Teaching at the 200-level in PWR

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19 Teaching at the 200-level in PWR

281 Basics: A Guide for Seasoned and New Instructors

First created by Candice Rai, 2014-21 PWR Director
Revised and updated by Stephanie Kerschbaum, PWR Director and Matthew Hitchman, 2024-25 281 Faculty Mentor

Brief Course History and Description

English 281 is an intermediate composition course that fills UW’s “Composition” general education requirement, and is capped at 23 students. (Note: We will be updating and revising the English 281 catalog description, hopefully in AY25-26, but it may be useful to know that historically, English 131 was numbered English 181. Decades ago, when English 111 and 121 were added to the curriculum, the course was re-numbered to 131. So 281 is a 200-level writing course version of English 131). In general, in approaching 281, we encourage instructors to look at the 100-level course outcomes and think about how to support their students in deepening their engagement with these outcomes beyond what might be expected in a 100-level course.

We hope/expect that students will have completed a 100-level or C requirement course prior to enrolling in a 200-level course but this doesn’t always happen, and if a student reaches junior or senior status and has not yet taken a “C” course, we encourage them to take a 200-level course instead of a 100-level course. (See more below under “Prerequisites”).

Designing a new course can be a lot of work, so we encourage you to draw on your experience teaching other writing courses as much as you can. While this is a 200-level course, you can and should bring in and adapt material from 100-level courses you have taught. It can be helpful to think about one or two major aspects of a previous course that you want to revise or update while otherwise replicating existing material so you are not creating everything from scratch.

Prerequisites

There is no prerequisite for 281. Many students will have completed an introductory composition course at UW or another institution, but some may not have. Consequently, we recommend that you consider including the following language in your syllabus and consider emailing that statement to enrolled students before the quarter begins.

While 281 has no formal prerequisite, you should know that it is an intermediate writing course. This means that students who enroll are expected to have some experience with college-level writing, including familiarity with genre, language and power, and writing as a process. We’ve found that students who take a 200-level writing course benefit from previous experience with composing in college, and in general, we encourage students to complete an introductory (100 level) writing course before enrolling in English 281.

Designing Intermediate Course Goals and Outcomes

As a 200-level PWR course, we encourage instructors to begin with the PWR 100-level course outcomes, but to design opportunities for students to engage more deeply or at a more sophisticated level with those outcomes. You might choose one of the outcomes, for instance, that you will lean in to or spend significant time supporting students with in your section, while not ignoring the other outcomes.

In addition to the 100-level outcomes, below are some suggested English 281 goals to consider adapting and/or adding to your syllabus:

To give students an awareness of how writing, rhetoric, and genre function.
To incorporate explicit attention to writing, rhetorical awareness and disciplinarity.
To help students understand the demands of particular writing situations, of performing in different genres, of how and why particular writing situations require specific rhetorical “moves.”

Assessment in English 281

PWR is committed to equitable assessment and student success. This means that all students should have the opportunity to succeed in any PWR class. As you identify goals and course outcomes for your class, you should also consider how your course assessment framework might account for a range of student incomes and performances.

Many instructors come to 281 after teaching 100-level classes in PWR, which all use a portfolio model. Portfolios are not required in English 281, and consequently, there is quite a bit more flexibility in course assignments, readings, and themes. It is important, however, that writing should remain the central, driving force in English 281, so you will want to provide opportunities for students to draft, workshop, get feedback from you, and revise (the Writing @UW website has some guidelines about designing a W course).

If you decide to use an assessment framework other than a portfolio, you will need to make some decisions about how assessment will be designed: how many assignments, how they will be weighted, how assignments will connect with course learning goals, and more. If you decide to design a new assessment framework, we encourage you to lean on and build from your experiences in teaching 100-level writing classes. The resources on the Writing@UW website On Grading Writing are highly recommended as you consider the approach you want to take.

Some instructors continue to use portfolio assessment in 281 and that is great! The reasons people choose to move away from portfolio assessment often have to do with how they want to scaffold assignments over the quarter or particular course design elements that don’t always work well with a portfolio. We are happy to consult or brainstorm as you think through the approach and assessment framework that will best fit your 281 course.

Other Details

Student conferencing continues to be a recommended practice. Please hold at least one 20-minute writing conference with every student each quarter.
As a composition course, the main focus of English 281 is writing, which we understand capaciously and as including multimodal genres and approaches to composing. We do not have a set expectation for the volume of writing, but students should be submitting writing on a weekly basis and getting a range of different kinds of feedback on that writing. Assignments can vary in length and complexity, and should include a mix of assignments, both formal and informal. Informal assignments should help scaffold or work toward completion of more formal assignments. For more guidance on writing and “W” classes, please see the guidance for Teaching W Courses offered on the Writing@UW website.
281 courses can be themed and include content readings but should also include readings and resources that support students’ writing practices, writing knowledges, and metacognition around writing.
The course is often taken by business and engineering majors, and some nursing students, but it is open to all students who would like to take a next-level composition course. Many 281 teachers build the course around a theme (e.g., vampires, popular culture, climate change, public rhetoric, or visual culture), but as with 100-level PWR courses, the theme needs to be in the service of writing. Some teachers have built their 281 course around the theme of disciplinarity, having students do research into their chosen discipline and then writing about and for that discipline. Others have done a genre-based approach, where students analyze academic or professional or public genres and then produce them.
While we can provide some example 281 syllabi on request, and there are some examples on the PWR Courses web page and in the PWR Instructor Archive, they vary widely according to instructor, pedagogical approach, and theme/emphasis.