University of Waterloo
In association with
Department of English Language and Literature
presents...
ENGL 109 - Introduction to Academic Writing
Instructor: Dr. Clive Forrester
Virtual Meeting Room: See LEARN for details
Office hours: Wed. 11:00-12:20pm EST (or by appointment)
Email: clive.forrester@uwaterloo.ca ext: 37905
Course Description:
ENGL 109 serves as an introductory course to the foundations and principles of the genre of writing expected at the university level. Participants will be exposed to three styles of academic essays - expository, narrative and argumentative essay - and instructed how each style fits into the larger goals of the institution as well as to the world outside the classroom. Since good writing is a social and collaborative activity, participants will receive ongoing feedback on their own writing, as well as learn how to give constructive criticisms to the writing of their peers.
Learning Outcomes:
At the end of the course participants should be able to:
- Demonstrate the principles of critical thinking, reading and writing
- Produce writing samples in different academic genres
- Communicate effectively to different academic audiences
- Create, edit, and revise ideas from concept to essay
- Design an independent research project
- Produce a professional writing portfolio
What’s with the colours?
This course outline uses three colours to indicate the writing module:
Yellow (Y) - Narrative
Blue (B) - Expository
Red (R) - Argumentative
They indicate which style of writing we will focus on for that class. It is important that you keep up to date with class activities and the progression of your writing since there is very little opportunity for redoing material which was covered in a previous module.
Featured Author
Each module has a featured author. During the weeks of the current featured author, we will look at their writing (which could be short stories, speeches, essays etc.) and discuss some of the themes they explore in relation to topics for that module.
|
Week |
Topic |
Readings / Assignments |
Featured Author |
|
1 |
Course Introduction & Goal Setting ● What is academic writing?
|
Complete goal setting exercise |
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie grew up in Nigeria. Her work has been translated into over thirty languages and has appeared in various publications, including The New Yorker, Granta, The O. Henry Prize Stories, the Financial Times, and Zoetrope. She is the author of the novels Purple Hibiscus, which won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize and the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award; Half of a Yellow Sun, which won the Orange Prize and was a National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist and a New York Times Notable Book; and Americanah, which won the National Book Critics Circle Award and was named one of The New York Times Top Ten Best Books of 2013. Ms. Adichie is also the author of the story collection The Thing Around Your Neck. Ms. Adichie has been invited to speak around the world. Her 2009 TED Talk, The Danger of A Single Story, is now one of the most-viewed TED Talks of all time. Her 2012 talk We Should All Be Feminists has a started a worldwide conversation about feminism, and was published as a book in 2014. Her most recent book, Dear Ijeawele, or a Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions, was published in March 2017. A recipient of a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship, Ms. Adichie divides her time between the United States and Nigeria. |
|
2 (Y) |
Narrative Writing [Foundations]
|
Create a theme for the story Read: HTWA, Chapter 19: Smart Reading | |
|
Choosing a “narrative lense” ● Who is telling the story? ● Character development |
Choose a narrative voice and introduce one character HTWA, Ch. 1: Narrative, pp. 4-9 | ||
|
3 (Y) |
Researching the narrative context
|
Develop a short research project for story HTWA, Ch. 37: Field Research, pp. 412-414 | |
|
Peer-review of narrative writing
|
Should have
| ||
|
4 (Y) |
Using vivid imagery in narratives & Creating a plot-twist
|
Storycraft, Ch. 6: Scene Storycraft, Ch. 2: Structure, pp. 34-37 |
| |||
|
Peer review of narrative writing
|
Should have:
| ||
|
5 (B) |
The Expository Essay [Foundations]
|
|
TANYA TALAGA is Ojibwe with roots in Fort William First Nation in Ontario, Canada. She worked as a journalist at the Toronto Star for more than twenty years, and has been nominated five times for the Michener Award in public service journalism. Talaga holds an honorary Doctor of Letters from Lakehead University in Thunder Bay, and shares her expertise on the boards of PEN Canada and The Narwal. Tanya is the President and CEO of Makwa Creative, a production company focussed on Indigenous storytelling. Tanya is the acclaimed author of Seven Fallen Feathers, which was the winner of the RBC Taylor Prize, the Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing, and First Nation Communities Read: Young Adult/Adult. The book was also a finalist for the Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Nonfiction Prize and the BC National Award for Nonfiction, and it was CBC’s Nonfiction Book of the Year, a Globe and Mail Top 100 Book, and a national bestseller. |
|
From thesis to paragraph
|
Develop introductory paragraph and first supporting point HTWA, Ch. 2: Report, pp. 40-42 | ||
|
6 (B) |
Doing background research for the essay
|
Prepare mock reference page in MLA style HTWA, Ch. 35: Research, pp. 400-405 | |
|
Peer- review of expository writing
|
Should have
|
|
7 |
NO CLASS - Reading Week | ||
|
8 (B) |
Incorporating tables, diagrams, graphs
|
| |
|
Conceptualizing recommendations/areas for further research
|
Writing rationale for research essays | ||
|
9 (B) |
Peer review of expository writing ● Final checking of style and content |
Should have:
|
Rupi Kaur (born 4 October 1992) is an Indian-born Canadian poet, illustrator, and author. Kaur rose to fame on Instagram and Tumblr through sharing her short visual poetry. She received widespread popularity, after the publication of her debut book Milk and Honey (2014), which went on to sell over 3 million copies worldwide and spent more than a year on The New York Times Best Seller list. In 2017, Kaur released her second book, The Sun and Her Flowers, leading her to be named on the BBC's 100 Women in 2017. Her work explores relationships, the immigrant experience, and sexual trauma and is considered to be at the forefront of Instapoetry. In 2019, The New Republic named Kaur, "Writer of the Decade" |
|
10 (R) |
Argumentative Writing [Foundations]
|
Choose a position on an argument Read: HTWA, Chapter 20: Experts | |
|
Logic, Truth and Critical thinking ● What is critical thinking?
|
Develop argument outline showing arguments and evidence HTWA, Ch. 3: Argument, pp. 68-73 | ||
|
Researching rhetorical strategies |
Fallacy identification in published work | ||
|
HTWA, Ch. 38: Evaluating Sources, pp. 415-419 | ||
|
11 (R) |
Peer-review of persuasive writing
|
Should have
| |
|
Anecdotes and analogies as rhetorical strategy & Developing a Rebuttal
|
Persuasive Writing, Ch. 2: Tools, pp. 27-31 Persuasive Writing, Ch. 3: Beyond Logic, pp. 43-47 | ||
|
12 (R) |
Peer review of argumentative writing
|
Should have:
| |
|
Individual Consultations before submission of final draft | |||
|
13 |
Assessment breakdown
All dates for assignments will be synchronized to the calendar on LEARN as well as MS Teams.
The assessment for this course is divided into three areas:
- Participation in peer review exercises (20%): One of the ways to maximize what you gain from this course is to engage in the various avenues for class participation as well as peer reviews. Throughout the term, you will have opportunities to review the writing of peers in your class as they do the same for your writing. The idea here is to make you aware that a large part of determining what constitutes “good writing” involves collaborative input from the larger community of writers.
- In-class activities (20%): A series of in-class writing activities based on the readings and/or course content will be uploaded throughout the course. The activities themselves do not carry individual grades, but are simply meant to see how well you have been keeping up with the material. This type of assessment is called “formative assessment.” Your overall grade here is dependent on completion of all exercises and a satisfactory demonstration that the material has been internalized.
-
Writing
Portfolio
(60%):
The
writing
portfolio
will
be
a
collection
of
all
the
substantive
writing
you
have
done
throughout
the
course.
It
will
contain:
a.
Three
academic
essays
[1
narrative,
1
expository
essay,
1
argumentative
essay]
- All previous drafts of the completed essays
- Any other material relevant to your writing development (e.g. research notes)
- Badges: Badges are merit-based awards that you can earn throughout the course for actions such as exceptional performance on an exercise, helping a classmate, or completing all assignments before the deadline. There are a variety of badges that carry different “credit” weighting. In the event that you didn’t perform too well in one graded area of the course (e.g. one of your major essays) credits can be traded in at the end of the course for a boost in your overall grade. Some badges are hidden, so you won’t know what they are until you earn them. Happy hunting!
Recommended Readings:
(chapters for readings are already uploaded to LEARN website)
Fredrick, P. (2011). Persuasive writing: How to harness the power of words. Harlow, England. Pearson Education Limited.
Hart, J. (2011). Storycraft: The complete guide to writing narrative non-fiction. Chicago. University of Chicago Press.
Ruszkiewicz, J. J., & Dolmage, J. (2010). How to write anything: A guide and reference with readings. New York. Bedford/St. Martin’s.
Late Assignments:
If you think that an assignment will be handed in late, be sure to say so in advance. Late assignments due to illness must be accompanied by a verification of illness form. In the absence of verifiable illness and/or a similar emergency (or an extension expressly granted by me) do NOT assume that the assignment will be accepted. Late penalties will apply to all assignments submitted after the posted due date, and will accrue at a rate of 5% per hour for every hour past the deadline.
Keeping in Touch With Me
Writing courses at a university can be tough - trust me I know. While you try to figure out your place at the university, feel free to stop by during office hours and have a chat about your writing. If for some reason you can’t come to the scheduled office hours, we can make an appointment to meet virtually. Most importantly, do not wait until you feel completely overwhelmed to seek help. Let’s start talking as early as possible.
Academic Integrity
In order to maintain a culture of academic integrity, members of the University of
Waterloo community are expected to promote honesty, trust, fairness, respect and responsibility. See the UWaterloo Academic Integrity Webpage
(https://uwaterloo.ca/academic-integrity/) and the Arts Academic Integrity Office Webpage (http://arts.uwaterloo.ca/current-undergraduates/academic-responsibility) for more information.
Discipline
A student is expected to know what constitutes academic integrity to avoid committing academic offenses and to take responsibility for his/her actions. A student who is unsure whether an action constitutes an offense, or who needs help in learning how to avoid offenses (e.g., plagiarism, cheating) or about “rules” for group work/collaboration should seek guidance from the course professor, academic advisor, or the undergraduate associate dean. For information on categories of offenses and types of penalties, students should refer to Policy 71, Student Discipline (http://www.adm.uwaterloo.ca/infosec/Policies/policy71.htm). For typical penalties check Guidelines for the Assessment of Penalties (http://www.adm.uwaterloo.ca/infosec/guidelines/penaltyguidelines.htm).
Grievance: A student who believes that a decision affecting some aspect of his/her university life has been unfair or unreasonable may have grounds for initiating a grievance. Read Policy 70 - Student Petitions and Grievances, Section 4. When in doubt, please be certain to contact the department’s administrative assistant who will provide further assistance.
Appeals: A decision made or penalty imposed under Policy 70 - Student Petitions and Grievances (other than a petition) or Policy 71 - Student Discipline may be appealed if there is a ground.