General Expectations for Each Student

• To pass each element of this class and earn 10 credits!
• To develop an awareness of yourself as an ethical creature and the responsibilities you have to yourself and others.
• To prepare you for the next level of writing courses.
• To prepare you to succeed as a student by developing study, time and personal management skills.
• To give instruction and practice in the writing of college essays.
• To give practice in the writing and revising of effective sentences, paragraphs, and essays. To develop a greater competency in the conventions of Standard American English.
• To gain an understanding of and practice in the use of computer technology for interpersonal communication and academic research.

Pass the Class!

The primary goal of this class is to get you to pass the class by writing paragraphs and essays and completing a number of tasks intended to develop your skills as a student. English 98 students will earn from 1 to 5 credits depending upon the amount of work done that meets at least minimum expectations. English 99 students will receive a number grade depending both upon the number of assignments completed and the level of competency they show in completing those assignments. Most successful English 98 students will move on to English 99. In order for any student to move on to English 101, successful completion of Section Four is the mandatory minimum, but in no way guarantees a 98 student will move to 101. For 98 students to move to English 99, successful completion of Section Three is the minimum required. Successful English 99 students will be eligible for English 101. This requires completing all of the paragraph assignments successfully and at least one of the essay assignments. Again, this is no guarantee of going onto English 101. English 94 students will. . . .. English 151 students will . . ..

Help you Write Effectively

A goal of this class is to help you not only pass so you can move on to the next level of English, but to help you develop skills and strategies so you can write effective essays for other classes. This will happen best if you come to class each day and do as is expected/asked of you.

Build Literacies

A third goal of this course, wrapped up in the course content and its delivery, is increased traditional, cultural, social, ethical and technological literacies at both functional and higher levels. Functional literacy in a traditional sense means you can read and write well enough to function effectively in society. In a technological sense it means you are master of the machine rather than the other way around.

Understand the Importance of Being Here

Some students fail to make this connection, but our course’s success depends on the quality of class discussion and participation, so come to class having read and thought about the assignment. If you miss a class, you must get any information you missed from a classmate or the blog. All students have one week's worth of class that can be missed without penalty (four full days), and all absences--excused or unexcused--are equal. English 99 students missing two or fewer classes will have a .3 bonus added to their final grades IF the final grade at that point is at least 2.5 for English 99 credits. Students missing more than a week's worth of classes will have a .1 deducted from the final grade for each absence after that. Once more than two weeks of class has been missed, you may fail the course with an earned F. If you find this to be objectionable, you have two choices: make it to class as expected or find another section. We won't be flexible about this.

Work Effectively with Others

For each assignment in this class you will be working with other writers and both teachers. When doing so, you are to offer constructive feedback to help group members improve the paper they have written. Our goal is to help you not only learn to recognize good writing and offer help and suggestions on how to improve your classmates' essays, but to enable you to learn something about the people in your groups. This creates a community of writers and learners in our classroom where you can learn that written communication is to be read, not just stuffed away in a drawer or to be given to an instructor to be marked up with red ink (Normally I use blue or black on paper or comment in the word processing document itself). This is also done so you can learn that each member of this class can offer you something to enrich your life and your scholarly pursuits. The rule for responding to the work of others is to do so with honesty (as opposed to being "brutally frank"), respect and courtesy. We are here to help each other improve as writers, not to laugh at or judge each other. We understand that the responses from other students are not always the best, but part of the reason we do this is so you are able to give better feedback once you are through with this and other writing classes.

Engage in Self-reflection

We want you to think about what it is you are doing and how you could possibly do it better. In part, this means writing your essays well before the day they are due so you can let your ideas simmer in your mind. You will also write a short paragraph (which answers certain assigned questions) at the end of each essay to evaluate your performance and the behaviors during the writing of your essays. This is one way to both learn from your mistakes and avoid repeating them while learning to recognize your strengths as well. I would also like you to consider how your behavior as a student affects others in the class. Respect and courtesy are key. Self-reflection is key to writing and learning. As college students, it is important that you understand the onus is on you to master the material once you have been introduced to it. This means thinking, and asking thoughtful questions.