Alexandra Chakov Assignments & Activities Archive Activity Description The purpose of this activity is to have students explore the ways their body is part of their writing process. Writing is not just a mental activity—it also involves the body. The body types out words or commands speech-to-text; the body feels anxiety as deadlines approach and […]
Developing Details: Embodied Writing Activity Read More »
Mary Laughlin Assignments & Activities Archive Assignment Description This assignment reflects my ongoing attempts to build transfer-oriented reflective opportunities into first-year writing projects. It was inspired in part by pedagogical advice in John C. Bean’s Engaging Ideas; specifically, his emphasis on giving students opportunities to consider purpose and audience. For example, Bean suggests an imagined
Multimodal FAQ Assignment Read More »
Aimee Jones Assignments & Activities Archive Activity Description This activity demonstrates how to ethically use two Generative AI tools in the research stage of the writing process. In the last year, AI writing tools, most notably Chat GPT, have generated academic-integrity related concerns for university administrators and instructors. In a study conducted from the Spring
Ethical Use of Generative AI for Conducting Research Read More »
Olivia Imirie Assignments & Activities Archive Activity Description This activity about writing metaphors is ideal for the first 1-2 weeks of the term and was originally developed for a first-year writing course. Students often struggle to talk about writing and their challenges with the writing process. They use statements such as “I don’t like writing,”
Benjamin Hojem and Rhiannon Scharnhorst Assignments & Activities Archive Activity Description From Aristotle’s correctness to Quintilian’s purity to Campbell’s nationality, rhetorical instruction in the formal qualities of writing has long emphasized stylistic “virtues” that serve to exclude language variants and their speakers. With this history in mind, how should we understand the capabilities and affordances
Experimenting with Style: Cyborg Voices Read More »
Stephen David Grover Assignments & Activities Archive Activity Description Writing assignments often require students to perform a complex array of interrelated tasks all at once. For example, when composing a typical researched argument essay, students must keep their eyes on higher-order concerns like thesis, organization, and finding and evaluating evidence, while at the same time
Steven Engel and Staci Shultz Assignments & Activities Archive Activity Description Rachel Hall Buck and Silvia Vaccino-Salvadore’s Writing Spaces essay, “‘Doing Research Is Fun; Citing Sources Is Not’: Understanding the Fuzzy Definition of Plagiarism,” suggests ways to help students unpack the complexity of plagiarism. Our activity extends these essential conversations by examining several recent highprofile
Fuzzy Logic: How the Fuzzy Definition of Plagiarism is Getting Even Fuzzier Read More »
Daniel P. Richards Volume 6 Chapter Description A literature review can take many forms and can be found in a wide array of academic, scientific, technical, and workplace documents spanning all fields and disciplines. Sometimes it is the full document; sometimes it is but part of a document. From essays in philosophy to journal articles
Let’s Party: Composing a Review of the Literature on a Technical Topic Read More »
Laura E. Decker Assignments & Activities Archive Activity Description First-year writers often struggle to take risks on projects, especially as they move from their composition courses to projects within new disciplines and contexts (Robertson et al.). However, taking risks by diving into new discourse communities, as Bartholomae argued, is required to participate effectively in the
Roger Powell Assignments & Activities Archive Assignment Description The purpose of this revision plan assignment is to help students in first-year composition courses effectively process teacher comments on their writing and make a plan to use them to revise their writing. The assignment rests on the notion that if students approach comments on their writing
Using a Growth Mindset and Revision Plan to Interpret and Apply Instructor Comments Read More »
