Tag: research

Undergraduate Column: Can We Talk about Reading?

Post author By aoleary4
Post date May 31, 2017

By Artie O’Leary

I have only experienced conversations about reading twice in my entire academic career. I don’t mean that we didn’t talk about the course readings themselves in my classes, we’ve talked quite a bit in many classes about the content of the pieces assigned. But these conversations often focused on content alone: What did the writer say? How is what the writer said different from what another writer said? How did what the writer say about the topic help me to understand important information related to the focus of the class?

Tags analytical reading, Reading, research, Writing

Undergraduate Perspectives

Undergraduate Column: Talk To Us About Your Writing Process

Post author By aoleary4
Post date April 19, 2017

Fenwick Library

For many undergraduate writers, being introduced and reintroduced to the writing process is an important part of learning to write in an academic community. Some of the most important aha moments I’ve had as an undergraduate writer have come from these infrequent opportunities to listen to my professors talk about their own writing, their experiences as writers, and their strategies for overcoming difficulties. I find this especially true as I take courses on the 300 and 400-levels. As my writing becomes more intensive, the insights I can gain from conversations with professors about their own writing has become invaluable.

Tags academic, Feedback, process, research, Writing

Faculty Writing

Supporting Faculty Writers: Mason Faculty Writing Retreats – A Comprehensive Review

Post author By caitlincholmes
Post date February 26, 2015

by: Caitlin Holmes

Caitlin Holmes is the Assistant Director of Writing Across the Curriculum at George Mason University. She blogs regularly about teaching here at thewritingcampus.com. You can reach her via email at wac@gmu.edu.

With the support of Mason’s Provost Office and Center for Teaching and Faculty Excellence, the Writing Across the Curriculum Program hosted two Faculty Writing Retreats in the past 12 months: one in May 2014 and the other in January 2015. Such retreats had occurred in the past under the supervision of the Northern Virginia Writing Project, but not for quite some time. This blog post will review the different structures of the May 2014 and January 2015 retreats, give summaries of evaluation results for both retreats, and provide a few concluding thoughts about what we may try in the future at Mason.

Tags Collaborative Teaching, digital writing, education, faculty, faculty writing, faculty writing support, higher education, Mason WAC, research, Writing, Writing in the Disciplines, writing pedagogy

Technology

Wikipedia: What Professors Tell Students and What Students Do

Post author By caitlincholmes
Post date February 12, 2015

by: Mikal Cardine

Mikal is a senior studying English at George Mason. She previously worked with WAC to create disciplinary writing guides for student use. To reach her, please contact wac@gmu.edu.

The average undergraduate will hear a variety of conflicting viewpoints from their university professors on the topic of Wikipedia. While some professors will openly express distrust of Wikipedia as a source for research, others are more open to the use of Wikipedia as a learning tool. While Middlebury College outright banned undergraduates from citing Wikipedia in any academic essay—stating that “students need to be taught to go for quality information, not just convenience” (Jaschik, 2)—professors such as Mark Kissling argue that faculty do a disservice to their students if they don’t help them to understand why instructors are concerned about the source. As Kissling writes, professors have a duty to teach “their students to learn to critically read Wikipedia…helping them understand how it is created, how it defines and positions knowledge, and what it makes possible and fails to do” (Kissling, 1).

As an undergraduate, I have to admit that Wikipedia is in. Originally branded as untrustworthy, the site is now our go-to research tool – but why? Has student scholarship fallen so far? Or has Wikipedia possibly become a useful research tool? Prompted to learn more, I decided to do a little research and created a simple survey to determine Wikipedia’s current value to both professors and students.

Teaching Writing

“The Rhetorical Situation” and Reading Strategies in Advanced Composition

Post author By caitlincholmes
Post date February 5, 2015

by: Caitlin Holmes

During a pre-semester meeting to discuss the QEP assessment findings of Mason’s English 302 Students-as-Scholars Program, instructors of our Advanced Composition courses went over the primary student learning outcomes (SLO):

SLO-1, Discovery: Understand how they can engage in the practice of scholarship at GMU
SLO-2, Discovery: Understand research methods used in a discipline
SLO-3, Discovery: Understand how knowledge is transmitted within a discipline, across disciplines, and to the public
SLO-4, Inquiry: Articulate and refine a question
SLO-5, Inquiry: Follow ethical principles
SLO-6, Inquiry: Situate the scholarly inquiry [and inquiry process] within a broader context
SLO-7, Inquiry: Apply appropriate scholarly conventions during scholarly inquiry/reporting

What those discussions reinforced for my colleagues and me is that engagement in scholarship and knowledge transmission requires that students have advanced reading practices that often are not overtly discussed – or are sometimes presumed as proficiencies – as we work on writing competencies.

Tags College Composition, education, exigence, Mason WAC, pedagogy, Reading, reading strategies, research, Teaching, teaching reading, Teaching Strategies, WAC, Writing in the Disciplines, writing pedagogy