Writing 1

King Abdulaziz University

Faculty of Arts and Humanities

Department of European Languages and Literature

_Fall 2011/2012

Course Syllabus – Writing I – LANE 213 – Section VA

COURSE DESCRIPTION:

This is a three hour credit course that focuses on the skills, techniques, and strategies for writing effectively. It assumes a demonstrated mastery of basic English grammar, punctuation, sentence structure, paragraph structure, and essay structure. The aim of the course is to teach students the steps of clear writing and thinking with the intention of applying such skills to essays and term papers they will be assigned in their introductory literature and linguistics classes. Upon completion, students should be able to demonstrate competence in the skills required for Writing II - LANE 216.

COURSE OBJECTIVES:

Upon completion of this course, students will be able to:

• Recognize and create unified and coherent paragraphs
• Compose developed, unified, competent expository essays 4 paragraphs in length that are relatively free from errors in grammar and mechanics
• Adhere to and apply punctuation rules to their writing
• Use connecting words and transition signals
• Employ one or more patterns of development (comparison and contrast, cause and effect, and opinion essays)
• Cater for audience and purpose
• Control voice, tone and level of formality
• Employ the standard methods of academic written discourse (i.e. introductions, conclusions, transitions, and topic sentences)
• Use sophisticated sentence structure with sentence type variety
• Use appropriate details to support a thesis or illustrate an idea
• Demonstrate awareness and use of the writing process to construct academic writing tasks that:

-          Use prewriting strategies to generate, determine, and organize ideas

-          Use strategies to organize and plan for writing

-          Use outlining techniques to organize ideas coherently

• Organize and write drafts that effectively address the writing task assigned
• Convert the planning stages of writing into connected prose
• Revise and refine existing drafts using editing worksheets and scoring rubrics
• Improve sentence level errors such as run-on sentences and fragments to create complete sentences
• Understand and avoid plagiarism

COURSE OUTCOMES:

Description of the knowledge to be acquired:

This course will enable students to:

• Write coherent essays using correct structures, punctuation, and other mechanics of writing
• Learn basic methods of drafting, critiquing, and revising compositions
• Think and write through four essentials: unity, support, coherence, and sentence skills
• Read and critically discuss expository texts
• Distinguish between three essay patterns
• Develop critical thinking skills to come up with solid essay outlines and logical ideas and specific details that support them
• Demonstrate the skill of recognition and distinction between academic and non-academic writing
• Develop maturity and self-growth in learning about one's own language mistakes and trying to overcome them
• Demonstrate the skill of academic writing and all what it entails

Description of cognitive skills to be developed:

This course will enable students to:

• Develop critical thinking skills to come up with solid essay outlines and logical ideas and specific details that support them
• Demonstrate the skill of recognition and distinction between academic and non-academic writing
• Develop maturity and self-growth in learning about one's own language mistakes and trying to overcome them
• Demonstrate the skill of academic writing and all what it entails

COURSE CONTENT:

REQUIRED TEXTBOOK:

Nuttall, G. (2006). College writing 3: Houghton Mifflin English for academic success series. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company.

SUPPLEMENTARY TEXTBOOK(S):

Langan, J. (2007). College writing skills with readings. Boston: McGraw Hill.

-          Any college level English dictionary and thesaurus such as Webster's New Collegiate, The American Heritage Dictionary, Roget's International Thesaurus, or Roget's Thesaurus.

COURSE ASSESSMENT:

ATTENDANCE POLICY:

-          Students are expected to be punctual and attend all classes

-          If a student arrives after the scheduled beginning time for class, it will be put down in the attendance sheet as Late (3 times Late = 1 absence)

-          Being absent for more than 20% of allocated course time means that the student will receive a DN (denied from final exam) grade which is equivalent to an F

GENERAL POLICIES

-          There will be NO make-up exams

-          Medical reports cannot be received in class. To present a medical report, come to the instructor’s office during office hours

-          During classes and exams, mobile phones should be turned off or set to silent mode

-          Students are expected to know and abide by university policies governing student conduct

-          Students are expected to exhibit a high level of personal and academic integrity and honesty

                       Fall 2011/2012 – Writing I – Lane213 – Section VA - Course Timeline