Author Archives: Tim Dalton

Class 09

Good morning. We’ll start off with a quick review of what we covered Wednesday. The activities from that class, as always, are on our Goals and Plans Doc. Last Wednesday:

  • we looked at the shout-outs in the reply box to last Monday’s post (and reviewed the difference between abstract and concrete language);
  • we shared some (concrete) cultural artifacts and described their (abstract) significance to us (and we also introduced the idea of a narrator’s position; cultural artifacts can help us remember and orient the reader to “where we’re coming from”)
  • finally, we did an exploratory freewrite, positioning ourselves (as readers) in relation to the concrete objects (books) we’ll be “reading alone and with others” over the rest of the semester. Some notes from those freewrites:
    • a number of us, including Taisjuan and Angel, liked how reading with others helped “piece together” the meaning of the text (Taisjuan) allowing for conversations about what was “inspiring” (Angel)
    • others, like Elijah and Janelle, liked the flexibility reading alone offers for people to apply their own techniques, like visualizing (Janelle) and reading at various paces (Elijah)
    • many of us, including Nayely and Leslie, mentioned the importance of finding the work interesting and ‘relatable’. Sometimes that had to do with content (Nayely’s “Leap of Faith” for example) and other times that had to do with form (“voice” and “motive” in the example Leslie brought up, A Long Way Gone.

Today in class, we’ll look at the opening pages (79-87) of a peer-reviewed scholarly article. There were some embedded questions in Hypothes.is that I asked you to look at, and these questions will shape our conversations today.

“These analytic conversations can shape and reshape adolescent identities as they learn to trust and affirm their own voices, take risks to act in new and positive ways, and analyze the texts and their own and others’ perspectives.”

(Polleck & Epstein 79)

This was a popular line for response, based on the annotations you made for homework. So let’s use this as a jumping off point. What is the author saying here? Which of these three elements (trusting your voice, taking risks, and analyzing perspectives) resonate most for you with your past experiences? Has one of these skills been hard for you to do when reading in school, but more possible when reading outside of school? In your experience, what other activities besides reading that “can shape and reshape adolescent identities”?

We’ll start class with some freewriting in response to those questions. Take your writing where it goes — that’s what freewriting is for. We’ll share in pairs and I’ll ask you to post a line or two in the reply box in the last few minutes of class.

Class 08: A Book Club that Doesn’t Suck

Today your first formal essay is due. Please turn it in using the Google Form at the very top of today’s entry on our Goals and Plans Doc.

September is almost behind us, but there is a lot of semester left. This first Module prepared us to choose a book for Module 3’s book groups. Module 4 is reflecting on our progress on many of the above skills and concepts.

So what is Module 2 about?

To borrow the phrase from Rebecca Renner, a journalist whose work we’ll read today: “How to start a book club that doesn’t suck.”

The essays you’ll write will draw on another wide swatch of experience and sources to imagine the kind of experience you want in Module 3. As a class, we’ll read open internet sources and peer-reviewed social science articles about the social phenomenon of reading with other people. What makes it work? How does it change when it happens at school? And what (yes) expectations do you bring to this experiment from your own history as a reader, writer, and student? These are starter questions; we’ll refine them as a group next Wednesday, October 6.

The turnaround for this essay is going to be quite a bit faster: a draft will be due October 12, and the graded revision will be due October 19.

You can write a traditional essay, or you can use a different form: collaborative writing, a powerpoint presentation, a video of a reasonable length, multimodal writing, a story map or some other kind of digital project. Again, more on that this coming Tuesday.

Today, we’ll start class with a freewrite about reading alone and with others. You’ll expand this, eventually, to a blog post. Here’s the prompt — broad, with lots of questions, designed to keep you writing. Go where it takes you and use all 10 mins:

Prompt: What do you enjoy about reading on your own? What’s hard? Is anything different when you read for school? What drives you to share something you’ve read with another person? What was the last thing you read and shared (verbally or otherwise)? What else comes to mind when you think of reading? Of reading for school? Of reading in groups?

Class 07

Good morning, all. Hope you had a chance to enjoy this glorious weekend. Today in class, we’ll review a number of the key concepts from Module 1, go over the expectations we can have for each other when it comes to Essay 1 (due Wednesday), and prepare to sharpen our use of digital tools, academic writing skills, and the richness of our class community as we turn to Module 2: Defining Book Groups.

You’ll want to start in the “Goals and Plans” Doc. There, you’ll see a list of the content and skills we covered this Module. We’ll spend some time writing and talking today about the ways we covered that content–and articulating moment where things “clicked” and questions we still have. Module 1 was quite a lot, but don’t worry, we’ll circle back to most of it in Module 2. That’s one thing about writing: it requires practice, and the more “reps” you get, the better.

After that, I’ll share an example of a student essay from Fall 2020 in response to this same prompt. We’ll look at it as a group, considering where we see its main idea, its evidence, its signs of organization, and the way the writer follows conventions.

With the balance of class, you’ll work on one of three things in independent work:

  1. Give a “shout-out” (do people even say that anymore?) or some “shine” (as they say in my kids’ elementary school) to another person in class who did great work in some way. Post that as a reply to this post by the start of our next class. (So, to be clear, if you don’t finish this in class, it’s OK to finish it as homework.)
  2. Use the “checklist” linked to on the “Goals and Plans” Doc to proofread your essay. There’s also a copy of it in the submission form for this essay. It must follow MLA format or I may ask you to revise it before marking it COMPLETE.
  3. If you’re listed under one of the “housekeeping” tasks, it means you’ve not completed the set-up of one or more digital tools. Please do this first, before the other two activities, and let me know if you need any help. I’ll have some breakout rooms open so we can talk without disturbing others doing independent work.

Class 06

Good morning, all. We have our first peer editing session today. The prompt you’re responding to is on our course site (and has been since the first day of class.)

Many of us have posted our drafts. Some of us haven’t. The groups have been updated accordingly. In class today, I’ll briefly go over the rubric I use; you’ll participate in editing this rubric for this essay once you’ve completed peer editing. After we’ve done that, we’ll discuss how to use your prior work in this essay. Then, editing or (for those not yet prepared with a draft) outlining.

While you work, I may call some students into “Room 7” for conferences. I’ll give you a heads up and then will move you myself. Might be a little disorienting. Zoom life.

Class 05

Good morning, all! We’ve made it through the stop-and-start part of our semester, and just at the right time. Wednesday we’ll have peer editing for Essay 1. A week from Wednesday, Sept 29, your first formal essay will be due.

Today, we’re spending time looking at some of the shorter assignments you’ve done with sources to prepare for Essay 1. These are the library assignment (where you were to practice summary and citation) and the blog post #2 (where you were to practice response and opinion writing). These are important skills and they take practice.

After we talk about summary and response, we’ll do some brainstorming about what goes into an effective first paragraph. From there, we’ll start thinking about all the sources and evidence we’ve compiled. How do we organize this under the argument we’re making: “I’ve decided to read X because Y…”

Class 04: Sept 13

Good morning and welcome back after a 12-day hiatus. Happy new year if you celebrate it, and happy first day of school for those of you with little siblings, cousins, kids, etc.

There were some nice conversations on the blog over the last few days. A few posts I’d like to highlight are those by Christopher, Jamy, and Kedwin. Each of the writers published their freewrite on our blog with a title and a tag, and one person commented on their post. Great job folks. If you didn’t add a tag, please do. If you didn’t add an image or make an interesting title, you can do that between now and Sept 27. Comments are closed. These pieces will be graded on a 5-point scale between now and our next class meeting, with two points assigned to the letter and one each to the title, the tag, and the comment from your peer. These are private. You should see them on your end of the Commons page; I haven’t used them before so we’ll learn together.

We will spend some time in class today wrapping up our previewing activities, including the “Page 99 test.” We’ll also discuss our annotations on the readings for today. We’ll also take a look at the prompt for Essay 1,

Class 03: Sept 1

Welcome back.

Our goal for today is to continue discussing reading practices; introduce summary and citation practices; continue previewing texts.

In class today, you’ll respond to “The Cover of my Face” in a way that builds on reading practices we discussed Monday. There were some great questions in the Hypothe.is conversation, and you’ll start there in breakout rooms, then move to a fuller-class discussion. We’ll also look at page 99 of all three texts using the same close reading skills you practiced with Hypothes.is. This is the same way you’ll read “La Otra” by Jaquira Diaz and “Quick Feet” by Kiese Laymon, your assigned texts for Sept 13.

Looking forward, we’ll be using the library to continue to locate texts to use to make our “Pick a book” decision. We’ll briefly go over the Assignment Sheet for Essay 1, on our class site, and the Library Assignment, on our Goals and Plans Doc. That essay’s peer edit draft is due Sept 22, with a revision due Sept 29. You’ll work in Google Docs for peer editing, and the final version will be published to a Commons site that you’ll start over this week, and which you’ll use throughout the semester to make your portfolio.

As a reminder, please log in to CUNY Academic Commons and to turn on Hypothes.is as we start class. If you’re having trouble with Hypothes.is, please be sure you’ve registered and installed the plug-in on Chrome, and joined our class group. If you’re still having trouble, talk with me after class and just follow along the best you can. There will be time in small groups for you to ask a friend from class to help you explain that process. You also should contact IT, whose information is on our syllabus.

Let’s get started with the “Goals and Plans” Doc.

Class 02 (8/30)

Welcome back.

Our goal for today is to continue discussing reading practices; introduce summary and citation practices; continue previewing texts.

In class today, you’ll respond to “The Cover of my Face” in a way that builds on reading practices we discussed Monday. There were some great questions in the Hypothe.is conversation, and you’ll start there in breakout rooms, then move to a fuller-class discussion. We’ll also look at page 99 of all three texts using the same close reading skills you practiced with Hypothes.is. This is the same way you’ll read “La Otra” by Jaquira Diaz and “Quick Feet” by Kiese Laymon, your assigned texts for Sept 13.

the “Goals and Plans” Doc.

Looking forward, we’ll be using the library to continue to locate texts to use to make our “Pick a book” decision. We’ll briefly go over the Assignment Sheet for Essay 1, on our class site, and the Library Assignment, on our Goals and Plans Doc. That essay’s peer edit draft is due Sept 22, with a revision due Sept 29. You’ll work in Google Docs for peer editing, and the final version will be published to a Commons site that you’ll start over this week, and which you’ll use throughout the semester to make your portfolio.

As a reminder, please log in to CUNY Academic Commons and to turn on Hypothes.is as we start class. If you’re having trouble with Hypothes.is, please be sure you’ve registered and installed the plug-in on Chrome, and joined our class group. If you’re still having trouble, talk with me after class and just follow along the best you can. There will be time in small groups for you to ask a friend from class to help you explain that process. You also should contact IT, whose information is on our syllabus.

Let’s get started with the “Goals and Plans” Doc.

Class 01: Welcome to ENG 111

This is the Academic Commons page for ENGL 111. A few bits of information about books and digital tools that might be helpful as we introduce the course today.

Books & Book Groups

Our class lists four books available for purchase. You need only acquire and read ONE. The choices are Fairest by Meredith Talusan; Heavy by Kiese Laymon, and Ordinary Girls by Jaquira Diaz (available in both English and Spanish editions).

Our class uses book groups to practice, analyze, and hone the skills of academic reading and essay writing. You’ll have a choice of three books. Each is a memoir about race and identity in the contemporary United States. From these three (again, Diaz’s Ordinary Girls is available in English and Spanish) you will acquire and read ONE.

It wouldn’t be a COVID semester without an early snafu so here’s ours. The books were ordered to the Lehman Bookstore. Apparently, as of August 24, they are “out of stock.” If that is the case (and if it is, I’m sorry to hear it), then I’d suggest ordering them through Bookshop.Org or Powells.com. You don’t need them right away, and again, you DON’T need to buy all three. Just one. I’ll go over this more over our first week.

Digital Tools

This Fall, we’ll use a number of digital tools to work. The big ones are CUNY Academic Commons, Hypothes.is, and Zoom.

CUNY Academic Commons

The Commons is one tool we will use a lot. You’ll use your CCNY email address to join the Commons. The instructions for how to join the Commons are here. Within the Commons, there’s our class blog (this is it). That blog is on our course site (the overall site you’re on now and every link in the menu above.) You’ll use the Commons as creators, too, designing your own four-page portfolios over the course of the semester.

What is the Commons blog?

Our blog is a place where the reading and writing work of the semester will get done. When we think and talk about the “world as a text,” this is where the words get processed. I’ll do most of this processing at first; you’ll do much of it by the end. I’ll invite you to the class group via your City College emails. Once you join the class site and class group, you should all have the ability to leave comments. We’ll test this out as early as our first week. As your instructor, I should have the means to leave public and private comments. Both will have their purposes as we produce informal writing.

What is the Commons group?

The ongoing link for the Commons group is here. You should receive an email inviting you to join it in your Lehman email. The instructions for how to join our Commons group are here. Readings and files and discussion threads are all possible uses for this. I’m still learning how to use this feature so we’ll see what works.

What is Hypothes.is?

Hypothesis is a social reading plug-in. You might think of it as a cross between Comments on Google Docs and the notes you take in your psychology textbook. We’ll use this to discuss a variety of readings as a group, including some of the writing you do yourselves. You can also make private notes using Hypothes.is. It works best on Chrome. The link to join the Hypothes.is group is here.

“But I hate technology.”

This is, of course, a writing class and not a technology class. While our major assignments, exploratory exercises, disciplinary writing experiments, and other informal classwork will certainly develop some of your digital literacy skills, the main goal of that work ahead of us is to nurture your capacity as a reader, writer, researcher, and active, accountable, engaged member of this academic community.

Links

Tasks (in-class, Aug 25, finish by Aug 30)