English 110: Critical Reading & Writing Syllabus
Spring 2012
Sarah Llewellyn
Middletown High School, rm. 1076
Period 2 A Days
Office Hours: Mon. 2:30-3:30 AHS (and Wed. by appointment); Wed. 2:30-3:30 MHS
Introduction to E110:
The first year writing course’s objective is to establish a critical reading, writing, and thinking
foundation for all incoming university students. Your time in this classroom will groom you for
other university classes as well, presenting you with a variety of ways to read and write. You will
also learn more about how you read and write, rather than how to alter yourself to meet your
teacher’s expectations. As an introductory course, you will better understand your reading and
writing strengths, and how to use them to your advantage, and your weaknesses, and how to
overcome them.
We will hone your critical reading skills by decoding a variety of genres, including narrative,
informative, and argumentative, as well as learning to recognize each piece’s purpose and
audience. Reading a variety of styles will improve your skills in the diverse classes you will each
find yourselves in at the university level. Identifying a writer’s purpose and audience will not
only build your understanding of the piece, but will also enhance your own writing. We will
sharpen your critical writing skills by first examining various writing styles, but then by learning
to create those styles yourself. We will learn the conventions of writing, but within the context of
your writing because each of you will present a unique set of grammatical and writing concerns.
Last, we will appreciate writing as a process where you will continue to revise your work and
strengthen your writing craft. And last, we will polish your critical thinking skills by
participating in class discussions about academic writings related to the study of English and
other disciplines. You will be responsible for preparing for and conducting the discussions.
Required Texts & Supplies:




The Allyn & Bacon Guide to Writing. Concise 5th ed. John D. Rampage, John C. Bean,
June Johnson. New York: Pearson, Longman, 2008. Print.
Faigley, Lester. The Little Penguin Handbook. Boston: Pearson, 2012. Print.
The Arak Anthology. 15th ed. Newark, DE: University of Delaware, 2008-2009. Print.
Flash drive and spiral bound notebook
and
Grading: In compliance with the Appoquinimink School District Grade and Grade Reporting Policies,
grades for this course will be calculated as 70% Product & 30% Process.
A
=
90 - 100%
B
=
80 - 89%
C
=
70 - 79%
D
=
60 - 69%
Grade sheets will be available upon request: It may take up to 48 hours for me to meet your request.
Disclaimer: Grade sheet will reflect latest grade reported on home access, not a current up to the minute
grade.
Llewellyn E110 Syllabus 2011-2012
1
Late Policy: Process assignments may NOT be handed in late. Product assessments must be turned in on
the due date. A product assignment is only accepted a maximum of one day late. You will receive ½
credit for handing in product assignments late.
Product v. Process: Grade will be determined as follows:

Product:
o Essays (includes outlines and first drafts of Personal Narrative, Summary/Response
Essay, Annotated Bibliography, & Informative Essay)
o Research paper assignments (checkpoints including reference cards, note cards, outlines,
and drafts)

Process:
o Classwork & Homework (includes participation, brief writing assignments, journal
entries, grammar instruction, participation, etc.)
o Essays (includes final drafts of Personal Narrative, Summary/Response Essay, Annotated
Bibliography, & Informative Essay)
o Research paper and presentation
Each essay grade will include involvement in the peer and teacher conferencing seminars. If you choose
to revise an essay, your new grade will be averaged with your original grade if the paper was deemed
revised.
Revision:
We will examine the revision process in the first few class meetings of the year in order to
dissect the distinction between revising (looking at content), editing (looking at organization,
thesis, sentence structure), and proofreading (grammar and word choice). We will then apply the
steps – revising, editing, and proofreading – together to the first essay as practice; later you will
complete the process on your own as your comfort level with revision grows.
Each essay will include a peer revision, and later a teacher conference if you request to improve
your grade; each peer revision will occur the day we discuss our writings in class and each
improved draft you turn in will be due a week after the essay is returned to you. When you
choose to revise, please keep the following in mind: 1. You will need to turn both the rough draft
and the revised draft in; 2. Correcting surface errors will not count as a revision of the paper
(need to review content, structure, etc. also); 3. Revision does not ensure that you will receive a
higher grade. If you choose to engage in the revision process of any essay, you must first meet
with your teacher for a conference about the piece.
Conferences:
This semester we will have conferences about the brief writing assignments as well as
conferences about the major essays. Each writing assignment will include a peer conference,
where each student is required to participate for a grade. Each writing assignment may entail
unique revisions and commentary, and your role as assessor may shift with each assignment.
Oftentimes, you will find that some of the errors will mirror previous errors, which will help you
see the patterns you need to work on more closely throughout the semester. For the major essays,
you are not required to have a formal teacher conference; rather, you have the option to meet
with the teacher once you receive your returned essay. For the research paper, the teacher
conferences are mandatory; you will meet with the teacher several times throughout the process.
For each conference you are required to bring in a draft of your assignment.
Llewellyn E110 Syllabus 2011-2012
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Classroom Behavior:
As this is a college course offered at the high school level, you will be given an extraordinary
opportunity to share your opinions with other like-minded students who take pleasure in writing
and want to engage in a higher level writing course in preparation for college level writing and
research. Your participation in this course is valued, so you need to be well-prepared for our
class discussions and writing workshops. Furthermore, your conduct in class should be
respectable to both your classmates and your teacher; any inappropriate actions or dialogue may
result in losing your participation points for that day. Last, if at any point you feel disrespected,
please see me before or after class to discuss how to handle the situation.
Major Assignments
Personal Narrative:
The personal essay will act as an introductory tool with many purposes; you will introduce
yourself as a person and as a writer. It is key to establish a strong foundation between yourself
and your peer since you will work together frequently throughout the semester. Your peer will
act as another set of eyes for a very personal act, writing, and in order for you to trust each other
you will need a piece to launch that conversation. Your teacher will use the personal narrative to
diagnose your strengths and weaknesses and use them to mold the lessons. Last, this piece will
act as your first piece of revision; you will first work independently to revise the piece, then with
your peer and teacher.
Summary/Strong Response Essay:
As a college student, you will analyze a variety of writing styles. Your professors will challenge
you to go beyond your reading and writing comfort levels, and you will need to have the
necessary tools to understand these complex pieces. Completing a summary and response essay
will allow you to “interact strongly with challenging texts” (86) so in order to do so we will
explore the use of summarizing a variety of texts as well as responding to said texts. In a
summary, you will evaluate the important points of a text and extract the main points of the
essay; both components of writing you will also need to know how to produce. In a response,
you will rehearse evaluating a source for its accuracy and use of rhetoric, as well as learn how to
develop your own argument based on the reading.
Annotated Bibliography:
Learning to explore a question further will help you consider other perspectives, which can then
build new ideas associated with your topic. An annotated bibliography “summarizes and briefly
critiques the research sources a writer used while exploring a problem” (128), usually beginning
with a Critical Preface, a first-person narrative detailing your thought process through your
investigation. In order to meet the Critical Preface’s requirements, you need to include a
summary of your topic’s main points, how you developed your research questions, how you
found your sources, and a short appraisal of the sources. Then you will draw from the Critical
Preface’s introduction to your research sources in order to build the Annotated Bibliography,
which includes a summary and evaluation of your sources. This assignment will help you retrace
your steps, which improves both your reader’s and your understandings of the final product.
Informative Essay:
Like the Summary/Response Essay and Annotated Bibliography, the Informative Essay can act
as a preparatory tool for your research paper. Learning how to develop an informative article or
Llewellyn E110 Syllabus 2011-2012
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essay is essential because this is how you will develop your basic argument and background of
any writing. Before your audience can understand your argument, there are certain elements of
your topic they will need to comprehend first; for instance, you might need to introduce
particular jargon or history in order to delve deeper into the argument. How you build this
background will determine how logical your argument is to your audience.
Research Paper:
You will develop a problem-solution research paper over the course of the last few weeks of our
semester together. You will choose your own topic, develop an argument based research paper,
and build the steps of the research process both in and out of the classroom. Throughout the
process we will have class discussions on your progress as well as peer/teacher conferences on
the various stages of the process. The steps you take to the final draft will count as process
assignments and the final draft will count as your product grade.
Reading/Writing Schedule:
Date
January
Week 1
Classwork
Introductions
Thinking Rhetorically
about Good Writing
Jan/Feb
Week 2
February
Week 3
Text Assigned
Arak
Assignments Due
Major Essay: Personal Narrative
A& B Ch. 1
pgs. 4-23
For Writing and Discussion:
Thinking about Purpose, Audience,
and Genre
Thinking Rhetorically
about Good Writing
A& B Ch. 1
Brief Writing Projects: 1 & 2
Thinking Rhetorically
about Style and
Document Design
A& B Ch. 4
pgs. 66-68
For Writing and Discussion:
Analyzing Differences in Style
Thinking Rhetorically
about Your Subject
Matter
A& B Ch. 2
pgs. 24-49,
“Believing and
Doubting Paul
Theroux’s
Negative View of
Sports” pgs. 32-33
A& B Ch. 5
pgs. 86-122
For Writing and Discussion:
Developing Thesis Statements Out of
Questions
A & B Ch. 5
“30 Little Turtles”
and “Questioning
Thomas L.
Friedman’s
Major Essay: A Summary
A Summary/Strong Response Essay
February
Week 4
Recognizing Functions
of a Text and
Formulating a Response
February
Week 5
Recognizing Functions
of a Text and
Formulating a Response
Llewellyn E110 Syllabus 2011-2012
Brief Writing Project: Playing the
Believing and Doubting Game
For Writing and Discussion:
Determining What Is a Good
Summary
Examining Thesis Statements for
Strong Response Critiques
4
Optimism in ’30
Little Turtles’”
pgs. 123-127
Feb/March Writing as a ProblemSolving Process – apply
Week 6
drafting and revising
stages to
summary/response essay
March
Week 7
March
Week 8
March
Week 9
For Writing and Discussion:
Analyzing Your Own Writing
Process
Practicing a Peer Review (Revise
Summary-Response)
Composing and Revising
Closed-Form Prose –
develop best practices
for addressing each of
the writing steps and
later apply each of the
steps to your research
paper
Summarizing and
Critiquing Your Sources
– during this chapter we
will connect the
Annotated Bibliography
& Research Paper
A & B Ch. 12
pgs. 288-323, pgs.
329-331
For Writing and Discussion:
Developing a Thesis/Support
Structure
A & B Ch. 6
pgs. 128, 139-143
For Writing and Discussion:
Keeping a Problem Open
Summarizing and
Critiquing Your Sources
A & B Ch. 6
Major Essay: An Annotated
“What Is the
Bibliography
Effect of Online
Social Networks
on Communication
Skills?” pgs. 149151
Evaluating Sources,
Blending
Summaries/Paraphrases/
Quotes, & Avoiding
Plagiarism
March
Week 10
A & B Ch. 11
pgs. 275-287
Citing & Documenting
Sources
Writing a Classical
Argument –develop a
problem-solution thesis
and argument for your
research paper
Llewellyn E110 Syllabus 2011-2012
A & B Ch. 13 &
14
pgs. 334-353
pgs. 354-370
A & B Ch. 9
pgs. 206-233,
“Paintball:
Promoter of
Violence or
Healthy Fun?”
pgs. 234-237,
For Writing and Discussion:
Evaluating Different Ways to Use
and Cite a Source
Avoiding Plagiarism
For Writing and Discussion:
Identifying Arguable Issues
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Continue Chapters 13-14
April
Week 11
Proposing a Solution –
develop a problemsolution thesis and
argument for your
research paper
Continue Chapters 13-14
“Why Uranium Is
the New Green”
pgs. 237-240, or
“No to Nukes”
pgs. 241-244
A & B Ch. 10
For Writing and Discussion: Using
pgs. 245-251, pgs. Different Strategies to Develop
252-254 & pgs.
Support
261-262 (Visual
Presentation),
“’The Hardest of
the Hardcore’:
Let’s Outlaw
Hired Guns in
Contemporary
American
Warfare” pgs. 267271
April
Week 12
Writing a Classical
Argument & Proposing a
Solution
A & B Ch. 9 & 10
April
Week 13
Present both sides for an
existing question and
learn to build reader’s
interest
A & B Ch. 7
pgs. 152-163,
Sample Paper
April
Week 14
Review previous
chapters/sample essays
on research
A & B 9, 10, 13 &
14
May
Week 15
Review previous
chapters/sample essays
on research
Arak
A & B 9, 10, 13 &
14
Writing Projects: A Classical
Argument & A Proposal Argument
(apply to research paper)
Major Essay: Informative Essay
Research Paper Workshops
Research Paper Workshops
Arak
May
Week 16
Llewellyn E110 Syllabus 2011-2012
Research Paper Workshops &
Reflections/Presentations
6