SYLLABUS

The syllabus, because it was made before we know you, is subject to change.

COLUMBIA COLLEGE CHICAGO
600 S. MICHIGAN AVE.
CHICAGO, IL 60605

BRIDGE: ENGLISH STUDIES
M-Th; 10:30-12:15 with post lunch activities
Room 10:30-11:15 Rm. 305 (33 E. Congress)
Room 11:20-12:15 Rm. 316 (33 E. Congress)

Instructor: Kristen Orser
Co-Instructor: Jeffrey Allen
Office: 33 E. Congress, Rm. 527
E-mail: korser@colum.edu and jeffreywilliamallen@gmail.com

COURSE DESCRIPTION: The Bridge course in English Studies helps students position themselves within the college experience, most specifically in relationship with the academic obligations associated with English Studies: reading and writing. Students will use reading and writing to reflect on how the experience of college relates to the student in terms of their chosen field of study, core beliefs, experiences, ambitions, and cultural conversations. Working closely with their instructor and co-instructor, students will engage in reading, response writing, essay writing, class discussion, and creative blog work intended to aid students in their effort to become college-level readers, writers, and thinkers. Activities will range from reading skills practice; sentence and paragraph level basic writing skills practice; drafting and revising essays using Microsoft Word; and using e-mail, online discussion board (blog), and the Internet.

COURSE GOALS AND OBJECTIVES:By the end of the Bridge Program, students who complete the reading and writing segment of the program successfully will be able to:

Become fully engaged with the college experience at Columbia College Chicago, connecting the academic, social, and artistic aspects of critical and cultural inquiry with their own
personal scholastic and career goals;
Use a variety of study skills to improve their reading comprehension and connection with reading;
Write no less than 20 pages of thoughtful, considered prose, including one 4-5 page college-level essay.
To support these overarching objectives, the Bridge reading and writing experience has the following, more detailed objectives:

READING
Students will develop the habit of reading, allocating daily and weekly reading time.
Students will use literature to stimulate personal reflection and response regarding their educational lives past, present, and future.
Students will develop close, critical, reading strategies and skills.
Students will develop their use of writing to facilitate comprehension, interpretations, and expression.
Students will respond to readings through interpretive projects exploring their arts and communications interests.

WRITING
Students will understand what constitutes college-level writing, and therefore understand also the level of work and commitment involved in attending Columbia and becoming an arts and communications professional.
Students will be able to use writing to analyze themselves, texts, and the world.
Students will use Edited American English when they write in a college environment.
Students will be able to use computer technology as an aid to writing and communicating.

REQUIREMENTS:
Online (Blog) forum responses and questions
8 word-processed, 1-2 page responses due daily
1 word-processed, 5 page essay
An artistic translation of the 5 page essay

ASSESMENT:At the end of the course, faculty members will give you either a “SC” or a “NSC” designation—“successful completion” or “not successful completion.” If you achieve a SC, you will meet with an advisor about Fall classes. If you receive a NSC, you will meet with an advisor about other educational options you can pursue besides Columbia.

HOW TO ACHIEVE AN SC (!):
Attend every class session
Come to class on time
Complete all reading assignments
Complete all writing assignments
Demonstrate your commitment to progress and improvement by working hard and developing your skills as recommended by instructors: follow suggestions for improvement
Participate (especially during workshops)


Dismissal Policy: Students may be dismissed from the Bridge Program any time during the four-week session.  Though every effort will be made to provide students with communication that the student is not performing at an acceptable level and that the student has deficiencies that need to be addressed, there is no guarantee that any warning will always be given, especially under circumstances of egregiously improper academic or inter-personal behavior.

Any student receiving a failing grade at the end of the program or who is dismissed during the four-week session will not be admitted to the College. 


TEXTS: One of two single-authored provided in class.

MATERIALS: Notebook, thumbdrive, folder for Jeffrey's corner (this is for drafts and comments), and an open mind

PLAGIARISM: All the work you do in class should be your own

WRITING CENTER: Everyone is welcome and encouraged to visit the Writing Center to receive additional help with writing. Appointments are recommended.
LOCATION: 618 S. Michigan Ave., First Floor

AT THE END OF THE COURSE, WHAT IS EXPECTED?:

You will have daily blog posting (a minimum of two times that you've generated a new post and a minimum of 14 comments to other student's posting.)
You will only receive credit for these blog obligations if the response moves past “gut reaction” and thoroughly considers peer writing, peer ideas, and contributes to a FULLER conversation.

You will have 8 reading responses (a total of at lest 12 pages of writing)
These reading responses should follow the assignment, should demonstrate practiced and improved writing and reading skills, and should seek to connect the reading to the world at large.

You will have one final essay that extends a reading response to a larger inquiry (this includes a 1-2 page proposal and a final, 5 page essay).

You will have attended workshop and you will be assessed on respect for peer, faculty, and the college community.

You will have a visual instantiation—visual essay—of the final essay.

You will present your final essay and be assessed on presentation and communication skills.



CLASS SCHEDULE AND DUE DATES: The English Studies course for Bridge has been designed to provide structure for the increasingly rigorous engagement with reading and writing as academic practices. Every day, students will spend a 45 minute session immersed in a writing (and reading) workshop. Students will read aloud the one-page response that will be due each day. The instructor will model peer response practices and provide feedback on student writing on a daily basis. During the workshops students will meet one-on-one with the teaching assistants in their own tutoring sessions. In this way, Bridge provides students with an idea of w hat it will mean to appropriately and actively participate in writing communities across the college.

A second 45 minute session will take the form of a free writing seminar; students are engaged in posting questions and responses on a class blog. Questions will, at first, be modeled by instructors and then posed by students. Overall, the goal is to provide students with the model for daily reading and extemporaneous response writing so often required of students at the college level.


NOTE ON WRITINGS: We will be doing ice breakers and experiments in writing. If you can’t think of anything to write down, then you should write, “nothing to write” over and over until another thought comes into your heads. Ideally, students should be “recording” the leaps made by their subconscious mind rather than “writing” logical prose.

Some basic tips for doing well in Bridge: Keep up with the reading schedule and plan ahead. If you start a paper or start studying at the last minute, there’s no time to think through complex problems or to discuss the work with your peers and with your instructors.

Come to class prepared to discuss the day’s text. To do this, you should read the assigned text actively, taking notes as you read and thinking about how the reading relates to previous assignments and class discussions.

If the text is difficult (and some of them are difficult), ask yourself what makes it difficult and take some notes about why and where you were stuck. This is a good starting point for resolving the difficulty or discussing it in class.

Bring to class the text we’re discussing.

Take good notes in class, during the lectures, and when reading. Taking notes makes you a better listener and thinker during class.

The same goes for participation: If you take part in discussions and ask and answer questions, you will be able to understand material much better and your paper writing will be that much easier.

If you don’t understand something, ask a question. If you realize later that you didn’t understand something, ask a question during the next class or email it to your instructors.

Do not miss a class.

Respect your peers and remember that we will generate more thoughtful conversation and writing if we collaborate, communicate, and care for each other.

And never turn in work that is not strictly your own. Often, plagiarism is a result of desperation at the last minute. It’s much better to turn in a late assignment than to turn in a plagiarized one (and plagiarized assignments are very easy to recognize).


DATE
ACTIVITIES
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
HOMEWORK

WEEK ONE: intentionality

8/2
“Group Symphony” (Ice Breaker)
Syllabus Intro and Course Goals/Expectations (reading)
Book Summaries and Selections
Self Portrait Activity (partnered / hold up a sign w/ picture)
Blog Questions:
“What should you ask of your professors?” and “What should your professors ask of you?”


Understand the goals and expectations of peers and teachers

Understand the course and course structure

Sign up for blogs and Kyle’s corner
Self Portrait (connect the dots and 3 paragraphs)
8/3
Jeffrey's Corner __________________ & __________________
“Conditionals” (Ice Breaker)
Small Writing Groups/Workshop
Discuss “persona” writing and writing as “other”
Blog Questions:
Touch maps and “what is it like inside my head?” (both for you and for your character)

Collaboration and workshop experience

Begin to see essays as drafts or smaller pieces of the whole
Character Portrait Response (optional challenge: include one conditional)
8/4
Jeffrey's Corner __________ & ___________
Draw your neighborhood and continue the discussion of self/other and us/them (walking in colors?)
Large Book(s) Conversation
Small Groups to “embody punctuation” (based on Paul Nouge's “A New Way of Juggling”)
Blog Questions ____________________ & _____________________
Begin to develop a language to discuss our literature
Simulation Response (choose a sense and write in response to and conversation with your book using that sense and is sensory language)

Bring in supplies: paperclips, tape, string, tacks, anything that can “adhere” or “connect” paper to paper.
8/5
Jeffrey's Corner __________________ & __________________
Connection Methods (applied to our texts)
Litany exercise
Workshop / Quotations (Disposable Culture / Disposable People?)
Grammar/Punctuation Seminar (based on shared patterns)
Blog Questions ____________________ & ___________________ & _________________________

Continue workshop atmosphere and practice pursuing a thought (that might never end)

Recognize class writing patterns and help peers / share knowledge
Response #4

WEEK TWO: process


8/9
Jeffrey's Corner __________ & ____________
“Negativities” (Ice Breaker): Briefly discuss why it is easier to describe something by what it is not rather than by what it is (let this inform your group activity)
Chris Jordan's art work (relevancy and importance of themes and theories in “work”)--theory of “identity”
Reading Groups: In a group with peers who are reading the same book, discuss and present your discussion to the class:
Create a sense of the book's environment or location. Discuss how that location influences the characters' circumstances, psychology, behavior, etc. Discuss how the location makes the story possible.


Blog Questions ____________________ & _________________________

Writing and readings processes visualized and articulated
Response #5
8/10
Jeffrey's Corner __________________ & __________________
New Myths (Ice Breaker)
Identity Issue Continued
Based on http://www.mediamatic.net/page/33851?forum_start=n34354#comment-34354. What public and national issue do you feel “regret” about? How would we, as a country of individuals, as a class of “Americans'” apologize for this? -- this will cross over into the blog session too


How do we get beyond the steps of brainstorming, drafting, etc?

How can you begin to find/discover aspects of your process?

How much time should all of this take anyway?
Response #6: Palimpsest
8/11
Jeffrey's Corner ____________ & ____________
“Questions and Answers” (Ice Breaker)
Continue our work from last class and begin discussing “wearables”
Blog Questions ____________________ & ____________________ & _________________________

Collaboration

How do we interpret what we’re reading?
Wearables
8/12
Jeffrey's Corner __________________ & __________________
Syllogisms (ice breaker)
Grammar/Writing Discussion
Wearables continued
In Class Reading: “Translations” from Raymond Queneau
In class writing exercise: Text message poem
Blog Questions ____________________ & ___________________ & _________________________

How do we write what we want to say?

How many ways can we say what we want to say?

What does form have to do with the essay?
Dear _______

WEEK THREE: product

8/16
Jeffrey's Corner ____________ & ________________
One Into Another (Ice Breaker)
http://www.vimeo.com/8835014
Small Reading Groups / Large Reading Group (Questions)
Blog Questions ____________________ & ___________________________ & _________________________

The expectation is that you’ll be self-driven in your reading conversation/discussion now

(What does it mean to critically engage with a text? How do we get beyond reflections of liking or not liking texts and move toward analysis? What does it mean to enter an academic conversation? How do we make connections among seemingly disconnected texts?
Pre-Proposal
8/17
Jeffrey's Corner __________________ & __________________
Yoko Ono Instructions (Ice Breaker)
Proposal Questions and Answers
Writing Workshop
Blog Questions ____________________ & ___________________________ & _________________________

How do you write a proposal?

How do you decide what to develop in earlier drafts?
Proposal Draft 1
8/18
Jeffrey's Corner ___________ & _____________
Notice Signs (in class activity)
Proposal accepts and rejects
Blog Questions ____________________ & ___________________________ & _________________________

Practice Translation
Ask questions about final project
Go over goals and expectations of final project

Proposal Draft 2
8/19
Jeffery's Corner __________________ & __________________
Directions for Use (ice breaker)
Visual Essay Clarification
Workshop Proposals
Discussion: Making it this far into the Bridge Program, what are some of your expectations for college? Which assumptions have you changed and which stayed the same? What are your anxieties about being a college student? About being a reader, writer, and thinker at the college level? How will you approach college in the fall?

Blog Questions ____________________ & ___________________________ & _________________________

Transparency
Final Essay
WEEK FOUR (FINAL WEEK)!: assessment
8/23
The Game of Illot Mollo (ice breaker)
Visual Writing
Final “Book Talk”
Blog Questions ____________________ & ___________________________ & _________________________

Closure

Application of Ideas
Final Essay
8/24
Artist's Statements
Draw Process
Peer Review Sheet (Final Workshop)
Any remaining questions will be answered and rubric will be clarified
Final Project
8/25
FINAL PROJECTS PRESENTED DURING BOTH CLASS SESSIONS
The Illusion of Closure
8/26
FINAL PROJECTS PRESENTED DURING BOTH CLASS SESSIONS
The Resistance of Closure