analyzing the specific article to be distributed to the class, composing a rough outline of considerations such as (1) the arguments (and counterarguments) most likely to be made by students, (2) the rhetorical concepts the instructor is most interested in covering, (3) questions that the class discussion might not touch upon.

The instructor should also do their due diligence in researching the subject in general. Visiting the actual sugar dating web sites is especially important. Students will have varying degrees of knowledge on the subject. Given the fact that these sites specifically target female college students, there is a strong likelihood that at least a couple of students will be well-versed on the subject; the instructor does not want to be learning about nuances of the sugar dating process, etc. from one of their students.

Instructions For Students:

As indicated above, instructions to be given to students are minimal (intentionally so). They're instructed to take about 10 minutes reading the article being contemporaneously distributed, with particular attention to tone, word choice, authorial bias, context, and visual rhetoric. They are then divided into two groups with opposing viewpoints, and are instructed to construct the most persuasive argument that they can, taking rough notes (to be submitted at the end of class) outlining the same.

They're reminded to consider likely arguments from the other side, and the best way to address/respond to them. Students then partake in a debate wherein the instructor guides them back on track if they are getting off-topic, overly emotional, or missing each other entirely (from a stasis theory standpoint).

At the end of the class, the students are given instructions to make a substanive blog posting responding to an instructor-provided prompt; the will seek to continue aspect(s) of the in-class discussion. Along with one original blog posting, students are instructed to post at least one response to the original posting of a classmate.

There is not any reading students are instructed to do in preparation for the class.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

The article’s author has a clear bias from the title onward, so I ask for a show of hands as to who agrees with the author’s…unflattering…representation of sugar dating and their advertisement and recruitment techniques. To my surprise, about 18 of my 22 students said that they agreed with the author. To keep the group numbers equal, I (somewhat lightheartedly) pointed out that the pinnacle of achievement for any rhetorician is to be able to effectively argue a point with which they wholly disagree. As my class is entitled “Rhetoric of Law,” I pointed out that this skill is of particular importance to attorneys, given that they take an oath to be “zealous advocates” for their clients in court, even if those clients are individuals whom they might find repugnant on a personal level. I then split the class roughly in half, based only upon where they happened to be sitting (or standing) at that moment, and then moving individual students towards one of two camps in order to arrive at numerical parity. I did not give consideration as to what side any particular student chose during our initial show of hands.

This lesson plan is well-suited for developing familiarity between students, increasing student participation, and establishing rapport between the instructor and his students- both individually and as a class. For these reasons, the lesson plan might be particularly useful at the beginning of the semester, or later on if class participation begins lagging.

Course Type:

Advanced Writing Course

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

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:

Mid-Semester

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:

Using Google Drive for Collaborative Bias Analysis

Meredith Coffey — Sat, 23 Nov 2013 18:53:25 +0000

Author:

Meredith Coffey

Image Credit:

The "Gold Guys"

Brief Assignment Overview:

In this exercise, students research potential sources of bias within a set of assigned texts and add their notes to a Google Drive spreadsheet. The students and instructor then review the spreadsheet as a group and finish with a class discussion.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Ethos

Ideology

Rhetorical Analysis

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

Bias Analysis

Google Drive

Google Spreadsheets

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

Required:

-individual computers for each student or pair of students

-access to Google Drive for all students

-pre-assigned readings

Recommended:

-overhead projector

More information:

Prior to class, the instructor should assign short online readings and create a corresponding Google Drive spreadsheet (see more under "Full Assignment Description"). I would strongly recommend a set of three readings about the same general topic but from different perspectives.

In class, each student (or pair of students, if the instructor prefers) will need a computer and access to the Google Drive spreadsheet. Ideally, the instructor should also be able to show the spreadsheet using an overhead projector.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Full Assignment Description:

BEFORE CLASS:

Prior to class, I assigned a set of short online readings. During a seventy-five minute class period, we were able to address three short readings, but instructors with shorter classes might want to work with only two. As indicated above, I recommend choosing articles about the same topic (for coherence) but written from different perspectives (for contrasting in class discussion). For example, I assigned three articles about ecotourism. The first was published on an elite US-based travel magazine website, the second came from a popular Caribbean news source, and the third was part of a specific travel agency's commercial site.

With these texts in mind, I created a Google Drive spreadsheet with three tabs, one for each article. Each was formatted the same way. For the left-hand column, I wrote each student's name, such that each student had one assigned row for each tab. On the top row, I listed different categories to consider while analyzing bias (these can vary, but I included criteria like political perspective, institutional affiliations, geographical affiliations, age, and religious perspective). I recommend freezing both the column with the students' names and the row listing the criteria, so that the students can navigate more easily. Freezing rows and/or columns will appear as an option under the "View" tab above the spreadsheet.

blank bias spreadsheet example.png

Shortly before class, I invited all of my students to access the Google Drive. Sending the invitation in advance saved some class time.

DURING CLASS:

At the beginning of class, we had a brief conversation about bias. We discussed the relationship between bias and credibility, what factors might impact an author's bias, etc. I made sure to introduce the criteria I had included on the spreadsheet. I also gave a quick introduction to Google Drive spreadsheets, since most of my students weren't familiar with them.

The students were then asked to review the readings, research the authors and venues of the readings, and fill out their own rows for each of the spreadsheet's three tabs. If they could not find a piece of information or did not believe it was applicable, I asked them to mark the box with "N/A" to indicate that they had at least considered the question. As they worked, I showed one of the tabs using the overhead projector. I also circulated around the room to answer questions. While I chose to have the students create their notes individually, an instructor could also have them work in pairs, if desired or needed.

completed bias spreadsheet example.png

After they had filled in their boxes, we looked together at each spreadsheet tab. I chose to do this part using the overhead projector, but if that option isn't available, students could also just look at their own screens. Instructors could choose from a number of discussion questions at this point. In our case, we talked about: similarities and differences among students' responses, how students obtained their information, and what they felt the most relevant criteria were in each case to determining author/source bias. They also contrasted the biases of the different sources.

PURPOSES:

The main goal of this activity was to ensure that students knew at least some preliminary factors to consider in thinking about bias. Because we did this activity early in the semester, it also helped with their research skills. For example, as I moved around the room, several students asked whether they could use Wikipedia as a reliable source about authors (answer: nope). The discussion portion also generated a conversation about strategies for research and information synthesis. For instance, with regard to the above screenshot: why did students get varying answers for "age," and why did others determine that the category was not relevant?

Between creating the spreadsheet and following up with class discussion, I aimed to engage both visual and auditory learners. The activity also worked well in terms of engaging quieter students, since they were all required to participate in the spreadsheet creation, and they all had time to think about their answers prior to the culminating class conversation.

In addition, many of my students had never used Google Drive before, and none of them had ever used the spreadsheet option. They had also never worked on Google Drive in real time. Consequently, this exercise gave them experience in accessing and using Google Drive spreadsheets as active, real-time collaborators.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Assign the readings for bias analysis several days in advance. Creating the Google Drive spreadsheet (see details above) only took about fifteen minutes, and inviting the students to edit the spreadsheet via email took another ten minutes.

I would also recommend that instructors thoroughly familiarize themselves with the authors and venues of the assigned readings. Doing so will help in the event that students have questions about their findings, produce conflicting information, etc.

Instructions For Students:

(These instructions are specific to the spreadsheet completion portion of the class.)

Please log on at your computers, open the pages with the pre-assigned readings, and make sure that you can access the Google Drive spreadsheet that I've invited you to edit. Be sure that you can find your name in the left-hand column on each tab.

Once you have these materials ready, you can begin to research the authors and organizations behind each article. Try to fill out information for each box on each tab. To find this information, click around on the website where the article appears, Google the author's or organization's name, or try other resources. Always make sure that your information is reliable! If you can't find a specific piece of information, or if you feel that it's really not relevant, you can write "N/A" in that box. If you have any questions, please let me know.

Evaluation Suggestions:

In a sense, this exercise was in itself an evaluation--making sure that students could perform this basic research, were familiar with some of these potential sources of bias, and could navigate the Google Drive spreadsheet with confidence.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

The students did a great job with this assignment, both in terms of enthusiasm and execution. Possibly because I was actively circulating around the room, they did not just copy and paste each others' answers--they really did their own research. The Google Drive spreadsheet format seemed to work well, since it was novel to most of them, but also pretty accessible and non-threatening (so we didn't have to spend much time on how to navigate the spreadsheet).

Course Type:

Course Description:

Rhetoric of Tourism

Despite recent global financial crises, the tourism industry has flourished, expanding to include new forms like ecotourism, medical tourism, space tourism, voluntourism, slum tourism, disaster tourism, sex tourism, wildlife tourism, drug tourism, cultural tourism, dark tourism, and birth tourism—to name just a few of the emerging modes through which tourists hope to view and/or experience something “foreign.” Examining this unprecedented growth in the industry, the course will investigate issues like the relationship between tourism and authenticity, tourism and local economies, and tourism and power dynamics. In conjunction with these broader inquiries, students will also pursue a more specific topic of their own choosing. Consider, for example: does Austin’s music scene benefit from increasing SXSW attendance each year, or might this growth in popularity erode the city’s unique character? Do European volunteer teachers in sub-Saharan Africa provide unique educational services to communities in need, or is their inevitable departure too disruptive to the students they intend to help? Should curators maintain Auschwitz to encourage visitors, or should they abandon the tragic Holocaust site to natural decay? Beginning with a selection of readings that introduces the growing field of tourism studies, the course will ask students to research historical context and current arguments surrounding a relevant debate. As the course progresses, students will continue to engage with their controversies, analyzing rhetorical appeals of texts like newspaper editorials, travel magazine articles, blog posts, print and video ads, and short documentary films. The final project may take one of a number of forms, including that of a travelogue article, a critical essay, or a multimedia project.

Tags:

Rhetorical analysis

Participation

Research and Descriptive Reading - Visual Analysis

Mercier — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 19:29:06 +0000

Author:

Aaron Mercier

Image Credit:

Piquef: Conde Nast, 2011

Brief Assignment Overview:

This plan puts student into groups of three or four and asks them to collaborate on generating a coherent analytical reading of a New Yorker cover image. The students present their readings to the class and then trade images and present a re-reading. Class ends with the groups reclaiming their original image, incorporating the different reading, and self-assigning research topics. The following class, the groups re-convene and then present a reading that integrates the two primary readings, bridged and nuanced through external research.

Type of Assignment:

Class Discussion

Assignment Length:

Multiple Class Periods

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Presentations

Visualization

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

Building descriptive and analytical habits of mind

Identifying and avoiding evaluative modes of reading

Accepting uncertainty

Synthesizing divergent ideas

Media Requirements:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Media Console/Projector

Required Materials:

Networked classroom or student laptops, and/or a pile of old New Yorkers or similar images. You can also compile and distribute these images digitally.

Media console/document projector for presentations

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Full Assignment Description:

**Note: this works best if you have made visual rhetoric exercises part of your course structure in the early weeks when you're introducing the "analysis" concept. If you haven't, you can set aside some classtime one or two days ahead of this to get some practice in with other images.

At the beginning of class, the instructor should review the differences between descriptive, evaluative, and analytical reading strategies. Emphasize the ways in which evaluative reading can disguise itself as analytical, and the obstacles to critical thought it can create.

--Divide the class into groups of 3-4

--Distribute New Yorker Covers. It's best if the instructor vets these for topicality, transparency, and complexity. It's a good idea to have a range of difficulties, but each image should have a clear current-events referent and be susceptible to at least two different interpretations. "Money Issue" covers and the covers published during the Occupy movement and major elections cycles are especially rich, although there are plenty of recent covers that take up higher ed and internecine sociocultural tensions that get really interesting too.

--You can have a written prompt if you like, but don't be too presctiptive. I simply tell my students to formulate a one-sentence description that states what the image is of/about, then to generate a kind of critical summary that points to specific visual elements and makes claims about how they contribute to a greater complexity of meaning. While they're working, circulate between the groups. if no one has questions for you, offer them some of your own. Be especially watchful for students who are skipping steps, or not working closely enough with the image, or being too general. Deal with these missteps by asking provocative questions about the grounds of their claims.

--Avoid being over-directive. This exercise is about keeping them in the space of discovery and description as long as possible, so questions should be formulated so as to throw them back into the text rather than push them towards conclusions. The typical undergrad is deeply uncomfortable with this space and if you give too many directions they will simply spit them back at you as "answers" in the presentation.

-- Give the students about fifteen minutes in their first group session to come up with a two-minute presentation. This seems like a relief to them, since they don't think they can fill longer time slots with "just this image." Inevitably, the groups will run over time. Be really strict. Time them with an alarmed stopwatch and cut them off after the two minutes. The fourth group to present will usually come in just at two minutes. This is a teachable moment about the time and space responsible analysis actually requires.

--Have the groups switch images and repeat the process.

--If you're being disciplined about time, you should have about 20-40 minutes to wrap up after the second round of presentations. (Ten minutes of housekeeping and introduction to the exercise, 30 minutes of group prep time, 16-20 minutes of presentation [assuming a class of 20-24 students], four minutes of transitions/slop time have been filled up so far.)

--Wrapping up:Have the groups reclaim their original image. Their assignments for next time will be for each student to find some relevant secondary source and write a 3-sentence description of it and its relevance to the group's image. At the beginning of the next class, the groups get a ten-minute final planning session, then give a 5 minute presentation.

--Give a prompt for this presentation, since it should do several very specific things.

--Present the group's original reading modified to integrate or challenge the second group's reading of the image in question.

-- Present at elast two secondary sources that give theoretical/critical and/or historical context to the image

--Offer a complex, nuanced, and analytical statement of what they believe the image is about, what it says, and how it fits into the larger context of the moment in which it was published.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

--Browse the issues of the New Yorker in general.

--Be aware of the headlines that were current when the issue was published

--Have a stopwatch of some kind

--Be ready to evade requests for over-directive instruction

--Have some inspirational quotes about uncertainty and negative capability handy

Instructions For Students:

In general, see the Full Assignment Description

I shy away from elaborate written instructions for this sequence because it's really about establishing comfort with a state of intellectual play. Written instructions become training wheels in this context. Because the stakes are very low, but kind of implicitly present in the whole economy of dialogue and idea exchange, I find such training wheels to be disruptive and counterproductive. Keep it all very verbal for this whole process.

Evaluation Suggestions:

This is not a lesson/assignment sequence that requires a lot of evaluation. In fact, evaluating the quality of analytical approaches should be left largely to class discussion. The way I approach this is to thank presenters and then ask the rest of the class where they'd take it next. Presentations that provoke the most energetic conversations become the examples you refer to in later classes, so there's a kind of ongoing reward system that does not punish lower-quality efforts

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

This exercise was a hit. Students respond pretty well to being given the thematic reins, and many of them respond really well to the oppportunity to argue. A lot of them remarked that the development of two co-existent readings for the same text, and then being asked to synthesize them, was a real eye-opener.

This exercise is also a great way to establish a collegial and collaborative learning environment. Be present, but keep your role in the realm of moderator/facilitator. Ask questions and insist on time limits for things, but try to avoid "correcting" readings unless they stray into major, fundamental error. Even then, it is usually better rely on the internal economy of the exercise. If one group goes astray, the next might correct them for you. Save these interventions, if necessary, for the endgame.

Additional Resources:

PBWorks/ some kind of blogging platform helps, but is not necessary, in bridging the classwork/homework divide. Make sure the group members make plans to be in touch, especially if you make the at-home portion happen over a weekend.

Course Type:

Course Description:

RHE-309k: Rhetorics of Truthiness is a broadly-conceived thematic intermediate writing course. It teaches the basics of critical reading, research, rhetorical analysis, and academic writing. Thematically, it focuses on the rhetorical strategies and topical questions surrounding the 24 hour news cycle and the question of bias through Stephen Colbert's provocative definition of truthiness: an argumentative quality that makes a claim "feel true" without any necessary connection to fact or 'Truth.'

Tags:

Researching a Controversy using Twitter

gerdes — Tue, 12 Mar 2013 16:14:58 +0000

Author:

Kendall Gerdes

Image Credit:

Class Twitter account, @rhetoric306, with Ancient Rhetorics for Contemporary Students (5th ed.) as background

Brief Assignment Overview:

By creating their own Twitter accounts and finding accounts to follow that are related to their research topic, students learn the difference between library resources and online resources like daily news, blogs, and opinion.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

Multiple Class Periods

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Invention

Pre-Writing

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Open Access Software

Social Media

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

Research, digital literacy

Media Requirements:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Media Console/Projector

Required Materials:

Students need a computer (or conceivably, smartphone) with internet access to sign up for a free Twitter account. When I taught this lesson in a computer mediated classroom, I had a projector screen to introduce students to Twitter.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Full Assignment Description:

Students created their own Twitter accounts in class, and I asked them to follow our class Twitter account right away. I use the class account to retweet my students and make short announcements. Then, I asked students to find an active Twitter account (with recent tweets) that is relevant to their research topic. I asked students to follow the account, then tweet the handle of thtat account to our class account. I also asked students to come up with a class hash tag.

I also gave students some research guidelines (see Instructions for Students, below) to help them think about the relationship between library resources, with their slower editorial gatekeeping process, and online resources, and the different research strategies required to use both.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Creating a class Twitter account can help keep students organized around a central account. I also recommend reading about what other instructors are doing to come up with a mix of ideas that suits your class. Some recommended reading is included in the additional resources, below.

Instructions For Students:

These are the instructions I gave my students:

Your first Twitter assignment is as follows:

Create your own professional Twitter account (or if you're not shy, you can use a Twitter account you already have).
Follow our class Twitter account, @rhetoric306, and tweet us to introduce yourself online (your name and the issue you're researching would be helpful!).
By Friday at 2 pm, you need to find an active Twitter account (with recent tweets) that is relevant to your issue. Follow them, then tweet their handle and how you found them to our class account. I'll use the class account to follow your recommendations!
We're going to need a class hash tag to keep track of our class tweets across our different accounts. When you tweet the account you followed, you should also propose a hash tag by tweeting @rhetoric306. The goals here are short, unique, and informative.
If you have ideas for how you want to use Twitter in our class, tweet them @rhetoric306.

Some Twitter guidelines:

You can only tweet 140 characters at once.
You create a link to other Twitter accounts when you put their handle, like @rhetoric306, in your tweet.
Hash tags help categorize your tweets for searches. #likethis
Although Twitter created a way to re-post someone else's entire Tweet (called retweeting), many people often still edit or comment on the tweet and post it again using the marker "RT" to credit the original poster.
If you can't figure out how to do something, try to Google it.
NB: Using Twitter puts us in contact with people outside of class. Obviously, we have no control over what these people say or share. If you find yourself uncomfortable with any Twitter content for any reason, you may unfollow or block any user, and disregard any comments, conversations, or links. Please come to me if you have any questions or concerns about this.

Some Twitter/Research guidelines:

Don't just go with the first thing you find. The goal is to find high-quality sources. Even just one quality Twitter account will give you much better returns than a dozen mediocre ones. Look through lots of Tweets (30-50) from each account, and look through lots of accounts before you decide who to follow.
Think about your search terms. You can search for words that appear in tweets, but you can also search for hash tags and usernames. And there are more ways to search Twitter than just the interface they provide you. Get creative.
Try to find experts and advocates. Journalists may be excellent news, but you also need opinion, and sometimes organizations or even scholars will have useful tweets.
Follow the links. Read what they are reading, check out who they are re-tweeting, surf their hash tags. Twitter doesn't use MLA, citing sources in such a way that your readers can recognize and locate the originals is still important.
Experiment. Whether it's on Twitter or on the Library site, effective research requires some creativity and experimentation. You have to try things out, and don't be disappointed if you don't what you want on the first try--use your failed and frustrated searches to figure out how to do it better.

Evaluation Suggestions:

I evaluate my class using the Learning Record, and I have students complete brief reflective writing exercises on what they learned each class.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

I admit, I was surprised at how many of my students were not already using Twitter. I wished I had left more time and given them more detailed instructions on the first day I introduced it. But, I also think Twitter is relatively easy to learn. A technological challenge can also foster student collaboration, since they pose questions and help each other figure out how to solve the problems that inevitably arise.

Additional Resources:

My post on Twitter at Blogging Pedagogy: http://bloggingpedagogy.dwrl.utexas.edu/content/researching-public-issues-twitter
Grad Hacker on Teaching with Twitter: http://www.gradhacker.org/2012/11/26/teaching-with-twitter/
Matt King's RHE 312 Twitter Assignment: http://rhe312.pbworks.com/w/page/21055220/Twitter%20Assignment
The Learning Record: http://www.learningrecord.org/

Course Type:

Course Description:

I used this lesson in my introductory writing course, RHE 306 Rhetoric and Writing.

Tags:

End of Term Writing Assignments

Voss — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 21:30:39 +0000

Image Credit:

The New Yorker magazine

Brief Assignment Overview:

We’re coming up on the midway point of this semester, and as we’re all currently planning the weeks ahead after Spring Break, I thought I’d take a moment here and share what I’m currently doing for my course’s final assignment. I’m teaching The Rhetoric of The New Yorker, and my students’ final assignment is to compose a New Yorker-style essay. Of course, with the rare exception whatever they produce is nowhere near New Yorker-quality. Nevertheless, this assignment grew out of two pedagogical realities and subsequently I think it’s entirely valuable. The first reality is that after a few semesters of teaching I realized that my students were rarely submitting end-of-semester work that met my expectations. I don’t admit this as any fault of my own teaching nor mean it as any disrespect towards my exceptional former students. Rather, I try to spend my time reading good writing and my students are journeymen writers – whatever they produce will inevitably fall short of what I like to read. Secondly, my former students have often considered submitted work to be in some way “finished,” and all us instructors know that writing is a process. No matter how much I told them that nothing is ever finished, they just persisted in thinking that A-level work is a finished product. So, as a result of these two imperatives, I thought I’d design an end of semester writing project in which it’s nearly impossible for any of my students to complete the work “perfectly”. The point of this assignment is the process, not the product.

Type of Assignment:

No Classroom Technology Required

Major Course Project

Semester-long Project

Assignment Length:

Course Unit

Semester-long Project

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

The goals of this assignment are for students to assimilate previous research into a coherent argument. More specifically, over the course of this assignment, it is my hope that students will learn how to: synthecize seperate arguments, articulate their uncertainties, learn to restrain themselves from writing about the obvious, and learn that writing is always an ongoing project.

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

This assignment doesn't not include a research component, so it's important that students have already compiled 7 or so relevant sources into an annotated bibliography. (In my course, the annotated bibliography is created in a mid-semester project, so by the end of the semester my students can focus entirely on compiling that research into good writing.) Ideally, they've compiled a variety of sources, such as several opposing arguments, interviews, historical accounts, etc. Other than that, it's important that students bring to this assignment general excitement and genuine intellectual interest in their subject matter -- without such things they'll be bored and their writing will suffer.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Late in the Semester

Full Assignment Description:

In 5-7 pages, students are to assimilate previous research into a New Yorker-style essay. What "New Yorker-style" means is basically an essay that subtly combinds narrative and argument into a well written product intended for educated readers. Students' writing should be free of grammatical error, writen in correct MLA-style (unless Chicago-style is more relevant to their future academic work), and contain correct grammatical usage. Structurally, there is no one set way New Yorker essays are organized, so in this assignment students need to determine what kind of organization is most effective for the argument they are trying to make. Asking students to determine their arguments parameters is often challenging for them, but it's my hope that the hurdle gets them thinking about the writing process in productive ways. (In general, students' papers for this assignment tend to be organized as follows: introduction of topic or individual, argument about said topic or individual, background of said topic or individual, and finally some use of counter argument to confirm their own argument.) I encourage students to think of a New Yorker essay (or two) that they liked over the course of the semester, and to model their argument off of what's done in that essay.

Throughout, students are asked to always keep in mind the ways in which various arguments relate to one another. They shouldn't be thinking of arguments as islands of thought that operate within a void, but rather discrete bits of information that romantically mingle with one another. If students get confused or discouraged, they're encouraged to articulate their uncertanty, which if they learn this skill often puts them ahead of their peers in so far as their ability to write is concerned. Throughout the unit I stress that a solid part of the assignment's assessment is their level of intellectual engagement -- in other words, if they think of this assignment in terms of "what shold I write to get an A," they will probably struggle.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

In general, since I know that my course is leading up to this assignment, I always try to direct my class's discussion of New Yorker articles in the direction of noticing writing mechanics. (Therefore, if this is the type of assignment that you'd perhaps like to encorporate into your own course, be thinking about the ways in which daily class discussion might be relevant to the larger goal.)

More specifically, be prepared for students to have a lot of trouble making subtle arguments (like those found in the New Yorker). They've been told for years that thesis statements are always at the end of the first paragraph of a text, which of course rarely holds true outside stuff written for school. Induldge their attempts and give them the benefit of the doubt as far as effort is concerned. There'll be a range of student achievement, as usual, but with such a difficult assignment I think it's important to keep in mind that students here will learn by doing.

Instructions For Students:

These are the instructions I give my students when presenting this assignment in class (I also include assessment criteria, see below):

"Your mission for Paper 3.1 is to take all of the research that you compiled in your Annotated Bibliography and turn it into a New Yorker-style essay. Your essay should be 5-7 pages in length and be in correct MLA format (doubled-spaced, page numbers, correct MLA citations, proper headings, etc.). Aside from these simple parameters, you’re free to go about this assignment in whichever way you determine to be most rhetorically appropriate given your subject matter. A profile of a popular sports athlete will look much different than a consideration of the social effects of our excessive cell phone use.

You’re encouraged to consider a New Yorker essay that you liked over the course of the semester, and use the structure of that essay as a model for your own writing. If you do this, what’ll probably happen is that you’ll start writing an essay structured similarly to the New Yorker piece, but then you’ll inevitably branch out a bit once your argument comes alive. You will probably even change your introduction to fit your conclusion and your essay will then be devoid of any resemblance to the New Yorker essay. (NOTE: DO NOT structure your essay based upon a New Yorker essay that considers your same topic – this will inevitably lead to a sort of plagiarism.)

Also, think about how often we went off on tangents during class discussion over the course of the semester. If I thought this was harmful to you as a writer, I would have worked to get us back “on topic.” Instead, most good writing often goes off on natural tangents, and these tangents are skillfully used to complete an argument and offer example. So as you think about and eventually write your essay, think freely and expansively about your content, just like we did in class."

Evaluation Suggestions:

I like to assess students on:

their ability to communicate ideas clearly and humanely,
their ability to avoid the boring five-paragraph essay format that they learned in high school,
their ability to master and objectively present the competing interests that circle their topic,
their ability to embed their argument with subtlety and style.

Course Type:

Course Description:

The New Yorker is a highbrow magazine that’s been around since the 1920s. Published weekly, the magazine regularly offers various forms of cultural commentary, from fiction submitted by respected authors, to investigative journalism written by first-rate essayists, to cartoons composed with unfailingly witty captions. Each issue contains calendars highlighting upcoming social events across Manhattan. Quite often longer content in the magazine relates to current events outside of New York City, and increasingly outside of the United States. This course will examine all the various rhetorics that surround the magazine. We will consider each week’s cover and the various rhetorical strategies therein at play. We will read several famous articles from the magazine’s past, as well as current articles commenting on the world in which we live. Ultimately, we will consider the various ways that arguments in the magazine are made.

Regular reading of The New Yorker will guide us as we practice research and writing over the course of the semester. Vital to your success will be your ability to “interpret” another’s argument, which basically means coming up with a cogent, interesting account of what an argument means, what it’s trying to do to/for the reader, what technical choices the author’s made in order to try to achieve the effects he wants, and so on. In light of this, you’ll also be asked to compose your own arguments. You will pick a controversy towards the beginning of the semester and, in addition to our reading from the magazine, investigate this particular issue. The goal of this research will be for you to produce a New Yorker-style essay by the end of the semester. This is all designed to enhance your ability to analyze the various positions held in any public debate and to advocate your own position effectively and responsibly.

Tags:

Using an Annotated Bibliography to Teach Basic Research Skills

Voss — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 19:05:39 +0000

Image Credit:

www1.chaffey.edu

Brief Assignment Overview:

In this assignment, students conduct research and build an annotated bibliography.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

No Classroom Technology Required

One-Two Class Periods

Multiple Class Periods

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

1) Practicing basic research methodologies.

2) Contextualizing research.

3) Learning to state why certain resrouces are important.

4) Learning to articulate scholarly intent.

Media Requirements:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Required Materials:

Students should go into this assignment with some idea of what they want to research.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Useful Anytime

First Day/Week

Full Assignment Description:

Rather than outline or map a group of sources in a 5-7 page written paper, in this assignment students find 6-7 sources form them into an annotated bibliography. Students should write 300-500 words about why each source is relevant and interesting. Part of the way this assignment is assessed is the degree to which students are able to articulate how the given sources are articulate and interesting. All sources must be cited in MLA-style. Students are strongly encouraged to find at least 3 argumentative sources pertaining to their topic, each arguing from a different set of premises to reach a different set of conclusions, and students are encouraged to use their remaining sources to provide context for their topic. All of this work is done outside of class in order to make time in class for various interesting readings. If you choose to give your students this assignment, be sure to encourage them to come to office hours for help brainstorming about various research strategies.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Some students will inevitable have a hard time finding sources, so do plan to make yourself available if students need help finding sources.

Instructions For Students:

Your task in this assignment is to compile an annotated bibliography in which you organize a mass of research that you’ll later draw from when composing an argumentative essay in Paper 3.1. (For those of you who haven’t encountered an annotated bibliography assignment before, an “annotated bibliography” is basically a Works Cited page in which each entry also contains some commentary on that particular source.) Your annotated bibliography for this assignment should contain 6-7 sources, and the commentary for each source should run 300-500 words. Remember, like a Works Cited page, the sources in your annotated bibliography should be listed in alphabetical order and cited in correct MLA style. Since each source’s commentary will come directly after the citation, if you want to do something like set your citations in bold in an effort to make things seemed more organized – be my guest. It goes without saying that your assignment should contain the standard MLA info at the top (your name, my name, course name, and date), and that your pages should be numbered. Lastly, at the top of your annotated bibliography, you should include a brief introductory paragraph in which you introduce your topic, state what issues or sub-arguments are covered in your topic, and make some mention of why your work will be interesting and fun.

At least 3 of your sources should be different arguments about your topic. (“Different” here means arguments that use alternate sets of premises to reach alternate sets of conclusions.) At least 2 of your sources should be historical or contextual (i.e., an interview found on the web in which the subject of your research project discusses relevant issues).

Evaluation Suggestions:

One way this assignment could be assessed is through a points system. For instance, each citation and annotation will be worth 20 points. 4 points will be granted automatically, just by virtue of students having found a source and written something about it. The remaining 15 points for each source will be earned as follows:

1 point – correct MLA citation;

2 points – quality of source (citing some random blog is not sufficient, unless you can articulate how the blog an example of something);

3 points – some awareness of how rhetoric’s at play in the given source (if the source is an Op-Ed piece this should be fairly straightforward; if the source is merely contextual, you should articulate this but also display some awareness of how biases effect how that history is presented);

4 points – your ability to coherently and comprehensively and appropriately summarize your source (“appropriately” means that the style of your analysis should be relevant to the type of source you’re citing – if that source is argumentative, merely paraphrasing it will not do);

3 points – evidence of original intellectual engagement and care for the source;

3 points – your ability to relate your source to other sources within your annotated bibliography.

Course Type:

Advanced Writing Course

Course Description:

The New Yorker is a highbrow magazine that’s been around since the 1920s. Published weekly, the magazine regularly offers various forms of cultural commentary, from fiction submitted by respected authors, to investigative journalism written by first-rate essayists, to cartoons composed with unfailingly witty captions.[1] Each issue contains calendars highlighting upcoming social events across Manhattan. Quite often longer content in the magazine relates to current events outside of New York City, and increasingly outside of the United States. This course will examine all the various rhetorics that surround the magazine. We will consider each week’s cover and the various rhetorical strategies therein at play. We will read several famous articles from the magazine’s past, as well as current articles commenting on the world in which we live. Ultimately, we will consider the various ways that arguments in the magazine are made.

[1] Kurt Vonnegut commented on The New Yorker in 1974 that “One thing we used to [say about literature] – when I was out in Iowa – was that the limiting factor is the reader. No other art requires the audience to be a performer. You have to count on the reader's being a good performer, and you may write music which he absolutely can't perform – in which case it's a bust. Those writers you mentioned and myself are teaching an audience how to play this kind of music in their heads. It's a learning process, and The New Yorker has been a very good institution of the sort needed. They have a captive audience, and they come out every week, and people finally catch on to Barthelme, for instance, and are able to perform that sort of thing in their heads and enjoy it.”

Tags:

Annotated bibliography

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:

http://www.mindmeister.com/

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:

Course Type:

Literary Studies Course

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

Oxford English Dictionary