SYLLABUS FOR ENGLISH 101: COMPOSITION: RHETORIC

Fall 1999

Required texts:
Composing Cyberspace: Identity Community and Knowledge in the Electronic Age, ed. Richard Holeton. McGraw Hill, 1998.
Easy Writer, a pocket guidebook. St. Martin's Press, 1997, or
Writing Guidebook - SUNY Farmingdale McGraw Hill, 1997

Additional materials: 2 HD diskettes (IBM compatible, formatted preferred)

Course requirements:

• Reading of assigned essays and journal responses. Journal questions will be e-mailed to you for each reading assigned. Your responses should be thoughtful, but your written responses will not be "graded" or edited. Due by e-mail within one week of posting date (10% of final grade).
• Short essays: six 2-3 page essays (based on selected journals). Journals can serve as rough drafts for essays. Due weeks 3, 4, 8, 9, 13, 14. Organization, clarity and grammar all count in final grade. Revisions are permitted. Late papers will lose points. Total credit for short essays is 30% of final grade.
• Research projects. You will complete three separate (short) research projects during the semester. Due at end of weeks 5, 10, 15. Credit for these projects is 60% of final grade. Students will work in three-person teams to complete the projects, but each person will be graded individually (no team grade). Each research project has three parts (FAQ's, Analysis and Assessment of the Issues, Argument). Each member of the team must be responsible for one part; responsibility rotates with each of the three projects; that is, you must try a different part for each of the three research projects and cannot, for example, do only the FAQ's. All members of the team are responsible for identifying web sites for research (each should find 10 sites) and evaluate for integrity, utility and validity of each site. This will be done during lab class time.

Part 1: FAQ's (Frequently Asked Questions)- the team member responsible for this part must compose a series of 10 increasingly complex questions and answers about the subject.

Part 2: Analysis and Assessment of Issues: the team member responsible for this part must write a 2-3 page objective report on the issues involved and identify who speaks for these issues.

Part 3: Argument: the team member responsible for this part is required to write a 2-3 page essay offering a position pro or con on one or more of the issues and address the ethical questions identified through your research.

In addition, one team member is responsible for giving a short (2-3 min.) oral report on the group's project. This report might highlight problems in research, explain issues, argue a position or discuss differences of opinion within the group. Responsibility for the oral report should rotate among team members. This can also be done as a joint effort, with one person speaking at a time.

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