Syllabus (Fall)

Space: 337 State Hall / Time: Tuesdays, 3-5 PM / Instructor: Dr. Jeff Pruchnic / Office: 9308, 5057 Woodward (Maccabees Bldg.) / Office Hours: Tuesdays 1-2:30 PM & by appointment / Phone: 313-577-3060 (office); 814-574-0252 (mobile)

The pedagogical practicum is designed to build skills in teaching at a university level generally and teaching Wayne State’s English 1020 course specifically. By reading pedagogical scholarship, familiarizing themselves with the challenges and controversies of the profession, and composing lesson plans and teaching strategies throughout the semester, students will engage both the theoretical and practical vectors of teaching first year composition. Most classes will be devoted to discussion of class readings and of lesson plans for Eng 1020. There is no research paper required for the course; graded deliverables include weekly responses to readings and other prompts as well as lesson plan designs, teaching demonstrations, and the development of other pedagogical resources.

COURSE OBJECTIVES

Standard Syllabus Instruction: The most immediate purpose of this course is to train participants to teach the standard syllabus—the “set” syllabus designed by the composition department that all new instructors are required to teach their first semester. Each week we will cover the readings, lesson plans, and other assorted vectors for approximately 3-4 class sessions of the syllabus. In covering these items, participants will be given advice on how to teach the standard syllabus but will also be expected to contribute their own ideas and suggestions for classroom activities that might complement the syllabus. Seminar participants are additionally welcome to identify any problems or areas for improvement they might find with the standard syllabus.

Composition Studies Expertise: Although it is likely that only a minority of seminar participants will choose to make rhetoric and/or composition studies the primary focus of their graduate school research, almost all of you will be teaching composition courses for the majority, if not entirety, of your teaching career. Similarly, insofar as composition curricula forms the lion share of most English department’s course offerings and provide their largest “revenue stream,” you will also have an investment in how composition is taught at whatever institution you eventually join, and may also be called upon to make decisions about the administration of composition programs as part of your service to your department. As such, in this course we will cover the major debates in the field — with particular reference to pedagogy and disciplinary controversies — that are important to all of those who will be teaching composition courses and joining the English Studies academy.

Professionalization: Similarly, as most of you will be eventually applying for positions that require the teaching of composition — and all of you will be gaining the vast majority of your experience teaching as a graduate student from the teaching of composition – it is largely your success or failure at this activity, and the presentation of your your work at this activity, that will be on display when you enter the job market. To help you begin preparing for your eventual entry into the job market, we will focus in this course on such items as the creation of teaching portfolios, how to handle questions about teaching during interviews, and how to situate teaching in relation to the other responsibilities (research, service, etc.) of being a graduate student.

Mentoring: Almost any good teacher will tell you that they’ve gained some of their strongest inspiration and finest ideas from their colleagues. We will attempt to jumpstart this process via a formal mentoring program this semester. Each course participant will be assigned an official mentor — an experienced instructor who has demonstrated excellence in teaching — with which they will meet four times outside of class this Fall. The first meeting will be casual one, in which you will have the chance to briefly familiarize yourself with your assigned mentor and arrange an appropriate date for your second meeting this semester. During the second meeting you will observe your mentor’s teaching of a single session of 1020. During a third meeting with your mentor, you will discuss your experience observing their session and, finally, a fourth meeting towards the end of the Fall semester will be dedicated to reviewing your syllabus and course plans for the Winter semester.  Mentors will also join the practicum for two sessions this Fall. They will field general questions from course participants during an early meeting of the practicum and also join us for a session on grading later in the semester.

Participants will also be assigned to observe two other sessions of 1020 in addition to the class taught by your official mentor; one taught by a lecturer in our department and another by either a GTA or part-time instructor. A brief (one page, single-spaced) observation report written by the observer will be due following each of these sessions (see below).  These mentoring activities should be particularly useful for those of you teaching composition for the first time; they should also be valuable to those of you who have already taught composition elsewhere, insofar as it will help you get acquainted with both the “Wayne way” of teaching composition and the makeup of Wayne student demographics

TEXTS

All of our required texts are either available as a free e-book via the WSU libraries or for purchase at the campus B & N bookstore; additional readings will be provided online or via e-mail or Blackboard. Complimentary copies of assigned texts for your sections of ENG 1020 have already been acquired and will be distributed during the first couple weeks of the practicum.

ASSIGNMENTS

Reading Responses: Each course participant will compose responses to readings in advance of those sessions for which readings have been assigned. Responses should be a single-spaced single page in length. We will begin each session by reading and discussing these responses. A hard copy should be turned in during class (which will be evaluated and returned the following week) and participants will also post their responses to our blog within 48 hours after our meetings so that they may serve as references for the rest of the class.

Lesson Plans & Pedagogical Materials: Detailed lesson plans (including learning objectives, reading assignments, and deliverables) will be provided for the majority of semester readings for your first section of ENG 1020 this Winter. You also, of course, have the opportunity to appropriate lesson plans and session outlines from the previous cohorts of GTAs. However, you will also be asked to individually design your own lesson plans for particular sessions of our model wiki. For two  particular assignments (creating grading rubrics for common 1020 projects and making a contribution to the annotated bibliographies of the WSU Teaching site) you will be assigned to a small collaborative group.

Syllabus Construction: As your final assignment in the course, you will create a syllabus for your Winter 1020 section that includes, in addition to all of the standard syllabi requirements (see the online faculty handbook for details),
full assignment description for all graded deliverables including the grading rubrics you will provide students for all major assignments; each major project should have its own rubric though there may be some overlap in items identified (our course text on rubrics should be helpful in completing this part of the syllabus). All syllabi should be vetted by your assigned mentor before being turned in to me for evaluation during our final class meeting (12/06).

Observation Report: After all three of your classroom observations, you will complete and submit a brief (one single-spaced, single page) report on the experience of observing their class session and discussing that session with them afterward.

Credit breakdown for assignments is as follows:

• Weekly Responses and Participation (30%)
• Lesson Plans and Pedagogical Materials (30%)
• Annotation Assignment (10%)
• Rubric Assignment (15%)
• Observation Reports (15%)

ATTENDANCE

All participants are expected to attend every session of this course. You are also encouraged to make use of office hours either by appearing in my office in person or chatting online via the “virtual classroom” option on Blackboard.

STUDENT DISABILITY SERVICES

If you have a documented disability that requires accommodations, you will need to register with Student Disability Services (SDS) for coordination of your academic accommodations. The Student Disability Services (SDS) office is located at 1600 David Adamany Undergraduate Library in the Student Academic Success Services department. SDS telephone number is 313-577-1851 or 313-577-3365 (TDD only). Once you have your accommodations in place, I will be glad to meet with you privately during my office hours to discuss your special needs. Student Disability Services’ mission is to assist the university in creating an accessible community where students with disabilities have an equal opportunity to fully participate in their educational experience at Wayne State University.

Please be aware that a delay in getting SDS accommodation letters for the current semester may hinder the availability or facilitation of those accommodations in a timely manner. Therefore, it is in your best interest to get your accommodation letters as early in the semester as possible.

ACADEMIC DISHONESTY

According to the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences policy on plagiarism, instructors are required to report all instances of academic dishonesty and the responsibility to notify the student of alleged violations and the action being taken. Both the student and the instructor are entitled to due process in all such cases. Acts of dishonest may lead to failure in a given course, suspension, or exclusion

The above is plagiarized from the Wayne State Policy on Academic Dishonesty; for more about the definition of plagiarism, consult your local library.