August 2003
Sunday
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday
Friday
Saturday
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26 Introduction
27
28 Elements of
Design
29
30
31
September 2003
Sunday
Monday
1
Tuesday
2 Peer Review
Wednesday
3
Thursday
4 Experiments
Friday
Saturday
5
6
PowerPoint due
7
8
9 Elements of a
Proper Report
10
11 Peer Review
12
13
14
15
16 Soil expert
17
18 Thesis
Statement and
Paper Structure
19
20 Farmer’s
Market
24
25 Emotional
Appeal
26
27
Report due
21
22
23 Final
Project
Soil analysis
due
28
29
30 Fact and
Reason
Reading
assignment
Reading
assignment
October 2003
Sunday
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
1
Thursday
2?
Friday
Saturday
3
4
10
11
17
18
24
25 Trip to a
sustainable
farm
Reading
assignment
5
6
7 Introduction
and Conclusion
8
Take notes in
journal
Reading
assignment
12
13
14 Paragraphs
15
Reading
assignment
19
20
21 ?
27
28 Compare
and Contrast
Reading
assignment
Humans &
environment
paper due
16 Rainbow
Revision
Take notes for
journal
22
Reading
assignment
26
9 Citation
23 Peer Review
Take notes for
journal
29
30 Paragraphs
Take notes for
journal
31
November 2003
Sunday
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday
Friday
Saturday
1
2
3
4 Evaluations
5
Reading
Assignment
9
10
Ethics essay
due
11 Elements of
Design
17
18 Multiple
viewpoints
12
30
24
25
8
13 Peer Review
14
15
21
22
28
29
Take notes for
journal
19
Reading
assignment
23
7
Take notes for
journal
Draft of
evaluation due
16
6 Introduction
and Conclusion
20 Butterfly
conservatory
Newsletters
due
26
27
Thanksgiving
December 2003
Sunday
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday
Friday
Saturday
1
2 Videotaped
presentations
3
4 Videotaped
presentations
5
6
7
8
9 Presentation
evaluations
10
11 Presentation
evaluations
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
Day One (Back)
Introduction.
Write an essay on how you view the soil that answers the following questions: How would you define it? What is
its purpose? How do you/would you take care of it?
Review outline structure.
Assignment for next time: Read “Understanding Soil Ecosystem” (Smillie and Gershuny 7-51) and make an outline of
the chapter.
Day Two (Back)
Today we’ll learn the elements of design. Someone from the College of Design will come and work with us.
Assignment: Create PowerPoint slideshow. Hand in to me on a CD/floppy and on paper (three slides to a page).
Include the notes that you would use to give an oral presentation of the material.
Assignment for next time: Create an informational PowerPoint presentation.
Audience: Beginning agronomy students.
Goal: Summarize, digest, and relay information without providing commentary.
Day Three [Back]
Peer review—write letter to peer after carefully examining the PowerPoint slides according to the peer review
guidelines.
Revise.
Assignment for next time: Read “Observing and Evaluating Your Soil” (Smillie and Gershuny 52-79) and make an
outline.
Day Four [Back]
Write a response letter following the guidelines on the handout.
Hand in a copy of the original PowerPoint presentation, the peer letter, an electronic and hard final copy of the
presentation, and your response letter.
Assignment for next time: Go Horticulture 111 and do the series of soil experiments that were outlined in the reading
today.
Day Five [Back]
Go over the elements of a proper report. Have examples from Horticulture 221.
Assignment: Write a report of your soil experiments.
Audience: Horticulture 111 professor. We’ll be grading them together.
Goal: Digest and use information. Learn proper format for a research report.
Day Six [Back]
Peer review—write letter to peer after carefully examining the report.
Revise and write response letter.
Reading: Read “Soil Management Practices” (Smillie and Gershuny 80-138) and make an outline of the material.
Day Seven [Back]
Hand in a copy of the draft, the peer letter, the revised essay, and your response letter.
Dr. Manu will give a short lecture on soil—this should be a review for you if you have been keeping up with the
material. Dr. Manu will have a couple of case soil studies for you to figure out so that you can use your newly
acquired knowledge to create a “fixing plan” to make the soil healthy. Dr. Manu will be able to go around and
help you personally. He will also read through your final drafts for accuracy.
Assignment: Explain what you need to do to make the soil you tested last week healthy. Due in one week.
Audience: The farmer who owns the field.
Goal: Understand, analysis, and apply information.
Assignment for next time: Do some research on the various ways that a farmer can market his/her goods. Shoot for
five alternatives.
Day Eight [Back]
“Marketing”—Agriculture Business expert and farmers (Cindy Madsen, for example).
Today we’ll workshop the papers, focusing on the thesis statement and paper.
[Saturday—Go to the Farmer’s Market in Des Moines. This outing will include a small primary research project.]
Day Nine [Back]
Discussion—how do you view the soil now? What have you learned about soil and how much do you appreciate it?
The information is directly related to the final project.
Final project is turning a traditional farm sustainable. This is where you’ll get the specs and start working on the final
project. I will grade it for communication and experts will examine the texts for accuracy in their fields.
Assignment for next time: Read “The Clan of One-Breasted Women” by Terry Tempest Williams (Anderson and
Runciman 569-575).
Day Ten [Back]
Assignment for next time: Read “Learning from Love Canal: A Twentieth-Anniversary Retrospective” by Lois Marie
Gibbs (Anderson and Runciman 550-554).
Day Eleven [Back]
Assignment for next time: Read “Fading Colors” by John Dillon (Anderson and Runciman 292-295).
Day Twelve [back]
Assignment: Paper on how humans effect their environment. Explain how a case can be made that how humans effect
their environment can effects humans. Refer to a case in your own family.
Audience:
Goal: Reflection, citations, thesis, and structure.
Day Thirteen [back]
Review thesis and structure. Start introductions and conclusions.
Assignment for next time: Read “Plants” (Schwenke15-22).
Day Fourteen [back]
Citations.
“Plants”—expert lecture.
Assignment for next time: Read “No Rms, Jungle Vu” by Melissa Greene (Anderson and Runciman 223-237).
Day Fifteen [back]
Repurpose the human/environment paper, concentrating on paragraphs centered on one main idea.
Assignment for next time: Read “Farm Machinery” (Schwenke 23-35) and take notes in your journal.
Day Sixteen [back]
Rainbow revision.
“Farm Machinery”—guest expert, local farmer and mechanic Mike Kalsem.
Assignment for next time: Read “A Life in Our Hands” by Keith Ervin (Anderson and Runciman 263-280).
Day Seventeen [back]
Assignment for next time: Read “Farm Practices” (Schwenke 36-45) and take notes in your journal.
Day Eighteen [back]
Peer review—write a letter following the guidelines set forth in the handout.
“Farm Practices.”
Assignment for next time: Read “Voices from White Earth” by Winona LaDuke (Anderson and Runciman 435-448).
Saturday trip to a sustainable farm, preferably a CSA.
Day Nineteen [back]
Research ethical issues in your chosen field in three parts. 1) Fully describe the situation. 2) Then describe the
ethics of your field. 3) How can you ethically solve the problem? A couple of people, one from Horticulture and
one from Agricultural Business, will come and discuss ethical problems in these fields. Hopefully this will get
you started.
Humans and environment paper due.
Assignment for next time: Read “Cash Crops” (Schwenke 46-58) and take notes in your journal.
Day Twenty [back]
Repurposing assignment on the draft of ethical issues.
“Cash Crops”—Agriculture department expert?
Assignment for next time: Read “Evaluating Children’s Fiction” (handout) and make a comprehensive list of the
evaluation criteria that the authors set forth.
Day Twenty-One [back]
Write an essay in which you evaluate a children’s book with the evaluation criteria set forth in the reading. The
audience will be elementary school teachers.
Assignment for next time: Read “Other Cash & Specialty Crops” (Schwenke 59-72) and take notes in your journal.
Ethical issues essay is due.
Day Twenty-Two [back]
Introduction and conclusion on the draft of ethical issues.
“Other Cash & Specialty Crops”—Horticulture crop expert?
Day Twenty-Three [back]
Elements of Design—students from the design college.
Create a handout for the children’s book evaluation you’ve written.
Evaluate a variety of newsletters and establish a set of evaluation criteria that you would use if you needed to
write an evaluation.
Assign newsletters for the humans and environment paper. Due on November 20.
Assignment for next time: Read “The Whole Farm” and “Conclusion” (Schwenke 73-92) and take notes in your journal.
Day Twenty-Four [back]
Peer review of the two parts of the evaluation assignment—write a peer letter according to the guidelines set
forth in the handout.
The Farm
Assignment for next time: Read “A Fragile Kingdom” by Sue Halpern (Anderson and Runciman 225-262).
Day Twenty-Five [back]
Discussion and research the butterfly given to you. Write a report.
Two parts of the evaluation assignment are due.
Day Twenty-Six [back]
Visit the butterfly conservatory at Reiman Gardens.
Newsletters due.
Day Twenty-Seven [back]
Presentations (videotaped)
Day Twenty-Eight [back]
Presentations (videotaped)
Day Twenty-Nine [back]
Presentation evaluations
Day Thirty [back]
Presentation evaluations
Final exam—questions on writing and visual elements.