Return to Unit One:MWF

Class Plan -- Unit One, Day 2, Part 2 (GTA's Only)

• Reading and prewriting exercises from PHG.

Goals:

• To connect the discussions from the last two days about communication and writing as a process to the four writing elements that we focus on in this course(Purpose/Audience, Focus, Development, Coherence).
• To demonstrate how these four writing elements are used as grading and workshopping criteria.

Assignment:

• Read PHG on Observing and Remembering (pp. 53-60; 103-112).

Setup Needs:

• Handout on the four writing elements (following this lesson).
• Overhead of sample paragraphs (following this lesson).
• Sample Essay (following this lesson).
• Before you teach, make sure you understand the four writing elements for yourself, as well as how they can be used as general grading criteria. Refer to the guide following this lesson plan as a place to start (and watch what happened in your audit section!).

Sequence:

• Start the class with the following writing prompt:

Start out today by thinking about the activity we did on the first day    

of class, in which you tried to communicate instructions about how to     

draw a complex shape to another person.  But now, rather than thinking    

about what went wrong with those instructions, think about an ideal set   

of instructions for drawing that shape.  What qualities and elements      

would a set of instructions need to have so that someone could redraw     

the shape by simply reading them?                                         

After giving your students a few minutes to write, quickly flag back to the first writing element you discussed on the first day: Purpose/Audience. Quickly recap the definitions of those terms. Then, start putting their responses from the Daily on the board. Once you've got a good number of responses on the board, simply categorize those responses in terms of the other three writing elements. The categorization will be easy. For instance, anything about a step-by-step sequence or a logical order is Focus; sufficient explanations, enough detail, etc. relate to Development, and understandable, clear language relates to Coherence. Voila! The other three writing elements revealed! Note for your students how all these elements stem from the idea of communicating your Purpose clearly to your Audience. (10 minutes)

• Hand out the sheet on the four elements and have your students read it out loud.
• Explain the grading procedure using these elements (refer to the following sheet). (10 minutes)
• Then, have students practice grading the two paragraphs on the overhead/handout following this lesson.
• If time allows (which it probably will), have your students break into groups and grade the following sample essay. be sure to bring the groups back together and discuss why they gave the essay the grade they did.
• Give the assignment.