ENG 101: SAMPLE ACTIVITY SHEETS
The purpose of these materials is not necessarily to provide documents that can be immediately distributed to students; rather, these sample classroom activity sheets and handouts are intended to inspire ideas, offer different pedagogical approaches to the course goals of ENG 101, and/or provide suggestions/guidelines for teachers writing their own documents.
Notes
- It is not recommended that one teach another’s course materials verbatim. While these materials may serve as productive guides and models, the process of writing classroom documents often helps teachers to shape materials for particular course needs, understand their own objectives for specific activities/assignments, be better able to answer students’ questions (rather than second-guess the original author’s intention), and make clear connections to other coursework (and discussions/lecturers/activities). Therefore, if teachers choose to use these documents, it is strongly suggested that they at least significantly modify them before integrating them into their own courses.
- An activity sheet or handout is only as good as the class time dedicated to it -- accompanying lectures, discussions, and other classroom activities cannot be represented here; the ultimate quality/productivity of these activities/handouts, then, cannot be judged by the documents alone.
- Some documents refer to textbooks, readings, or materials specific to a particular section of ENG 101; these ancillary materials are therefore not made available by the Department. Some documents also refer to particular syllabi and/or corresponding assignment sheets; whenever possible, this material has been included in this database, and links are provided.
- Teachers collaborate and share materials frequently in the Department. As a result, some of the documents included here look very much alike. That can be an asset for greater programmatic coherence, to be certain. Yet sometimes even subtle changes (tone or word choice, just for instance) can be significant, given particular pedagogical styles and classes.
- For clarity and easier accessibility, documents are divided according to genres (listed and described below), as much as it is recognized that these categories often overlap and can be only loosely defined. Sometimes activities will ask students to accomplish multiple tasks, allowing documents to be readily included in several sections; for simplicity, they are not cross-listed.
- Many of these documents can be easily adapted for ENG 102. (Likewise, many of the ENG 102 sample activity sheets can be adopted for ENG 101.)
Category Descriptions/Page Index
Analysis Strategies/Guides . . .
. . . that help students to develop “critical thinking” skills, recognize unique ways to investigate perhaps different objects of study (prose, image, place, etc.), analyze using different strategies (semantic, semiotic, rhetorical, etc.)
Discussion Prompts/Short Assignments . . .
. . . that are used to enhance/create classroom discussion (or better-prepare students for it), to “lead into” longer or more sophisticated writing assignments, to “test” that students are doing the reading
Peer Review Sheets/Activities . . .
. . . specifically designed for students to work with one another in class on particular assignments or writing goals
Presentations . . .
. . . are projects that require some oral component, to be performed in front of a live audience (individual or collaborative presentations that require out-of-class preparation or are accomplished within a single class session)
Revision Activities/Guides . . .
. . . that help students to revise their own work or self-reflect upon their own writing strategies, usually individually (for peer critiques, see above)
Thesis Development Materials . . .
. . . that help students to understand what thesis statements are, or develop/enhance a thesis statement already discovered (through research, the writing process, assignment drafts, or invention techniques)
