previous

CO 150 College Composition Spring 1999

Instructor: Sue Doe
Office:322 Eddy; Phone: 491-7251
Email: [removed]
Office Hours: T/R 11-12 noon and by appointment

Course Textbooks

Reid, S. (1998). The Prentice Hall guide for college writers, 4th Ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Sladky, P. (1997). Free falling and other student essays, 3rd Ed. New York: St. Martin’s Press.

Course Description

This course is designed to introduce you to and prepare you for the types of writing you will do in college. As this is an introductory course, you will be evaluated on how well your writing meets standards of college writing. We will focus on personal essays, summaries of and responses to texts, syntheses of texts written by other authors, analyses of the rhetorical conventions of texts, and original arguments.

All class sessions will be held in the Clark Building, Room C213. Much of our class time will be spent in discussion, in providing peer responses to essays, and in writing. Therefore, this class will tend to take a form quite different from traditional lectures classes and will rely heavily upon your attendance and participation. Your participation will say much about your readiness for college work in general, since higher level classes will tend to take the kind of participatory approach we will begin here. In a class such as this it is not possible to miss a few classes and then borrow someone else’s notes. As such, I cannot recommend highly enough that you make every effort to attend every class; save your allowable absences for true illness or emergency.

Additional Information

This is a limited add/drop course. If you are planning to drop this course, you must do so quickly, as indicated in other information provided on the first day.

Please let me know if you have health concerns that may be relevant to the class. Also, please let me know as soon as possible if you have special requests for learning accommodations—for instance, a diagnosed or suspected learning disability. You may use our (private) autobiographical index cards to indicate any such information. Also, if you know that you will be absent at some point during the semester, I would appreciate knowing the specifics as soon as possible.

Policies and Requirements

Paper Format: All papers must be printed in a legible font using as high a quality printer as available.

Three-Ring Binder: Please bring a three-ring binder to each and every class. You will keep your written work here, and I will distribute handouts three-hole punched for ease of filing.

Late Papers: All late papers will be penalized one grade per day late. A paper turned on the due date but after class will be considered one day late. Please contact me as soon as you know your paper will be late, via email, and if you drop off a late paper at the English Office, please ask them to date and initial the paper for verification purposes.

Attendance: Attendance is a non-negotiable item. While good attendance will not guarantee you a good grade the class, poor attendance will assure a poor grade. If you miss two classes on a Tuesday-Thursday class such as ours, you have missed a full week of course material. Consider two classes a logical limit, and, as recommended before, save these absences for illness or emergency. A pattern of absences will be addressed and corrected, or I will assume that your approach to the class is less than professional. Absences in excess of two will drop your grade on the affected unit by one grade per additional absence. The number of absences during the semester will be considered cumulative

Backup Copies of Your Work: You are responsible for making backup copies of all your coursework. I recommend making an additional hard copy of each assignment turned in as well as saving to disk and to your hard drive. Remember that some of the computer labs on campus have virus problems, and that virus checking and double-checking of your disks is essential. Make sure you put your name on your disks, too, as disks are found all the time and generally not returned because they have no identification on them. Plan ahead and remember that a down printer is not a worthy excuse for a later paper. Assume that things will go wrong, and get things done early.

Open-Door Policy: If you have questions at any time, please contact me. Call or email me, or make an appointment, if my office hours are inconvenient for you.

Grading

Your course grade will be based on the quality of your written work, on the quality and consistency of your class participation (including attendance!), and on your execution of various class exercises and out-of-class assignments. The course grade will be calculated as follows:

Unit One: Examining the Functions of Language

  1. Personal Essay: 5%
  2. Response Essay: 10%
  3. Inquiry Essay: 15%
  4. Unit Two: Analyzing the Language of Texts in an Academic Discipline

  5. Text Analysis Report: 10%
  6. Unit Three: Formulating a Written Argument

  7. Arguing Essay Proposal Packet: 10%
  8. Arguing Essay Brief: 5%
  9. Arguing Essay: 20%
  10. Additional

  11. Final Exam: 5%
  12. Homework and In-Class Work, including Participation: 20%

**Please note that failure to submit any of the required papers may result in a failing grade for the course. **Please also note special information regarding attendance in the lines above.

Plus/Minus Grading: This class uses plus/minus grading and a 10-point grading scale.

Plagiarism

Plagiarism is the dishonest use of someone else’s thoughts or words. It is a form of cheating and of theft because you are attributing someone else’s words to yourself. Plagiarism can vary from submitting someone else’s paper as your own to "borrowing" a phrase, to using a source without citing it correctly, to "padding" a bibliography by making up sources or including sources you didn’t use in your research. Whenever you use a general concept or idea, quotation, statistic, fact, illustration, or phrase that is not your own without giving proper acknowledgement to the author, you are plagiarizing. Plagiarism is a serious offense, which can result in failure on a paper, failure for the whole course, or expulsion from the university. Please contact me if and when you have questions about citing sources.

Course Resources

The Writing Center: Please make use of the Writing Center, located in Eddy Hall, Room 6, where tutors are available to help you with your writing, providing feedback on your work as it progresses, or to explore ideas with you about your writing. Writing tutors do not proofread papers, but they’ll help you develop your proofreading and editing skills. When you make use of the Writing Center, arrive as fully prepared as possible, assignment and two copies of your draft in hand so that you both have a text to look at. Plan to become a regular customer!

The On-Line Writing Center: Located at http://www.colostate.edu on the Web, the On-Line Writing Center is the largest on-line writing assistance center anywhere. It is a resource you should become familiar with right away and then continue to consult throughout your college career. If you need help navigating through the 7,000+ pages of materials, consult the Index or talk to your instructor.

TIMELINE for CO150, Section 38

Through Spring Break

Class #

Date

Reading Assigned

Items DueFor Grade

Additional Info

1

1/19

PHG: 3-15, 17-31

Fall: 13, 16

 

 

2

1/21

PHG 77-9, 125-6, 99-109

Fall: 19, 26

 

 

3

1/26

Fall: 31

 

 

4

1/28

 

 

 

5

2/2

PHG 145-53

Fall: 162

Personal Essay

 

6

2/4

PHG: 154-6, 172-84

Fall: 164

 

 

7

2/9

PHG: Reread 183-4,

Also:278-83, 192-6

Fall: 168

 

 

8

2/11

PHG: Reread 278-83

192-6, 182-83

Fall: 170

 

 

9

2/16

Friendly Critiquing

Fall: 80

 

 

10

2/18

Fall: 112

 

 

11

2/23

Handout

Fall: 76

Response Essay

 

12

2/25

Reread essays selected for inquiry essay

Fall: 89

 

 

13

3/2

Selected essays

Fall: 98

 

Bring highliter

14

3/4

Fall: 102, 143

 

 

SPRING BREAK

15

3/16

Fall: 146

 

 

16

3/18

PHG: 20-26

Magazine Articles

Inquiry Essay

 

************************************************************************

More Timeline to follow Spring Break

Other Due Dates for Planning Purposes

April 1—Text Analysis Due

April 15—Arguing Proposal Packet Due

April 20—Argument Brief Due

May 10 (first day of finals week)—Argument Paper Due

Final Exam—to be announced when schedule released