9 Sample Lesson Plans and Ideas
Class Activities
The following are sample class activities that can be used across the 100-level courses. These activities and many more are available in the PWR Teaching Materials Archive. To find the following activities either click on the link or search the title of the activity in the archive. Brief framing is provided for each activity.
- Building a claim_Telephone Activity: This ‘Telephone Activity’ helps students build complex claims in a collaborative manner. Students work as a group to create a part of the claim and then pass the worksheet to the left for the next group to continue working on the claim. The purpose of this worksheet is to break down the process of writing a complex claim.
- Rhetorical analysis mad-lib activity (framing from Laurel Wilkinson): This class activity consists of lecture slides and an in-class worksheet/handout. I adapted this activity from an article that provides a template for instructors to teach rhetorical analysis and close reading while simultaneously enacting anti-racist pedagogy and praxis by encouraging students to confront their biases, whether conscious or unconscious. In the original activity, students are given a “mad-lib” version of a paragraph of the instructor’s choosing that contains blanks, or missing words. Students are asked to fill in the blanks individually, using their rhetorical awareness to match what they perceive to be the tone/intention of the paragraph. Then, they discuss their answers with a partner, and are asked to articulate the rationale for their decisions. After coming to a consensus as a group, the partners share their answers in a full-class discussion. Finally, the instructor reveals the “correct” answers and leads a discussion exploring how context affects diction/word choice and the ways in which our words express subtle but powerful information about our biases, assumptions, and values.
- Rhetorical Situation Swap for Teaching Reading (framing from Niccolo Bechtler): In the activity, I ask students first to explain a few thoughts on the differences between the two types of reviews in a Polleverywhere, to make sure everyone can feel comfortable sharing. Then, I ask students to work in their small groups and perform a rhetorical situation swap on the two subgenres of review. First, they find a passage of a groupmate’s chosen popular review that addresses the central claim of that review, and they adapt it into the style of a more academic review. Then, they do the same for the “Tracy Austin” review, switching a key passage into the rhetorical situation of a popular review. I provide examples of each type of rhetorical situation swap. Finally, I ask students to write a short “Ticket to Leave” in their notes, where they consider the rhetorical effects of the two subgenres of review, before handing the ticket to me as they leave.
Assignments
The following are two assignment sequences previous PWR instructors have used in their classes and shared with the PWR team. The first originated in English 182, multimodal composition, and the second originated in English 131, but both could be adapted for a variety of PWR courses. These assignments might pair well with the above class activities. For instance, the “Multimodal Social Campaign” assignment would pair well with the “Building a Claim_Telephone Activity” whereas the “Rhetorical Analysis (SA2)” would pair well with the “Rhetorical Situation Swap.”
Sequence #1:
Sequence #2 (from TJ Walker):
Portfolio Sequence
This blog post, “11 Resources for Teaching the Portfolio Sequence” shares out a set of ideas generated by the 2021-22 team of PWR Assistant Directors: Francesca Colonnese, Alycia Gilbert, Missy González-Garduño, Anselma Prihandita, and Joe Wilson. The post is chock full of ideas to help you and your students pursue our 100-level course outcome of recursive, collaborative revision in meaningful ways (outcome 4).