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Mini-Module: Genre as RhetoricGenre awareness is an important practice for students to learn. Genres, from a rhetorical perspective, pay attention to communication patterns in writing and use those patterns to reimagine and address new rhetorical situations (since every time we communicate or write we create a new rhetorical situation). Key to teaching genre awareness to students is to help them pay attention to the constraints of a genre (the patterns that are part of any genre) while also supporting them in seeing the rhetorical possibilities and creativity of the communication situation.
Assessments: Short Write-Genre Analysis |
Mini-Module: Inquiry QuestionsThe purpose of this module is to introduce writers to the mindset and concept of inquiry and demonstrate how to use specific strategies for asking inquiry questions to deepen their thinking as they transition from reading and writing. In ERWC, inquiry is understood as a metacognitive and recursive process that generates knowledge. Inquiry is a habit of mind that students and teachers utilize throughout their intellectual work. As we read, write, and think, we ask ourselves what we know and how we know it. In addition, we identify what we want to know about the topics that interest us. In doing so, we become more curious and generate questions that lead to deeper and more enriching reading and writing practices. This mini-module emphasizes the importance of inquiry and curiosity in considering any topic, rhetorical situation, or writing task before writers take a “stand” or decide what they think.
Assessment: Short Write-Inquiry Unit Five: Juvenile JustiveLegal issues surrounding the mandatory sentencing of juveniles to life in prison for serious crimes is an engaging topic for students who are juveniles themselves. The scientific evidence about the changes that teenaged brains undergo is surprising for most teens while the question of whether young people who have committed crimes can be rehabilitated raises fundamental questions about human nature. The readings provide rich opportunities to analyze how writers use rhetorical appeals to sway their readers while the writing assignment asks students to use the evidence from the texts to form an argument supporting one or the other sides of the Supreme Court decision.
Assessments: Problem/Solution Argumentative Essay |
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Unit Six: Fake NewsMost teenagers have regular access to social media and other online sources of information. Students’ ability to critically examine and uncover fake news is part of a larger skill set that is needed for 21st century engagement: news and media literacy. This module supports students’ development of fact- checking skills so they can engage responsibly as informed participants in society.
Assessment: Opinion Editorial Unit Seven: Big Brother is WatchingGeorge Orwell’s 1984 is sometimes not recognized as a science fiction novel. There are no rocket ships or aliens, and the date is now in the past. However, it is clearly about an imagined future extrapolated from post-World War II political trends, advances in techniques of propaganda, and the potential of surveillance technology to increase the control of a totalitarian government over its citizens. Now surveillance technology is vastly more powerful and pervasive than Orwell ever imagined, and we use much of it voluntarily. What if technology allowed our government to watch and listen to us every moment? In 1984, Orwell explores what that would be like. This module will have students consider the life presented in 1984 and have them compare it to current events and technological advances in our time.
Assessments: Socratic Seminar Reading Journal Mini-Module: Stasis TheoryThe purpose of this mini-module is to introduce the forensic and deliberative stasis questions and practice their use in analyzing issues and locating points of disagreement.
Assessments: Research Presentation |
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