English 100 Guidelines for Instructors

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Writing Skills Requirement | E-mail Mary Lenard

Mission statement:

English 100 should prepare students fully for English 101, which means not only addressing students' mechanical competence, but also introducing them to rhetorical, logical, and analytical concepts.

English 100 Course Goals/ Objectives:

  1. Instructors should introduce their students to the basic principles of rhetoric--effective self-presentation, the clarity and logical strength of the message, and attention to audience--even though this introduction can be through a simple assignment, such as a consumer letter.

  2. Instructors should introduce their students to the most important principle of argument: to establish claims and back them up with evidence, whether this evidence consists of personal experience examples or researched evidence. If they wish, instructors can also encourage their students to anticipate and deal with opposing points of view.

  3. Students should learn the basic principles of organization:
    • essays must have a thesis or main idea
    • each paragraph should have a main idea
    • there should be clear, logical connections between sentences and ideas within paragraphs and between paragraphs

    4. Students also must understand that their choices about organization must be communicated to the reader by the use of logical transitions.

  4. English 100 should focus on grammar to a greater degree than English 101, especially such major problems as: sentence fragments, run-on sentences (specifically, comma splices), verb tense, subject/ verb agreement, vague or ambiguous pronoun reference, pronoun case and agreement, and punctuation for clarity, etc. There are several possible methods to achieve this focus on grammar, and instructors can use whatever method or combination of methods works best for them:
    • covering specific grammar issues in class with lessons and/or written exercises
    • having students work on grammar individually or in groups, with editing logs and/or assigning handbook exercises or worksheets for individual students
    • assigning presentations in which students research grammar issues and teach them to the rest of the class
    • having students do exercises from a handbook or from worksheets, in which they must take a piece of writing and proofread and edit for a specific type of grammar problem
    • having students correct each other's work on grammar and/or editing exercises

  5. Some kind of peer review should be built into the course, not only to help in the revision process for the papers, but to help students become more sophisticated and critical readers of their own writing.

  6. Students should also do some kind of reflection or self-assessment of their writing process, and their strengths and weaknesses as writers, either for each paper, or as a reflective essay at the end of the course, or both.

  7. Since reading and writing skills are interdependent, both should be addressed with English 100 students. Instructors should incorporate vocabulary and reading comprehension activities into the course.

Types of Assignments for English 100:

Generally, English 100 paper assignments should be for short (1-5 page) papers, with a focus on the rhetorical and logical aspects of writing. Students should be able to revise at least some of their papers, either before or after they are graded. English 100 instructors should also be aware that they must prepare their students to write longer papers (5+ pages) in English 101 and in their other college courses.

Students should also be required to do at least one persuasive or argumentative paper in English 100, to prepare for English 101, even if it's only supported with personal experience examples. If they wish, English 100 instructors may choose to have their students do a paper that uses researched evidence, but this assignment should limit the students' choice of topics to those that could be covered adequately in a shorter paper and could not easily be plagiarized.

Grading and course policy requirements for English 100 instructors:

  1. Course policies, including grading, should be clearly explained in the syllabus. The syllabus should cover issues such as absences, late assignments, revisions of papers, and how final grades will be calculated. All instructors should have an attendance policy that may lower student grades for excessive absences, with possible exceptions for documented illnesses, family emergencies, etc.

  2. For essay assignments, instructors need to give students written assignment sheets, clearly explaining goals, length requirements, expectations, etc.

  3. Grammar and mechanics can (and probably should) be emphasized more in the grading for English 100 than for English 101, but grammar should not be emphasized to the exclusion of other aspects of writing, such as rhetorical and logical qualities.