Assignments

The writing workshop, as another writing teacher has called it, is "a communal conversation" among the members of a writing class about a piece of writing-in-progress done by one of the writers in the group. I like the phrase "communal conversation," so I've borrowed it for our use. To describe the workshop in that way highlights that all of us participate actively in that conversation, stresses that each one of us is responsible for reading the text in question with an open mind, reading it carefully and with our full attention, and then for contributing our perceptions, insights, and visions of the piece, what we see as its strengths, where we think it is going or could go, and how we think the writer might engage further with it in order to make it more successful--all in a process of focused dialogue, or conversation, with the writer and other readers in the group.

The first step in preparing for the workshop is reading. In that way it has much in common with your reading for the course, but with a significant difference: those published works are finished, so your reading is an exercise in discerning the operations of the text for your own purposes of learning from what it has to say and how the writer has managed to say it. When you read the writing of another member of our class community, though, your reading is aimed at assisting the writer to intervene in the text's production, to help the writer shape and hone and refine it.

In preparing for the workshop, you should read the text that is to be discussed, and then read through it very carefully again. Try to locate the places in the text that seem to you to be in some way its centers of gravity, places where something happens which focuses the text and moves it in some particular direction. Then think about questions you have which the text does not answer--what do you still need or want to know? Finally, given what you understand of the writer's intentions for the piece, what suggestions would you give the writer for improving this piece?

I don't mean that you prepare what you have to say about the piece, and then say it in the workshop, and you're done. It's nowhere near as cut-and-dried as that, and we don't want it to be. Instead, the communal conversation is dynamic: the talk stimulates new ideas, altered ways of seeing or thinking about the piece, and opens up possibilities that perhaps none of us foresaw before we began the conversation. That's what makes the workshop lively and valuable for everyone involved.

When we begin our discussion of the text in question, the writer will open the workshop by asking questions of us and waiting for our responses. The writer's most important role in the workshop is to listen. Sometimes, out of nervousness perhaps, writers spend too much time talking about their own work, and the important opportunity to hear how others read it is lost. I'll help with trying to avoid that pitfall. 

The basic workshop format will be the writer asking these questions:

1. What strengths do you see in what I've written?
2. What seems to you to be my idea or point here?
3. What questions remain for you after reading?
4. What suggestions do you have for me in thinking about ways to make this better?

It is also appropriate, when time permits, for readers to ask at the end of the workshop for the writer's assessment of how useful our comments have been and what the writer's plans are for continuing to work on the piece.

The format I've outlined here is not fixed by any means, but will change as our focus of attention changes for particular pieces of writing. For instance, I might ask you during the workshop to think in a particular way about the text we are discussing, or to address particular questions about the text which I think could help every writer in the class in thinking about her or his own work. Likewise, the writer whose work is being discussed might have specific questions about the piece and so might ask for our response to particular areas or issues regarding the work.

The process of the workshop, then--the specific ways we focus our attention on the texts at hand--will alter to meet our changing needs. Sometimes the whole class will focus on the work of one writer at a time; at other times you will work together in small groups and I will circulate to offer assistance and guidance. Sometimes, too, you will be asked to offer written rather than oral responses to each other's work. More about that later. There are some things that must not change about the workshop, though:
 
- The atmosphere must be a safe and supportive one for writers whose work-in-progress is up for discussion.
- The workshop must be encouraging at the same time that we strive to develop a serious critique of the work under scrutiny (and remember that a critique does not imply just negative criticism, but is the result of reading with critical insight--including recognizing what works well, how the writer has succeeded in realizing his or her intentions).
- The "communal conversation" of the workshop should produce new insights and possibilities for the work under discussion; should, that is, provide the writer an incentive for further engagement with the text and some concrete ideas for how to begin revising.
- No one should usurp all the linguistic space in the workshop; everyone should have equal time and opportunity to express her or his responses.
 
At the conclusion of a workshop on something you have written, you as a writer should be more conscious of how a reading audience responds to your work, should feel renewed interest and energy for returning to the piece and engaging further with it, and should have some specific ideas about how to begin the process of achieving your purposes and aspirations for what you are writing.

The workshop has something to offer you when you serve as a reader too: an opportunity to learn how other writers approach a task, to acquire and practice using a critical vocabulary applicable not only to your own and your classmates' writing but to any text you read, and to hone your skills as a textual critic. 

My hopes for our class workshops are that they will be focused, serious, energetic, and productive, and I will try to lead them in such a way as to ensure that they are a rich source of learning for everyone. I count on each of you to help me in that effort.

Guidelines and Schedule for Second Oral Presentations (PDF)

Your final oral presentation will be a five-minute one reporting to the class on the subject of your researched essay. Think about what you most want the audience to know about your subject, then prepare the presentation as a summary of what you learned about your subject by investigating it.

We'll leave a few minutes after each presentation for questions, discussion, and oral feedback on your performance. But you should be sure to limit your formal presentation to five minutes. As with your last presentation, you must practice three times and time yourself carefully--once aloud alone, once aloud in front of a mirror, and once with an audience of friends. 

You are welcome to use Power Point or other computer-based visual aids in your presentation. Doing so usually enhances the audience's appreciation of what you have to say and can make your arguments more forceful. 

Once again, you must not read your presentation. Use an outline to keep yourself organized and on task. You need to make frequent eye contact with your audience and avoid mumbling, speaking too softly, looking down at your papers too much, or filling your presentation with things like "um," "uh," "and," "like," "you know," etc.

Be interesting; be convincing; be personable; be effective; project your voice so that everyone in the audience can hear you without difficulty. Making oral presentations is an important skill; here is another chance for you to practice and develop it.

Schedule for Presentations: 

Presentation 1- Class 21 
Presentation 2- Class 22
Presentation 3- Class 23

Preparing Your Portfolio for Submission (PDF)

Our semester together is drawing to a close, and it is time for you to begin the process of review, reflection, and re-vision necessary to prepare your portfolio of your work of the semester to submit to me so that I can assign you a grade for the course. The following guidelines are to help you to make sure your portfolio is complete and arranged in a way that will facilitate my review of your work.

Here is what your portfolio must contain, and in this order:

* Your profile of yourself as a writer and reader, assigned on the first day of class, with my responses.
* Your four essays, in the order that you wrote them: for each, first submitted version (with my responses), revision (with my responses), and subsequent revision(s), if any.
* Your Reader's Notebook: Responses to all assigned reading (with my responses), arranged in chronological order as assigned, with full bibliographic entry as heading for each and with pages numbered, plus responses to your three self-selected essays and your response to the reading or lecture you attended. You can make sure your Notebook is complete by checking the schedules (you were given two of them) for assigned reading for the semester.

Note: Substantive re-visions of your work are welcome and encouraged and, if genuinely successful, could raise your grade somewhat. Revisions will not in any case lower your grade, so you risk nothing in choosing to re-write, and grades aside, you stand to learn more from the revision process--always the real reason to do it. If you decide to do additional revisions, they should be inserted after the earlier revised and responded-to version. Even if you decide not to do any substantive revisions, you must go through the last version of each essay and correct any editing problems (the responses and the check marks in the margins will be the guide).

* For your final writing assignment of the semester, I would like you to return to the scrutiny of yourself as a writer and reader with which we began the semester and to write another profile of yourself as a writer and reader now, after this semester of work, learning, and practice. To prepare for your self-scrutiny, re-read the course syllabus, the handout on the Reader's Notebook, and the writing workshop guidelines you were given at the start of the semester as well as all the writing you've done this semester, as assembled above. With the course goals and processes and the work you've done fresh in your mind, ask yourself the following questions and address them in your writer's profile: What sort of writer would you call yourself now? What have you learned about writing and reading this semester? What are you proud of as you look through your portfolio? What remains for future efforts? Your claims, of course, should be ones your portfolio can support and give evidence of, though you certainly can claim to have learned about some aspect or feature of writing which you believe you have not yet mastered. What aspects of writing do you think you still need to work on? And last, what do you foresee for yourself as a writer in the future? What would you like to accomplish in your writing, and how do you intend to go about accomplishing your writing goals? How do you expect to continue to draw on what you've learned in this course in the writing you will do in the future?

* Finally, prepare a brief Introduction and Conclusion to your portfolio (your "Collected Works"!), number the pages of the portfolio sequentially throughout (numbering in ink by hand is okay), and then prepare a Table of Contents. Title your collection if you care to. Please be sure that everything in the portfolio is labeled (Essay I, Revised, etc.). And remember: no class notes, no handouts, no extraneous "stuff" is to be included in the portfolio. Place your portfolio securely in something that will hold it together--not in a manila file folder, in other words! Also be sure your name is clearly legible on the outside cover of the portfolio.

In assessing your work and assigning grades, I will first check for completeness of your portfolio (all requirements must be met satisfactorily for a grade of C or better) and review your record of attendance in class and at conferences, your preparedness for class (including workshops), your engagement and effort, active and interested participation, and timely submission of the portfolio and of all assignments, notebook, and other assigned work. The primary determinant of your grade, of course, will be the quality of your written work.

The completed portfolio is due at final class meeting. 

As always, I'm happy to answer any questions you may have. I hope you will enjoy the process of reflection, review, and re-vision which preparing your portfolio will entail, and I look forward to reading your work.