Miami University

FRANCES YATES

INTRODUCTION TO SEQUENCED WRITING ASSIGNMENTS

The following assignment is for EDL 204, Socio-cultural Studies in Education. 

Course objectives are for students to discuss the purposes of education in a democratic society, critically analyze the role of schools in creating citizens, and to think critically about the ways in which schools address issues of diversity and difference, including social and economic class, religion, gender, race, culture, and sexual orientation.

Students meet those objectives by analyzing written and visual assigned texts, reflecting on their own experiences as students and citizens, and developing an “education issues” action plan based on research and formulated to meet a real-world need.

There are education majors and non-majors in the class and sophomores through seniors.  I encourage students to select issues that are relevant to their majors.  Thus, business/marketing majors might explore the issue of commercialism in schools and PHS majors could explore student obesity.

The Center for Writing Excellence/CELT Workshop on Improving Student Writing contributed to my rethinking about the construction of each assignment in the course and how they can come together to create a more engaging and cohesive course.  Using some of Bean’s ideas has infused creative short assignments into the course that I am confident the students and I will enjoy as well as gaining the necessary content knowledge.  I am especially excited about the Bio-poem to help classmates get to know each other while connecting it to the socio-cultural topics we will be discussing. I also believe the dialogue journal idea will focus discussion and help to diffuse possibly heated exchanges that often arise with the “hot topics” that are discussed in this course.

SEQUENCED WRITING ASSIGNMENTS FOR STUDENTS

EDL 204 – Socio-cultural studies in education

Learning objectives:

Students will demonstrate reflection on and understanding of key concepts of the impact of gender in education.

Format: Dialogue Journal

Due date: October 20, 2004

Points:  0 or 10 (see expectations and criteria)

Process:

prior to class session, on your own (20-30 minutes):

• Read/view the content for week 10: “Schooling and gender”
• Write a journal entry (minimum: 1 page) that reflects on the lead question for the week: “How do schools, as social and political institutions, impact the construction of gender? What are the implications for males and females?”
• Include 3 main points from the written and visual texts and provide 2 examples of your experiences related to the concept.
• Write 2 questions the concept and content made you think about.

during class, partner discussion (15 minutes):

• Exchange your journal with a partner.
• Take a few minutes to read the entry related to this week’s lead question.
• Discuss with your partner the points you agree and disagree about.

during class, whole group discussion  (30-45 minutes)  :

• Discuss as a class, making sure each partner group contributes at least 3 ideas or anecdotes to the discussion.

Expectations and Criteria:

To earn 10 points for this journal entry and in-class participation, you will have included all the requested information in your written entry and will contribute the requisite verbal additions to the whole group discussion. If all these criteria are not met, you will earn 0 points.