Class information

ENG 101 – Composition I

29 students

English Composition is the standard freshman writing course. The course introduces students to academic writing. By its conclusion, students will be ready for English 201 and for the writing they will be asked to do in advanced courses across the curriculum. Students completing ENG 101 will have mastered the fundamentals of college-level reading and writing, including developing a thesis-driven response to the writing of others and following the basic conventions of citation and documentation. They will have practiced what Mike Rose calls the “habits of mind” necessary for success in college and in the larger world: summarizing, classifying, comparing, contrasting, and analyzing. Students will be introduced to basic research methods and MLA documentation and complete a research project. Students are required to take a departmental final exam that requires the composition of a 500-word thesis-driven essay comparing two essays.

Project overview

My project is a several-weeks long intervention that begins with an in-person group scavenger hunt that relates to the various student services around the BMCC campus. After the scavenger hunt, students design interactive presentations for other students in the class, centered on one service they investigated in more depth from the initial three, and then each student writes an informative-narrative hybrid essay which details their experiences.

Why did you select this project? How does it relate to identity and purpose?

This project grew out of a need I saw among my students, many of whom have extreme obstacles in pursuing their educational goals, but who often feel that they must “figure it out” on their own, when obstacles arise. I’ve found myself often referring students to various offices when they are at the end of their rope and have already fallen into difficult circumstances in their classes, due to a lack of connection to support services that would actually help them succeed. In addition, I found that students, especially after lockdown, have suffered from a lack of social connection and ability to interact with their classmates, who can become another source of support for them. At the same time, the presentation and essays they must compose build their skills in analysis, persuasive writing, and writing for an audience, which are goals of the composition sequence.

What advice do you have for other faculty who would like to implement a similar project?

I was in the lucky position to teach two Express sections of English 101 this semester, so I got to try this out on the first express section in the first seven weeks and then try it again for the second group. It was effective in both groups, I think, but I was able to hone my materials to better help students to understand my expectations for the presentations. The first express section, almost without fail, defaulted to the stale model of presentations, “playing it safe,” and producing somewhat dull presentations, while I spent more time really talking through what the expectations were in the second group, and less people played it safe (though some still did), and those who put the most planning and thought into making their presentation interactive got the best results from students who voted for them at the end of class.

There were the usual difficulties of group work, and I would highly suggest that you allocate ample time in class for groups to meet and start their work and that you encourage students to exchange information. Most groups did not use the Blackboard-based tools for the class, even though this was a hybrid class, so having their own means to communicate outside class was most helpful to the students, and also, I think, allowed for the building of community and belonging. I had students, after the scavenger hunt activities were over, who continued to hang out outside class and texted each other with questions and support about other assignments.

Related materials

https://abiseminaralums.commons.gc.cuny.edu/wp-content/blogs.dir/17838/files/2023/12/prompt-for-Essay1.-fall-2023.pdf, https://abiseminaralums.commons.gc.cuny.edu/wp-content/blogs.dir/17838/files/2023/12/Locations-to-Visit.docx, https://abiseminaralums.commons.gc.cuny.edu/wp-content/blogs.dir/17838/files/2023/12/Course-Companion-Group-Steps.-Scavenger-Hunt-and-Presenation.pdf

Locations to Visit I created a list of most important student services at BMCC, with their websites attached. I distributed this as a survey before the hunt began. I then cut a copy into strips and put them into a hat, and the student groups picked out three that they would be assigned to visit. I weighted the choices so that there would be double the number from the first page of the survey compared to the second page, so that students would be more likely to grab the more key services. Once they had their locations, they had to use the websites to research where the offices were and plan their trip around campus (we have three buildings to navigate in TriBeCa). This game element made the mood light and fun, and I offered prizes for the groups who did the best job on their hunts (I bought BMCC emblazoned folders at the college bookstore). I gave this same survey at the end of the semester, with room for come commentary from students on the experience. I would ultimately like to use these pre- and post- surveys to assess the effectiveness of the intervention.

Course Companion Group Steps After students returned from the hunt (I gave them about an hour, and all groups were able to return in time), we discussed the presentations they would begin to work on, and I introduced them to the Course Companion Groups on Blackboard, where they had a space to share group materials to help form their presentations. This prompt also details what I expect from a presentation, which is not just them running through a PowerPoint or reading from their notes, but allowing students to interact actively with the materials–more like teaching than presenting.

Prompt for Essay 1 After the presentations were done, each student needed to compose their own individual essay that followed the guidelines in the prompt. One of the key community-building aspects of writing the essay is that I expected them to attend, pay attention to, and details what two OTHER groups did in their presentations, not just in their own, which helped tremendously in getting class participation in the presentations. I also had groups vote for the best quality presentations at the end of that class period, and I awarded the folder prizes to the two groups who got the most votes. Reflecting on what made for a quality presentation seemed to be a side benefit of this project, as they could themselves see the difference between presentations that only offered information without interaction, or those that offered only interaction without information.