Preparing for the Final Class on 11/12 Monday

Hi everyone,

We have two more classes and here is the plan.

11/7 Wed
---------------
After my explanation about how to finish up the course, this will be our final free working day. Please find partners to do peer collaboration for brainstorming, revising, editing.

11/12
----------------
In this final class, each writer will share a little writing (favorite sentence or line), and/or also share a little about what you learned about writing or about yourself as a writer during this course.

Please prepare for that by finishing your 2nd or 3rd piece, and doing the final fixed blogging topic on the syllabus.

I'll also ask for your cooperation with a final anonymous online survey on this course, which can be done by email after the final class.

Finishing Up
-------------------
This class never finishes, in the sense that I hope your writing will continue as a long-long endeavor. Also, you are free to publish anything on this website and your blog any time you like, even after the course finishes.

The most important thing, as Kathleen mentioned, is that you keep writing down your thoughts and experiences day to day, and have a sensitive awareness to human life.

I hope you will do that.

If you are curious about your grade (as I often was when I was a student), just send me an email after the final class 11/12. I will be grading based on effort and engagement in three areas: 1) participation, 2) blogging, and 3) the process of publishing.

If you are worried about failing, please send me an email IMMEDIATELY and I will let you know if you still have a chance to do a minimum within the next 5 days. Those who have been frequently absent should definitely contact me. It may be too late already, but we may be able to come to an agreement if you have been doing some of the blogging and publishing work.

October 24, Wednesday - A writing/sharing work day

Hi everyone,

Q1. What's your plan or goal for finishing your writing this week? (By Monday)

Q2. Can you bring a draft of your 2nd piece on Monday for peer review?

 If you are behind schedule, please try to catch up!

 Reminders:
-If you haven't written a reaction to Kathleen's talk, please do so.
-If you haven't responded to the Mid-Term Questionnaire, this is your final chance. It is almost the end of the term...
-Keep up your blogging/commenting. See the new commenting groups.

-Most importantly, move the process of your writing/publishing forward according to your schedule!

To review, basically, it is 8 steps:

1) Brainstorm theme/genre, discuss ideas with partners --> 2) See mentor texts (pieces of a similar genre on the web etc.) to get good ideas --> 3) write draft --> 4) show and get feedback --> 5) revise --> 6) show and get feedback --> 7) edit, get help with editing --> 8) publish with author's note, thanking your helpers.

See you on Monday!

10/10 Wed, Class Summary / Homework

1. Discuss your blogging/commenting: How's it coming? Have you reached 10 articles?

2. Week 5 - Fixed topic = What's happiness to you?

3. Continuing your publishing - How's your first piece? Today's goal is to have a printed first piece that you have already revised, and try to get feedback for editing.

4. Most of you should have received invitation emails to edit this blog. You can publish your own piece in the following steps:

  1) Log in.
  2) Create new post.
  3) Write your title, and piece info such as link or content, and author's note including thanks to two or more classmates or other people who helped you with revising/editing.
  4) Add labels with the format "by Name" and also your genre such as "Poem" or "Short Story"

5. Homework = Mid-term reflection - respond to my email to be sent tonight or tomorrow.

6. Visit by Kathleen Hill on Wed next week - What questions do you want to ask?
     Her author website is: http://www.kathleenhillwriter.com/
     One of her impressive short stories is the The Annointed.

Class Summary and Homework 9/24 M & 9/26 W

Week 3:
Getting Started on the Writing/Publishing Process

1. How is your blogging? You should have 6 blog articles by the end of this week and 8 by the end of next week. I will ask for a Half-Way  Self-evaluation and Reflection, which will be due 10/10 Wed. By then, you need 10 articles or more with 100 words or more and meaningful content (6 fixed topics, 4 or more free/open topics).

Also, you should write comments on all blog postings of all partners (See below). Even short comments! Make sure you do it week by week.

Blog Comment partner groups (in alphabetical order of names):

1. Haruka, Jun, Kayano, Kumiko, Madoka

2. Mariko, Masaaki, Megumi, Moro

3. Nozomi, Rinako, Risa, Ryo 

4. Ryoko, Saaya, Saya, Shoto

5. Shun, Tsubasa, Yohei, Yumi

-----------
2. Be an Author!
What do YOU want to write??
Liberate yourself! Don't limit yourself. No theme is too small, or too big!
Fundamentally...what is good writing? Let's brainstorm together a bit.

-----------
3. What is the Writing Process? 7 Steps of Authors
Step 1: Brainstorm possible territories and themes (in notebook)
Step 2: Choose a theme and genre. Learn genres from mentor texts.
Step 3: Develop ideas and start a draft
Step 4: Get feedback in or out of class
Step 5: Revise the draft and get more feedback
Step 6: Edit the piece and submit to editor (me)
Step 7: Publish on our website or another medium!

-----------
4. One Possible Pace/Schedule for Publishing 3 Pieces of 3 Genres

Piece #1  A Personal Narrative (Samples)
Draft by 10/1 M, Revise/Edit and Publish by 10/8 M

Piece #2  A Poem (Samples) or Haiku (Samples)
Draft by 10/15 M, Revise/Edit and Publish by 10/22 M

Piece #3  A Short Story (Short samples,  longer samples) or Essay (Sample)
Draft by 10/29 M, Revise/Edit and Publish by 11/5 M

Note: This is only one image of a steady pace. Different writers have different preferences and paces, and we will respect that. The pacing and genres are up to you, and how much content you write is up to you, too! This is one of the challenges of being a real author. I am not going to force you to keep the pace above or to follow those three genres. Each of you will work on your OWN themes and genres at your OWN best pace. Be original and make it work for yourself, but if you are not sure, try to follow the above pace.

But please remember that our final class is 11/12 M and that is the last possible day for publishing. Also, please note that it may be difficult to get feedback from classmates or myself if you don't give us sufficient time to respond to drafts in class or by email etc.

The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost, produced in video on YouTube. Or just text.

A Man by Nina Cassian.

Class Summary and Homework 9/12 W and 9/17, 19

Today we will create and practice our "Who am I?" presentations.

The purpose of the Who am I? presentations is to give each class member a chance to visually show what they want to show about themselves so we can get to know them. Also, it is fun to think "Who am I?" and what you will show within a limited time and space. Feel free to be creative and original in the approach you take!

If possible, consider this slide show something that you can post on your blog too. It won't be required, but it is a nice visual element to spice up your personal writing blog. To upload the slides and embed them, just use SlideShare.com and copy the embed code into the HTML window of blogger.

1) Confirm blogging topics - Which topics have you finished? What did/will you write about "Are you a writer?" What open topic did/will you blog on?

2) Mark's demo of 10x10 "Who am I?" presentation?

3) Brainstorm 10x10 content on paper + Share with a partner.

4) Download 10x10 PowerPoint template (click here) and practice adding images (from the Internet) and key words. Note: If you need a scanner, the ILC Helpdesk has one, and it is quite easy to use.

5) If possible, let's do a very rough rehearsal at the end of class, and also decide order of presentations on Monday/Wednesday.

Monday=

１．Tsubasa

２．Masaaki

３．Madoka

４．Shoto

５．Nozomi

６．Saaya

７．Ryo

８．Yumi

９．Kumiko

１０．     Mariko

Wed = ABC  order of first name

6) How to practice/do rehearsals = You need to practice at least 10 times with your VOICE out loud, standing in front of a computer, to be ready. Manage your time and don't spend all of your time for creating the visuals. Plan 30 minutes for purely practicing your delivery. The visuals can be rough, and some slides can just be a key word with text only.

7) On your presentation day, make sure you bring your PowerPoint file on a USB. Make sure it is ready to go because there will be no time for final changes!

Class Summary and Assigned Homework 9/10 M

Class Activities:

1. Welcome! Mingle and learn classmate names (10 minutes)
     -What's your name? Why did you decide to take this class?

2. Learn more about a partner: Non-verbal communication

3. Overview of this course: Tentative schedule etc.

4. Interview a partner and introduce him/her
    a) Name, Please call him/her..., ELP section
    b) Why did you take this class?
    c) Do you like writing? Why or why not? If yes, what kind?

Homework (for the next class)

First, please create your OWN blog on Blogger.com or another blog site so that you can start writing. Please send me your blog address, too, preferably in the same email as above. Feel free to start blogging on this week's topics right away!

Second, please send me your Gmail address so that I can add you as an editor of this blog.

See you on Wed!

11/7 - Final Class! + Self-Eval Email Assignment

Wednesday 11/9 - Final Class:
In this class, everyone, including me, will make a short presentation of 1~2 min. to the whole class. The purpose of the presentation is twofold:

a) To share what you published or plan to publish. Explain the theme, genre, main characteristics and highlights of your pieces.

b) Share what you learned about yourself and yourself as a writer (which is the final blogging topic). What have you discovered about what you like to write, what you have found is difficult, how you've developed your skill for the process etc. How's your skill of choosing a theme/genre, getting a mentor text, using a writer's notebook, finding a time/place to write, drafting, sharing/getting feedback, revising, editing, publishing.

Friday 11/11 is the deadline for your Self-Evaluation and Reflection: In an email to me, please answer the following 5 questions:

1) How was your blogging of 20 topics, 100 words or more? Excellent, good, satisfactory or unsatisfactory? Were you able to thinking carefully about the topic and write your ideas thoughtfully even if roughly?

2) How was your publishing of 3 different genres? Excellent, good, satisfactory or unsatisfactory? Were you able to experience the process of writing and develop yourself as a writer?

3) How was your participation in the You class? Excellent, good, satisfactory or unsatisfactory? Did you actively attend and support other classmates through feedback and commenting on blogs or published pieces?

4) Based on the above, if you were me (the instructor Mark), what final course grade (A Excellent, B Good, C Satisfactory, D Unsatisfactory ~E) would you give yourself and why?

5) Finally, what was your impression of the YOU class? What was good for you? Also, how can it be better next year? I would appreciate your suggestions!

Nov. 2 Wed: Class Content and Homework

Welcome back after the festival, everyone!

Class Content / Homework

1. Warm-Up: How's your writing going? What did you blog about religion? What's your goal for today?

2. Directions for finishing up the term. November 10th is the final day for assignments to be considered for evaluation of Excellent, Good, Satisfactory etc. in each category.

• Blogging and commenting: We'll keep the same groups for one more week. We'll discuss your Obituary on Monday. Try your best to finish all 20 blog postings by November 10th
  .In addition to posting them on my blog, let's all share our Obituaries as a comment on the Obituary posting below. Be creative with these!
  
• Publishing 3 different genres: Toward the end, you might have to make a choice to either 1) write very short pieces, 2) focus on only two longer pieces, or 3) submit one more pieces as "incomplete" pieces. In the end, you will self-evaluate your engagement in the publishing process as Excellent, Good, or Satisfactory. Good luck with finishing as much as you can up to Nov. 10th!
• Final classes next week and Self-Evaluation/Reflection submission:
  s
  Monday 11/7: Final peer review time: We will discuss your obituaries content and then use the remaining time for you to get feedback from classmates on your final publishing pieces. We will make groups of 3 or 4 writers, and you will show your drafts to each other to discuss how to improve and finish the pieces. Make sure you have a draft of your second or third piece!
  
  Wednesday 11/9 - Final Class: In this class, everyone, including me, will make a short presentation of 1~2 min. to the whole class. The purpose of the presentation is twofold:
  a) To share what you published or plan to publish. Explain the theme, genre, main characteristics and highlights of your pieces.
  b) Share what you learned about yourself as a writer (which is the final blogging topic). What have you discovered about what you like to write, what you have found is difficult, how you've developed your skill for the process etc. How's your skill of choosing a theme/genre, getting a mentor text, using a writer's notebook, finding a time/place to write, drafting, sharing/getting feedback, revising, editing, publishing.
  
  Friday 11/11 is the deadline for your Self-Evaluation and Reflection: In an email to me, please answer the following 5 questions:
  1) How was your blogging of 20 topics, 100 words or more? Excellent, good, satisfactory or unsatisfactory? Were you able to thinking carefully about the topic and write your ideas thoughtfully even if roughly?
  2) How was your publishing of 3 different genres? Excellent, good, satisfactory or unsatisfactory? Were you able to experience the process of writing and develop yourself as a writer?
  3) How was your participation in the You class? Excellent, good, satisfactory or unsatisfactory? Did you actively attend and support other classmates through feedback and commenting on blogs or published pieces?
  4) Based on the above, if you were me (the instructor Mark), what grade (A~E) would you give yourself and why?
  5) Finally, what was your impression of the YOU class? What was good for you? Also, how can it be better next year? I would appreciate your suggestions!

Class Summary and Homework 10/12 Wed

First, for Monday next week, 10/17, please:

1) Make sure you have finished blogging on "What is happiness to you?" We will have a short discussion time at the beginning of class for you to share ideas with a few group members.

2) Start commenting on the blogs of your new partners. You can leave comments on any blog articles that interest you, but especially focus on any new ones that have been posted.

Genta, Meiko, Tetsuro, Natsuki

Mitsuru, Yu Inoue, Kazuki, Buchi,

Aze, Soichiro, Riki, Hisashi

Kumiko, Kan, Uka, Mio

Chihiro, Yu K, Arisa, Kaori

3) Continue to write your blog articles and published pieces! Keep asking for feedback on drafts for revision and editing from your classmates. As much as possible, please get classmate feedback before showing it to me!

Share One Good Poem (any kind!)

Hi everyone,

By Wednesday, please leave a Comment that includes one good poem in English that you know or have found.

Include:

Title (link)
Author, Year (if available)

Poem

Why you like it.

Class Summary and Homework 10/3 M

Welcome back!

1. Warm-Up: What blog articles did you write last week? What is your most precious thing?

2. How are the "to be published" pieces coming? On Wednesday 10/5, we will take time for a peer review, so please have your "draft" printed on paper and ready to show to a classmate to get reactions and suggestions.

3. Mini-Lesson/Brainstorming: What is good writing?

4. Writing Time

5. Sharing Time: Ready to show a draft on Wednesday?

Homework: 
-Keep moving forward in the process of writing!
-Make sure you bring a draft of your first piece of writing.
-Make sure you are on schedule to finish 10 blog articles by Friday 10/7 for the mid-term self-evaluation and reflection that you will submit.

Class Summary and Homework 9/19-21

We are using these two days for your Who Am I? 10x10 presentations. Please be ready with your set of PowerPoint slides on a USB memory device.

I hope the process of preparing the 10x10 is helpful for thinking about who you are and what is meaningful to you.

I also hope that listening to your classmates presentations will help all of you develop a sense of community as you begin to write and communicate about yourselves.

Homework for 9/26 Monday:
On Monday, we will start exploring the process of writing and various genres that you can write and publish in this class. I will provide a "sample plan" for drafting, revising, and publishing 3 pieces of creative, personal writing (personal narrative, haiku/poem, and short story) and give examples and resources.

1) Bring a notebook of any size to class. This will be your Writer's Notebook for brainstorming or jotting down sudden inspirations.

2) Continue your blogging: This week's fixed topic is Who Am I?  Please also write an open topic blog--choose a topic that is meaningful for you! If possible, try to embed your Who Am I? slides on your blog using www.SlideShare.net.

3) Comment on your partners' blogs: For all of the topics so far, please leave a short or long comment to show your reaction, ask a question, or send a message. The groups of 4 for commenting are, in order of student number:

Genta, Mitsuru, Aze, Kumiko

Chihiro, Meiko, Yu Inoue, Soichiro

Kan, Yu K., Tetsuro, Kazuki

Riki, Uka, Arisa, Natsuki

Buchi, Hisashi, Mio, Kaori

These partner groups for commenting will continue until Week 5. Then I will change the groups. Of course, you are free to comment on all classmate blogs and my blog posts too! I hope somebody will leave me a message because blogging with no reactions is very lonely. I plan to leave a comment on everyone's blog over this long weekend too.