Designing Effective Writing Assignments

1. Designing Effective Writing Assignments Karla Saari Kitalong, English New Faculty OrientationAugust 15, 2007

2. The point • Assignment design influences students’ thinking and writing processes. • When planning assignments, consider not only the course learning goals but also the thinking, learning, and writing processes you want to invoke. New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

3. Resources • Writing Across the Curriculum Clearinghouse http://wac.colostate.edu/index.cfm • Bedford/St. Martins Professional Resources (http://bedfordstmartins.com) • Hedengren, B. A TA’s Guide to Teaching Writing in All Disciplines. 2004. • Gottschalk, K. and K. Hjortshoj. The Elements of Teaching Writing: A Resource for Instructors in All Disciplines. 2004. • University Writing Center www.uwc.ucf.edu • Bean, John C. Engaging Ideas: The Professor’s Guide to Integrating Writing, Critical Thinking, and Active Learning in the Classroom. Jossey-Bass, 2001 (www.josseybass.com). • Karla Saari Kitalong, Director of Writing Programskitalong@mail.ucf.edu New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

4. One Minute Paper: • If time and resources were unlimited, what kinds of writing would you assign your students to do? • Why are these writing assignments important to your students’ learning? New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

5. Writing is… • a complex activity or practice • a process as well as a product • a learning activity • a communications activity New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

6. Challenges of Teaching Writing • Writing problems are numerous and varied. • Solutions may be discipline specific. • Much of what an accomplished writer knows about writing remains tacit. • Tacit knowledge is (arguably) best communicated through apprenticeship. New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

7. Writing to Perform/Communicate(Transactional Writing) • Formal papers prepared over weeks or months. • Model format and style of professional papers in the discipline. • Graded primarily on content. • Expect standard format, logical organization, mechanical correctness. • Can involve interim drafts, peer review. New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

8. Writing to Learn • Informal (short, impromptu) writing tasks • Help students understand concepts or ideas. • Often limited to five minutes of class time or assigned as out-of-class assignments. • Active learning, sometimes collaborative. • One minute paper; think-pair-share; online discussion or blog entry. New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

9. Effective Writing Assignments: Getting Started • Start with a clear goal that YOU can express. “What does this writing task accomplish for students?” • Visualize the final product and think backwards. "What do I want to read at the end of this assignment? How can we get there?” New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

10. Written Assignment Sheet • Tie the writing to specific course goals. • Note rhetorical aspects of the task (audience, purpose, situation). • Make all elements of the task clear. • Include grading criteria. • Break the task into manageable steps and allow for multiple drafts. New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

11. Unnecessary Challenges • Incomplete assignments (not written down; deadlines, format, grading rubric not specified). • Complex assignments (too many questions to consider; hard to find “the” question; overly detailed structure). • Vague assignments (provide general imperatives such as discuss, analyze instead of focused questions). New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

12. Focus the Question CONFUSING:In the graveyard scene of Hamlet, Shakespeare alters his sources by adding the clownish gravediggers. How does the presence of the gravediggers influence your interpretation of the scene? Do you think they are funny? Absurd? Blasphemous? How does Hamlet’s attitude toward the gravediggers affect the scene? Do you think it is appropriate to sing while digging a grave? What about the jokes they tell? Do you think that Yorick was more like the gravediggers or more like Hamlet? Do you think it is appropriate to have a lighthearted moment like this in the middle of a tragedy? Is the scene really lighthearted? New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

13. Focus the Question BETTER:In the graveyard scene of Hamlet, Shakespeare alters his sources by adding the clownish gravediggers. How does the presence of the gravediggers influence your interpretation of the scene? New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

14. Suggest a Proposition • This proposed bridge design does / does not meet the criteria set forth by the city in its request for proposal.[civil engineering] • “The path to holiness lies through questioning everything.” Agree or disagree.[religious studies] • Based on the attached case, the nurse supervisor should/should not honor the husband’s request that his wife (a stroke victim) be assigned a new nurse.[nursing] • Global warming is / is not a significant environmental threat at this time.[environmental biology] • When the tablecloth was pulled from underneath the dishes, the dishes stayed on the table. Why? [physics exam] New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

15. Guide Them to a Proposition • Write an essay of no more than two double-spaced pages answering the following question: Is a skilled trout fisher on a variable interval or a variable ratio schedule or reinforcement? Imagine that you are writing to a classmate who has missed the last week of lectures and finds the textbook explanations of “variable interval” and “variable ratio” confusing. [Psychology] • Gauss’s law relates the field at the surface to the charge inside the surface. But surely the field at the surface is affected by the charges outside the surface. How do you resolve this difficulty? [Physics] • Choose a question that Plato answers in one way and Aristotle answers in a different way (for example, “How do things change?”) Then, in the first part of your paper, explain to your reader the differences in these two theories. In the second part of your paper, evaluate the two positions, arguing that one position is stronger than the other. In this section, specifically answer the following question: What situation or thing does one theory explain well that the other cannot explain adequately? [Philosophy] New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

16. They Choose a Proposition • Write an essay of X pages on any topic related to this course. • Use the introduction of your essay to engage your reader’s interest in a problem or question that you would like to address in your essay. Show your reader what makes the question both significant and problematic. • The body of your essay should be your own response to this question made as persuasive as possible through appropriate analysis and argumentation, including effective use of evidence. • Midway through the course, you will submit to the instructor a prospectus that describes the problem or question that you plan to address and shows why the question is (1) problematic and (2) significant. New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

17. Focus the Question: Discuss the use of pesticides in controlling mosquitoes. New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

18. Focus the Question LESS EFFECTIVE:Discuss the use of pesticides in controlling mosquitoes. MORE EFFECTIVE:What are the pros and cons of using pesticides to control mosquitoes? Or Which pesticides (if any) would you recommend using to control pesticides in the attached case, and why? New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

19. What we know about writing in the disciplines • Writing • promotes learning • is the responsibility of the entire academic community • must be integrated across departmental boundaries • The best writing instruction • is continuous throughout undergraduate education • Effective writing within a discipline • requires practicing the conventions of that discipline. New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong

20. Finishing Up • Jot down some notes for a formal or informal writing assignment you could try in one of your classes. • What learning goals does the assignment fulfill? • How will you assess the assignment? New Faculty Orientation -- Kitalong