College Writing III, English 123

Spring, 1997

Required Text

Literature and Its Writers is the main text for the course; however, students will also be referred to their handbook as needed for help with specific writing problems or questions concerning MLA documentation.

Critical Writing After Critical Thinking

English 123 is designed to allow students to put all their analytic reading and writing skills to work on the analysis of imaginative literature. To this end, the class will use the "real questions" technique designed by Dr.Sheila Coghill of Moorhead State University to develop and answer questions about the literature. (See attached). This technique should allow students to focus on aspects of the literature they feel are most important. This will put the responsibility for questioning a work and developing answers to those questions squarely on the students in the class; students shouldn't expect "canned" answers from the instructor. Research into the "real questions" technique has shown that students can and do identify the major issues raised by a work, are more interested in discussing the questions they themselves have generated, and can easily turn questions of interest into thesis statements for essays.

Analytic essays reflecting a student's thinking about a particular work or works will culminate each discussion and will constitute the major portion of the written work in the course. It is expected that the essay will develop a persuasive or informative thesis about the work which is supported by specific reference to the work. A paper which is no more than a retelling of the work (or a summary) will be returned without a grade for reworking.

Class Organization

For discussion of individual works, the class will be divided into no more than five work groups. Each group will be assigned one or more works and asked to provide biographical information about the author or authors to the class as a whole as well as presenting their assigned work. Students will be expected to read, discuss and develop "real questions" about all the works in a given assignment; however, a student may choose to write about only one of the works if they so desire.

Students will also be expected to organize the panel presentation of their group. For example, each panel presentation will need a moderator to introduce the group and the work and to keep the panel discussion moving; each member of the group must take a turn acting as moderator.

As a final project, each student will be expected to research, review, and write a movie review, rating the film as "two thumbs up, " or "two thumbs down," or a mixed review. In rating a film like this, you are making a recommendation to the audience about whether or not the movie is worth seeing, Students may choose their own movie, but students may choose to review the same movie and work together on the raw data for the review, but each student must write their own review. The movie review will be presented as a formal oral presentation during the final week of class.

Instructor Expectations

• Attendance: Attendance will be taken each day, and a student's grade may be lowered for non-attendance after after two (2) absences; student's absent on the day of their panel presentations will have ten (10) points deducted from the paper resulting from that round of panels.
• Discussion: It is my expectation that students come to class having read the assignment and ready to discuss the readings or write about them. This does not mean that students must like the work under discussion or know everything about it. However, it does mean that students should be willing to explain to others why they did not like a work or what they did not understand about it. Spot quizzes may be used to enforce this expectation if needed.
• Written work: Written work is to be turned in on the day it is due; any late paper will be reduced one grade for each day it is late unless prior arrangement has been made with the instructor. In addition, all essays will follow the short paper format, be typed or word processed, documented and stapled or clipped together.
• Tests: There will be a mid-term and a final exam consisting of identification and short answer essay. The background reading as well as the literature will be covered on the tests.
• Each class period will be split between discussion/lecture 8-9 and computer work, discussion and writing 9-10 in the computer lab.

Proposed Sequence of Readings

Wk I: March 11 and 13 (No class March 13): Theoretical background to literature;

• Read: "What is a Short Story?" pgs. 3-30 ; modeling of the use of evidence to support a thesis; Short Story Set I: "Casebook on Sandra Cisneros" pgs. 832-847; "The House on Mango Street," pg. 161
• Write: Essay I: My Critical Stance or How I Decide What Is Good; due Tuesday, March 18

Wk II: March 18, 20:

• Read: Short Story Set II -- Crane, "The Open Boat," pg. 166; Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily," pg. 204; Cisneros, "My Name," pg. 162 and 'Mango Says Goodbye Sometimes," pg. 165; and Borges, "Everything and Nothing," pg. 96.
• Do: Short Story Set I; Real Questions Technique.

Wk III: March 25,-27:

• Read: Poetry Set I; to be assigned.
• Do: Panel Presentations--Short Story Set II; real Questions Technique.
• Write: Essay II: Analytic paper on Short Story Sets I or II. Due Thursday, March 27

Wk IV: April 1,-3:

• Read: Poetry Set II; to be assigned
• Do: Panel presentations--Poetry Set I; Real Questions Technique

Wk V: April 8, 10:

• Read: Drama Set I
• Do: Panel presentations--Poetry Set II; Real Questions Technique.
• Write: Essay III: Analytic Essay on Poetry Sets I or II. Due, Thursday, April 10

Wk VI: April 15,17 Mid-term (Short Story/Poetry)--Thursday, April 17:

Read: Drama Set II

Do: Panel presentations--Drama Set I; Real Questions Technique

Wk VII: April 22, 24:

• Read: Student Selected Literature I.
• Do: Panel presentations--Drama Set II
• Write: Essay IV; Analytic Essay on Drama Set I or II, Due Thursday, April 24

Wk VIII: April 29, May 1:

• Read: Student Selected Literature II.
• Do: Panel presentations--Student Selected Literature I; real Questions Technique.

Wk IX:May 6, 8:

• Do: Panel presentations--Student selected literature II; Real Questions Technique.
• Write: Essay V; Analytic Essay on Student Selected Literature I or II. Due, Thursday, May 8;

Wk X: May 13, 15: Oral Presentations of Movie Reviews; written review, Essay VI due Thursday, May 15.

A User's Guide to Real Questions

Developed by Dr. Sheila Coghill
Moorhead State University

In order to be a "real" question, the question must:

a) be a question which grows out of your own reading and thinking about the work

b) be a question which cannot be answered "yes" or "no" or is too literal

c) be a question which cannot be answered by a more thorough reading of the text

d) be a question which cannot be answered directly by biographical or historical data

e) be a question to which you would genuinely like an answer because the question interests you

Each student group is to develop questions about the work which meet this criteria. On the way to developing these questions, the group may find itself answering specific questions about the work which may be confusing some group members or may be "yes" or "no" questions. There is nothing wrong with this, but the discussion should not stop there.

The "answers" and questions will be collected at the end of the hour, duplicated and distributed for further discussion.

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