Class-by-Class Schedule

Assignments are listed (as HW) on the day they are assigned, and are due at 10pm the night before1 the following class meeting, unless otherwise specified. You should in general also bring a copy to class, so that we have access to it for in-class discussion and/or revisions.

Past and upcoming assignments are listed on the day-by-day schedule. Click the link on the assignment name to see full details.

Note: Everything is up for revision until it’s final, so anything still labelled “work in progress” is just that—a work in progress. Consider these your opportunity to get involved in the design of what’s to come. If you see I’m working on an assignment prompt for us and you want it to include some certain element, leave a message on the wiki page for the prompt-in-progress.

Unit 1 — The Art and Science of Writing


Lesson 1, Tues 8/28 — Introductions

Hw:

Read:

  • Course overview and policies
  • Selinger, Carl. "Writing". Stuff You Don’t Learn in Engineering School: Skills for Success in the Real World. Hoboken, NJ: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2004. Print. p. 11 - 16
  • Barrass, Robert. “Scientists must write” Scientists Must Write: A guide to better writing for scientists, engineers and students. London: Chapman & Hall, 1995: p. 1 - 5

Readings for 8/30 will be e-mailed to you directly


Lesson 2, Thu 8/30—Diagnostic essay Exercise: Writing for Engineers?

Rd:

  • They Say / I Say Introduction chapter
  • TSIS Chapter 1 “‘They Say’ Starting with What Other Are Saying”

HW:


Lesson 3, Tues 9/4—Discussion sequence: Templates, Originality, Creativity

Rd:

  • Handout: Murray  (Pre-)Reading Exercise: Beliefs and Expectations
  • Murray, D. (January, 1984) Writing and Teaching for Surprise. College English, 46,1: p. 1 - 7.

HW:

  • Leave a comment on one of your peers’ responses to discussion post 1.
  • In your response, point out one or two things you find interesting about your peer’s post.
  • After you read Murray’s essay, draft a quick response to the final question on the Murray Pre-Reading Handout. Come prepared to discuss your response to the whole questionnaire for next time.

Lesson 4, Thu 9/6—Writing exercise: Writing, surprise, and revision; Discussion: can templates be used creatively?

Rd:

  •  Goodman, P. (November 20, 1969) Can Technology Be Humane? New York Review of Books. p 1 - 11.

Lesson 5, Tue 9/11—Writing and Activity sequence: Technology and Humanity; initial discussion of Goodman

Watch:

Rd:

  • TSIS Ch 2

Hw:

  • Bring two single-paragraph summaries of Dugan's Ted Talk

Extra Credit Opportunity Because of the holidays, the schedule has gotten a bit compact here in the schedule. I have (what I think is) a cool assignment that asks you to put Goodman and Dugan into dialogue with one another, but I fear it's too big of a project for most of you to get to by Thursday, and pushing the deadline back would upset the days to follow. So, I've decided to make it optional: our first freebie opportunity. See Extra Credit 1 for the full prompt. Post your response to the blog by Fri 9/21 to earn one free credit to erase a deduction from your contract.


Lesson 6, Thu 9/13—Discussion: Must Technology be Humane?; Dugan vs Goodman

Rd:

  • TS/IS Chapter 3 “‘As He Himself Puts It’: The Art of Quoting”
  • Find a TEDtalk on http://www.ted.com that has relivance to your passions in science, technology, or any other field of knowledge you claim to be passionate about.

HW:

  • Use that TEDtalk as the basis for your post in response to blog prompt 2, due 10pm on Wed 9/19.

Tuesday 9/18 no class.


Lesson 7, Thu 9/20—TED Show and Tell; Preview of Unit 2

Hw:

  • Leave a comment on a peer's TED Talk review that is either a descenting or concurring opinion. See lesson 7 for details.

Rd:

  • TS/IS chapter 4 “‘Yes / No / Okay, But’: Three Ways to Respond”
  • Lombardo, T. (2006) “Future Studies” Contemporary Futurist Thought: Science Fiction, Future Studies, and Theories and Visions of the Future in the Last Century. Bloomington, IN: Author House. p. 109 - 132.
  • Kaku, M. (2011) “A Day in the Life of 2100”. Physic of the Future: How Science will Shape Human Destiny and our Daily Lives by the Year 2100. New York: Doubleday. p. 353 - 368.

Tuesday 9/25 no class

Unit 2 — Arguing into the Future

Lesson 8, Thu 9/27—Future prediction and/as argumentation

Rd:

  • TS/IS chapter 5 “‘And Yet’: Distinguishing What you Say from What They Say”
  • Kaku, M. (1997) “Choreographers of Matter, Life, and Intelligence” Visions: How Science Will Revolutionize the 21st Century. New York: First Anchor Books. p 3 - 22.
  • Linden, E. (1998) Introduction. The Future in Plain Sight: Nine Clues to the Coming Instability. New York: Simon & Schuster. p 13 - 32.

HW:

  • Complete an adjusted form of the second question of TSIS chapter 5 (in my edition, the question is on pages 77 - 78). The question asks you to take a piece of your own writing and analyze it in terms of what you learned in ch 5.

I have one suggestion and one adjustment to make to the assignment, however:

  1. I suggest you use your diagnostic essay or your TED review, but if you can think of an old piece of yours from earlier in your writing career that'd be a better fit, use it
  2. You are not actually required to revise the piece itself. It would be perfectly fine for you to simply bringing in a few bullet points in response to the questions listed (a through f).

Extra Credit Alert: If you WOULD like to actually revise your diagnostic essay taking the insights of this chapter into account, you may submit it as an extra-credit discussion post.

To earn this Freebie, you must post a new revised version of your diagnostic essay (or some other argumentative piece of your choosing). You must also include a brief (300 word minimum) behind-the-scenes section before or after your revised essay in which you explain how you went about revising this piece and why you chose this approach. Be as specific as possible in this piece, and don't be afraid to say what you think worked well and didn't work well in the revision process.

Fine print:

  1. This freebie offer is time sensitive. Your post must be up on the DB by 10pm on Friday, 10/5 to earn your freebie.
  2. Freebies may be used to erase one contract infringement from your record.
  3. Unused freebies do not carry any value toward your final grade.  

Lesson 9, Tue 10/2 — Approaches to future prediction: Linden vs Kaku; revisiting revising

Rd:

  • TS/IS chapter 6 “‘Skeptics May Object’: Planting a Naysayer in Your Text”
  • Kaku, M. (1997) “The Invisible Computer” Visions: How Science Will Revolutionize the 21st Century. New York: First Anchor Books. p. 23 - 42.
  • Wagar W. W. (1989) “The Molecular Society”. A Short History of the Future. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. p. 80 - 103.
  • Linden, E. (1998) “New York City: Advertising Adapts”. The Future in Plain Sight: Nine Clues to the Coming Instability. p. 200 - 212.

Hw:

  • Compose initial draft of blog-post 3, which is a summary and analysis of one of the future prediction models you've encountered so far. For next time, bring in an initial draft of your piece to share in class.

Lesson 10, Thu 10/4 — Group Share and Compare session: Initial drafts of Futurist analytical response; the art of counter-argumentation

Hw:

  • Post your response to blog-post-3 to the class blog by 10pm on Monday, 10/8.
  • Also, create a page for your writer archive and update it with initial content. See lesson 10 for details.

Lesson 11, Tue 10/9 — Fuzzy ambitions and other predictions of the future; group brainstorming for BP4

Hw:

  • Bring in mood board, mind map, recipe toward your future prediction piece

Lesson 12, Thu 10/11 — Writing Exercise: Feeling your way through the idea in writing

Rd:

  • Perl S. and Schwartz M.  “Workshopping a Draft” Writing True: The Art and Craft of Creative Nonfiction. p. 85 - 105
  • Bishop, W. (2004) “Revising Out and Revising In”. Acts of Revision: A Guide for Writers Heineman: p. 13 - 27.

Hw:

  • Bring five copies of initial “fat draft” of your Blog-Prompt 4 response for workshop on Thu 10/11

Lesson 13, Tue 10/16 — Peer Review Workshop 1: Arguing into the Future

Rd:

  • Sommers, N. (1980). “Revision Strategies of Student Writers and Experienced Adult Writers”. College Composition and Communication, Vol. 31, No. 4: p. 378-388.

Hw

  • Post your response to Blog-Prompt 4 by 10pm on Thu, 10/18
  • Sign up for and attend a revision session with Andrew between 10/22 and 10/26.

Lesson 14, Thu 10/18 — Revision Strategies workshop

Hw:

  • Sign up for and attend a revision session with Andrew between 10/22 and 10/26.
  • Begin revising midterm RP

Tue 10/23 — Open class session for revision consultations; solo and group work at student’s discretion

Hw: Continue revision work on midterm RP, Bring 5 copies of most recent draft on Thursday 10/25


Thu 10/25—Peer Review Workshop 2: Revised Piece (RP)

Hw:

  • Complete draft of Revised Piece submitted by 10pm Monday, 10/29.

Unit 3 — Research, Discourse, Inspiration

Lesson 15, Tue 10/30 — post-midterm check-in, research project topic development, Film: Urbanized CANCELED DUE TO HURRICANE SANDY


Lesson 16, Thu 11/1 Urbanized continued; discussion of film and Bowen chapters; share-and-compare: Annotated Bibliography rehearsals CANCELED DUE TO HURRICANE SANDY


Extra-credit opportunity Write a review of the film for our blog. Particularly, I want your review to begin by summarizing what this film is saying, and to who its probably intended audience is. Perhaps you might refer back to Bowen's distinction between work intended for popular or professional audiences as you try to describe who it is — exactly — this film is designed to appeal to. You should then offer an evaluation of the film, touching on both its successes and its shortcomings.

Your review should, as usual, have distinct They Say and I Say movementsit should lead with a strategic summary of the film, and develop from there a particular evaluation of its value.—

As usual, this freebie offer is time sensitive. Your post must be up on the blog by 10pm on Friday, 11/9 to earn your freebie.

//Fine Print Reminder: //Freebies may be used to erase one contract infringement from your record. Unused freebies do not carry any value toward your final grade.

I will add a new freebie assignment to Unit 4 to replace the one removed from this unit!


POST HURRICANE REVISION PLAN

Rd:

  • Bowen, M. E. and J. A. Mazzeo, eds. (1979) Writing about Science. New York: Oxford University Press.

Mandatory:
* Introduction p. xxi - xxiii
* “Writing for Popular Audiences” p 3 - 5
* “Writing for Professional Audiences” p 195 - 198

Choose one item from the menu below as the basis for an Annotated Bibliography Entry (described below):
* Michael Faraday, “The Chemical History of a Candle” p 7 - 20
* Isaac Asimov, “Organic Synthesis” p 40 - 52
* Bertrand Russell, “What is Matter?” p. 52 - 58
* Lewis Thomas, “Vibes” p. 120 - 124
* Rachel Carson, “A Fable for Tomorrow” and "The Obligation to Endure" p 149 - 159
* Gerrett Hardin “Coding the Mechanism” p 199 - 218
* George and Muriel Beadle “The Mandelian Laws” p 274 - 287
* Watch: Taylor, J. B. “Jill Bolte Taylor’s stroke of insight” TED Talks.
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/jill_bolte_taylor_s_powerful_stroke_of_insight.html
* Watch: “Boaz Almog ‘levitates’ a superconductor” TED Talks.
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/boaz_almog_levitates_a_superconductor.html

HW: Write an annotated bibliography entry for one item from the above list. Your entry should have three parts: a) the correct APA citation for your chosen text/video; b) a summary of your chosen piece in terms of style and content; and c) some sort of analytical response wherein you play both the believing and doubting games.

Bring in a printed or hand-written copy to discuss in class next time.

note: this is just a rehearsal round, so don't go too crazy on being perfect here. You'll be making a more high-stakes annotated bibliography later. For now, doing this in freewritten form is fine. Just make sure you cover all your bases.


Lesson 17, Tue 11/6 — Share-and-compare: Annotated Bibliography rehearsals; Unit 3 overview

Hw: Find a spark for something you'd like to write about in unit 3. Examples: book you've read or want to read, person whose work or ideas fascinate you, scientific principle you're intrigued by or don't yet understand, an innovation or invention you marvel at, a question you yourself want to answer as an engineer. Bring in some sort of physical representation of that spark for next class, and come prepared to tell your peers about it. (Hint: A spark object might be an online magazine article you've printed out or a scholarly book, or it might be a family photograph, or an old marked-up lab report, or an online video, a toy or gadget you own.)

Rd:

  • Booth, W., Colom, G. and Williams, J. “From Topics to Questions” The Craft of Research. Chicago: University of Chicago Press: p. 40 - 52.
  • TS/IS chapter 13 “‘The Data Suggest’: Writing in the Sciences”

Lesson 19, Tue 11/13 — Spark objects show and tell; Topics to Questions activity sequence

Rd:

  • TSIS Chapter 7 & 8

Lesson 20, Thu 11/15 — Working groups revealed and initial research discussion

Hw:

  • Post your initial project proposal (Blog post 5) by 10pm Friday, 11/16
  • Bring in three potential sources on your topic to class next time. Push yourself to find one from each general category—one source designed for a popular audience, one for a semi-professional or student audience, one for a professional or expert audience.

At least have them skimmed and notated so you can more easily discuss them. Next time we'll be working closely with these sources to develop some initial writing toward your reflective annotated bibliography.

Rd:

  • TS/IS chapter 12 “‘What’s Motivating this Writing?’: Reading for the Conversation”
  • OPTIONAL: Okasha, S. (2002). “Explanation in Science” Philosophy of Science: A Very Short Introduction. New York: Oxford University Press.

Lesson 22, Tue 11/20 — Evaluating sources, APA style overview

Hw:

  • Submit version of your reflective annotated bibliography (blog post 6) by Sunday 11/25

Your annotated bibliography should have two to three entries. Each entry should have four sections: a) the correct APA citation for your chosen text/video; b) a summary that provides a complete overview of the content of your source and its overall style of presentation; c) a bank of 2 or 3 direct quotations from the piece with page references (p. 12); and d) an evaluation of the source in terms of how it fits into your project and how it relates to your thinking.


Lesson 23, Tue 11/27 — TBD

Lesson 24, Thu 11/29—**Peer review workshop **: Researched Wiki Project (RWP)

Rd:

  • TS/IS chapter 10 “‘But don’t get me wrong’: The Art of Metacommentary”
  • Cook, D. “Punctuation as editing”. Acts of Revision: A Guide for Writers Wendy Bishop, ed. Portsmouth, NH: Heinneman. p 98 - 107.

Hw:

  • Update final version of your RWP by 10pm on Sun Dec 2nd
  • Begin gathering your materials for your portfolio. Brainstorm what approach you think you’ll take to argue you deserve a grade above contract level based on your written work

Unit 4 — Looking Forward, Looking Back

Lesson 25, Tue 12/4 — Reflecting on Writing: Self-Evaluation and Portfolio talk
Rd:

  • Bishop's "Composing Ourselves as Readers"

Hw:

Lesson 26, Thu 12/6 — Portfolio Strategy session; Share and Compare
Hw:

  • Compose initial draft of portfolio essay; bring four printed copies for peer review next class

Freebie Opportunity: choose a blog post or piece of informal writing from earlier in the term and revise it in some substantial way. You may either take a piece and write again for a new audience, or convert it into a substantially different form or genre from the original.

You must also include a 300-word "behind the scenes" statement evaluating your revision process: what were you trying to do? what was difficult or easy about the process? which version do you like better, and why?

Please post the original piece as well. Due to blog by 12/7


Lesson 27, Tue 12/11 —Peer Review: Portfolio essay

  • Revise portfolio essay

Lesson 28, Thu 12/13 — Peer Review: Author's choice of revised piece

Hw:

  • Prepare a 3 to 5-minute demonstration of your digital portfolio, highlighting your approach to the assignment and some of your favorite bits

Lesson 29, Tue 12/18—Symposium and Party

Hw:

  • Final portfolio due to the wiki at midnight on 12/21

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