Yen-Chu Weng

When I taught this course in the past, I found students struggling with the weekly intellectual journals assignment. The goal of this assignment is for students to write a critical appraisal of each week’s assigned readings, including the one overarching theme that weaved through this week’s readings and student’s thoughts and reactions, in around 400-500 words.

This time, I will include more hands-on guidance and instructions on the weekly intellectual journals, including:

1. in-class discussion time about the assignment,
2. a writer’s memo asking students to keep track of their ideas and what they learned from each week’s journal, and
3. sharing of exemplary work with students and in-class peer review.

The prompts for the writer’s memo are: What I’m struggling with this week and what I will try to improve for the next journal.

Materials

• ENVIR430/JSIS484 Syllabus (pdf)

Reflection on Fellowship

The Writing@UW Fellowship was a valuable experience. Initially I added a W designation to my course because there are a lot of writing assignments in my course. However, my course was a content course, and previously I did not purposefully teach writing in this course. With the Writing@UW Fellowship, I learned many important aspects of how to teach writing.

• Understand the different types of college-level writing and be specific about the objectives of each writing assignment. Think about the audience, genre, purpose, and presentation format. 
• Treat writing as an iterative process. Add a meta-cognitive level low-stake assignment such as a writer’s memo or zero draft to guide students through the writing process. Writing does not need to be perfect the first time. Give incentives for revisions.
• Be mindful of the DEI issues in writing. How to promote inclusivity in using English as the dominant form of communication in academia. Consider students’ language background, gender/identify dynamics, and equity in evaluation.