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Many universities require students to complete a series of composition classes during their freshman year or at least before they graduate.  These composition courses are designed to introduce students to the basic writing conventions in academia, and these courses also introduce students to research techniques.  Much of the information is general in nature but can then be applied to more specific courses.

This composition class will be no different.  You will write four essays (a prospectus, an annotated bibliography, a research-argument, and a counter-argument paper) that will be combined into a large research based paper at the end of the semester.  Essentially, you will chose a single topic that you will investigate for the entire semester.

Maybe an example would be helpful here.  Let’s say you chose to write about the connection between crude oil and gas prices at the pump for the semester.  Your first paper, the prospectus, would outline your general argument for the semester.  Your second paper, the audience analysis, would analyze what kind of audience would be impacted or effected by your argument about crude oil and gas.  Your third paper, the research argument, would be your actual argument about the connection between crude oil and gas prices.  Your fourth paper, the counter-arguments paper, would be your definition and refutations of counter-arguments to your own about crude-oil and gas prices.  At the end of the semester, you would take these four writing projects and combine them into a single seamless argument about crude oil and gas prices.

We'll discuss "how-to" research during this semester.

Why write about one issue for the semester, you ask?  Well, why take a course about one topic, I ask?    Cicero once said: “No one can speak well, unless he thoroughly understands his subject.”  In your other introductory courses, you learn about biology, calculus, physics, etc. for the fifteen weeks during the semester.  It takes at least fifteen weeks to just begin to learn about a subject, and that’s why I encourage you to chose a subject that interests you and use my course as a way to investigate it.  Rather than seeing Composition II as a series of arbitrary papers about unrelated ideas, I hope you see your papers as a large project that helps you map, define, and refine your knowledge about a pet subject.

Now that you understand the paper projects for the course, your next concern is more than likely about the day-to-day class activities.  My classes tend to be very light-hearted.  I know we’re covering important concepts that apply beyond just my classroom, but that doesn’t mean that we have to be serious all the time.  During class, I’ll use the projector to focus my lectures and our discussions (you can get those notes on the PowerPoints page).  Some days I’ll just lecture about an important concept and then you’ll write.  Other days, you’ll work in small groups on an activity and then we’ll discuss concepts as a class.  You can expect, though, to do a lot of writing in my class.

Outside of class, we can keep in touch via this blog, email, and my office hours.  You’ll always find me in my office (Meier Hall 305) during office hours, and you never need to schedule an appointment – just stop in.  Use the blog (via Meebo and the comments section) and email if you need to get in touch electronically. Finally, periodically during the semester, I will cancel class so that we can meet one-on-one to discuss your papers and your writing.