Required Journal Entry 1: Me, A Writer? Attitude: Describe your attitude toward completing this course. As part of the description, explore how your feelings about being required to take a composition course may affect your performance in accomplishing the course objectives. (1 paragraph, 5 sentences) Inventory: Explain what you learned about yourself as a writer working through the inventory exercise. Discuss two ways you want to improve as a writer and why. (1 paragraph, 5 sentences) Required Journal Entry 2: Prewriting Brainstorming: Brainstorm about specific positive and negative effects computers have had on your personal, professional, and academic life. Create a one-page list of your ideas. Thesis: Based on your brainstorming, write a one-sentence working thesis statement that focuses on the impact of computers related to a single area of your life (personal, professional, or academic). The thesis should be one you could develop into an essay of about one page (250–300 words), directed to readers of your local newspaper. Don't draft the essay in your journal, however. You need only your list from brainstorming and your working thesis statement. Required Journal Entry 3: Drafting This entry builds on the brainstorming and thesis you developed for Journal Entry 2. Evidence: Identify three different types of evidence you could use to develop your working thesis from Entry 2. Use specific information from your brainstorming list, and any other ideas that come to you. (Length open) Organization: Choose a method of organization for your evidence. Using that evidence, prepare an outline or simulate a graphic organizer to show your organizational plan for the one-page essay. Don't draft the essay in your journal, however. (Length open) Required Journal Entry 4: Revising This journal entry requires you to review the rough draft of the essay that follows. As you analyze the draft according to each of the areas listed, identify what needs revision. For each area, explain why and how you would change the draft. (4 paragraphs, 5 sentences each) Analyze the essay's • Purpose and audience • Thesis statement, topic sentences, and paragraphs • Evidence • Organization Rough Draft: E-mail vs. Letters Instead of using e-mails, mail a letter to your grandparents, an aunt or uncle, or another role model who's older than you are. We live in a fast-paced world. We use computers to send e-mails and instant messages. Some, though, don't live in that time zone. Forget all the fonts, emoticons, and abbreviations like LOL. You point and click, but some people want to hold something, unwrap a letter, and smell it. A crayoned picture smells and feels special; no scanner can do that. People's senses want to be used. We live in a physical world, not an invisible one. People can touch something that's mailed. Sometimes it's as if touching the ink or pencil on paper helps them touch the writer. A picture can be held and used in so many ways. For example, I get to see how my grandkids' handwriting is changing as they grow. I know how they feel just from the way they write the words. A letter gives someone the real thing. A letter exists in time and space. Even if someone e-mails you regularly, the surprise of a mailed letter provides something to cherish rather than to be deleted. Of course, they may like getting through the Internet a photograph of you on the day of a special event. However, a printed photograph can be put into an album or used for a bookmark or posted on the refrigerator for regular review. They don't have to worry about color cartridges or paper because you've given them what they need in the mail. Though they may have a hard time reading your handwriting, a letter is a tangible way to remind them that you care enough to take the time and effort to communicate with them and them alone. The convenience and efficiency of computers can't be matched by regular postal service. However, they sometimes bleep and blurp in a frustrating conversation, one that older persons can't always hear or understand. One wrong click here and another there can mean mass destruction. They may get a paper cut from your letter, but even sucking on a finger while reading makes their experience more memorable and satisfying. The cut heals; the letter remains alive. Required Journal Entry 5: Public Space Reread Brent Staples' essay "Black Men and Public Space" on pages 160–162. Explore the ways you and individuals around you "alter public space." Include specific examples from your life. You may wish to describe a situation in which your intentions were misunderstood or when someone made false assumptions about you. Another option is to discuss times when you've had to change your behavior to accommodate someone else's needs or expectations. (2 paragraphs, 5 sentences for each) Freewrite about the way errors in grammar, spelling, and punctuation can alter the public space between writer and reader in an essay. (1 paragraph, 5 sentences) Required Journal Entry 6: Narration Outline one specific time in your life when you felt extremely stressed by the pressure to succeed in your studies, perform on the job (if applicable), and spend time with family and friends. As needed, prewrite on the topic in your notes file, but don't submit that work. For this journal entry, use the following labels to sketch out the details for your narrative of that time. Scene Key actions Key participants Key lines of dialogue Feelings Required Journal Entry 7: Description Think of an experience in which you faced an important test (either in school, at work, or in a personal situation). As needed, prewrite on the topic in your notes file or notebook, but don't submit that work. Sensory details: For this journal entry, list two specific, concrete, original details for each sense describing that particular testing event: • Sight • Sound • Smell • Taste • Touch Comparison: Write one fresh, creative comparison for one of your details (one simile or metaphor). Evaluation: For which of the five senses was it easiest to write sensory details? For which was it most difficult? Why? (1 paragraph, 5 sentences) Required Journal Entry 8: Reflection Attitude: Now that you're halfway through your journal assignments, think back to when you first picked up this study guide and looked at the list of assignments. Do you remember how you felt? Do you still feel the same way? Describe how your feelings toward English have changed, or what feelings have stayed the same. (1 paragraph, 5 sentences) Inventory: Think back to those goals you made for yourself in that first reflective journal entry. Now that you've submitted several assignments, do you feel that you've made any improvements toward meeting them? If not, what goals do you still have to meet? Are there any new goals that you might now want to make? (1 paragraph, 5 sentences) Required Journal Entry 9: Comparison and Contrast Review Abigail Zuger's "Defining a Doctor, with a Tear, a Shrug, and a Schedule" on pages 403–405. Describe an experience you've had with a doctor or other medical professional. (1 paragraph, 5 sentences) Compare/contrast: List the similarities and the differences of your own experience, showing how they match up with the work of the two doctors described in Zuger's article. (2 paragraphs, 5 sentences) Required Journal Entry 10: Classification and Division Review "Generating Ideas" on pages 421–423. Using either Method 1 or Method 2, explore the reasons students may be tempted to cheat on one or more assignments in their college program. Whichever method you choose, identify the principle of classification or division and devise a set of categories or parts in which you list the examples, situations, or other details you would use to describe each category or part. You may simulate a graphic organizer. Required Journal Entry 11: Classification and Division Think about the information you've read concerning definition, classification, and division. How would you define or classify yourself? As you freewrite, consider all your aspects, including your roles, personality, background, and experiences. Required Journal Entry 12: Argument Analyze: Review the essay by Peter Bregman on pages 534–536 and the essay by David Silverman on pages 537–539. Respond to the two viewpoints using either the compare/ contrast or the classify/divide pattern of development. Review Chapters 12 and 13 if necessary. (Open, list) React: React to this thesis: "Reducing multitasking to a minimum reduces the stressful dehumanizing effects of compulsive multitasking." Don't immediately choose to agree or disagree. Instead, explore in the entry your feelings and beliefs, both agreement and disagreement, until you reach a point of conviction, showing yourself coming to a place where you strongly agree or disagree. (3 paragraphs, 5 sentences each) Required Journal Entry 13: Website Evaluation First, identify or make up a particular career need you've faced or might face, such as earning a promotion at your current job, switching jobs, or entering the job market. Then, reread "Choosing and Evaluating Useful Sources," pages 583–587, and "Evaluating Internet Sources," pages 585–586. Next, examine each of the following two websites: • http://www.careerbuilder.com • http://www.rileyguide.com Argue in favor of the site you believe is most relevant for your career need and most reliable. As you discuss specific reasons to support your thesis, use the terminology and criteria for electronic sources discussed in the textbook. Include with your evidence why the other site isn't as satisfactory for your purpose. (5 paragraphs, 5 sentences each) Required Journal Entry 14: Notes and Citations Reread "Writing Summary Notes," "Writing Paraphrases," and "Avoiding Plagiarism" on pages 611–614 of the textbook. Also review both the MLA and APA formats for citing Internet sources on textbook pages 652–655 and 673–674. Then, go to http://www.careerbuilder.com. Scroll to the Job Search Tools section. Click Career Advice from the bulleted list. From the list provided, choose any article related to a job search. Actively read and reread that article several times. Summary: Summarize the article. (1 paragraph, 3–5 sentences) MLA format: Write an accurate citation for the article using MLA format. APA format: Write an accurate citation for the article using APA format. Required Journal Entry 15: Course Reflection Reflect: Reread what you wrote for Journal Entry 1: "Me, a Writer?" Compare and contrast your attitude then with your attitude now. Reflect on how knowing who you are as a learner has helped you with the course activities. Reflect on ways you've changed as a writer, reader, and/or thinker throughout the course. (3 paragraphs, 5 sentences each) Evaluate: Evaluate this English Composition course. Explain what you found most helpful, least understandable, and/or least helpful. Suggest ways to improve the course so it better accomplishes its objectives for college students. (2 paragraphs, 5 sentences each)