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Pittsburg State University
1701 South Broadway
Pittsburg KS 66762
Don Judd
WAC Coordinator
English
Phone: (620) 235-4697
Kathleen De Grave
Assistant WAC Coordinator
English
Phone: (620) 235-4705
Cynthia Woodburn
Assistant WAC Coordinator
Mathematics
Phone: (620) 235-4490
Bruce Shields
WAC Graduate Assistant
English
Phone: (620) 235-4686
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How do I write a syllabus for a WL course?
A WL syllabus will, like any other syllabus, give the rationale for the course,
name the texts, and outline overall expectations. However, for a WL course there
are two specific differences in the syllabus and then several general
considerations for you to think about. The specific differences are
that the WL syllabus must have a "Statement of Intent" and a "Philosophy
of Writing." These statements give continuity from one WL course to another,
making it easy for a student to recognize that a particular course is WL, and
they emphasize that any given WL course is part of a larger program.
The Statement of Intent explains how you will use writing in your course.
The Philosophy of Writing explains why you are structuring your course the
way you are and why you are giving particular kinds of writing assignments.
Follow these links to see samples of the two statements and to practice
writing statements of your own:
Some general considerations in writing a WL syllabus include
- how the writing component will affect how you teach the course
- how writing affects your grading scale as a whole
- how other WL concepts, such as small group work and rough drafts,
will be integrated into your course structure.
See below for ideas on each of the issues that should be addressed in your
WL syllabus.
Sample WL Syllabi
The following syllabi can give you an overall impression of what a WL syllabus
looks like in different disciplines.
General Considerations
As you read the following discussions, you might want to look
at those sections of the sample syllabi above.
Other items you may want to include in your syllabus
include
Your students need to know how you will grade their writing.
If you will be asking for different kinds of writing, you should
specify which criteria apply to which assignments. For instance,
if you assign a journal
or idea notebook, will you be counting off for mechanical errors? What kinds
of thinking will earn an A in this informal kind of writing? Are you looking
for risk-taking or for the ability to summarize what students read? If you
assign a formal essay, will mechanics count there? Will you expect
organization and development? Each teacher has to decide for him or
herself what the criteria are for the different kinds of writing
assignments given in that class, and those criteria must be
communicated clearly to the students. Including a short version of
the criteria on the syllabus helps the students see what to expect
and can get them on the right track from the start.
WL courses are often structured differently from larger lecture courses,
and your
syllabus should reflect those differences. Are you using small
groups? Will
students be expected to participate in discussions? Will there be
short in-class writing?
Are you going to ask your students to write a longer, more
formal report?
If you describe the activities students will be asked to participate
in, they will be better prepared when the time comes.
To help students see how writing will be integrated into your course, you should
specify how much the writing affects the final course grade.
What portion of the
final grade will come from individual kinds of assignments?
If you are assigning
a journal, will that be 10% of the final grade? 15%?
If you use a point system,
how many points will the journal be worth? If you assign short
writes, do their
grades add up to 20% of the final grade? By assigning weights to different
writing tasks, you are indicating their relative importance in your course. Most
WL instructors have decided that writing should count for at least 25 to 30% of
the final course grade, while some have integrated writing so thoroughly into
their courses that the writing grades cannot be separated out.
Because students in WL courses do a lot of writing, it will be practical for you to
come up with a policy on whether you will accept late papers, and if so, what the
penalties will be. Without such a structure, some students will put off doing the
writing assignments until the end of the semester. For many WL faculty, in-class
writing cannot be handed in late at all (it is a way to ensure that students come to
class, on time). More complex writing assignments might have grade reductions
based on how late they are. If your policy is stated in the syllabus, students
cannot say that they were unaware of the time requirements.
Students need to plan their semester, based on the requirements of each
course they are taking. If you can give your students a sense of how
much writing they will be doing in your WL course, they can make more
informed choices about how and when to attack major projects. For
instance, writing three formal essays, of about five pages each, will
require a different kind of time commitment than writing one formal
essay of ten pages. If you pick up journals every other week, that
means students will need to keep the journal up-to-date more regularly
than if you pick it up just once, at the end of the semester. If you
intend for your students to do in-class writing twice a week, they
should be told that up front. If short writes are more irregularly
assigned, you could say that students will be doing this kind of
writing "frequently."
The syllabus is the best place to give students a sense of the kinds of
writing they will be doing in your course, so that they can prepare
themselves mentally as class begins. A
research paper
will require a different kind of mental preparation than a group writing
task or a series of informal response papers. You don't have to go into
great detail on each assignment, but do name the writing tasks your students
will be asked to complete, with brief descriptions
Good writing is a process. If you can intervene in the process, your
students' writing will be better. One way to encourage your students
to revise their essays before handing them in for a grade is to ask
them to hand in a
rough draft.
The syllabus can state that a rough draft is required or that a draft is encouraged.
If you give credit for a student having a draft on time (say on a "rough draft day"),
that should be stated as well. You might also explain what a rough draft entails for
your course (just how rough "rough" is).
One of the best ways to help students write well is to speak to each student
individually about a specific writing project. The dialogue initiated in a
personal conference can go a long way toward clearing up confusions on both
sides, and students have a chance to play with their ideas in a productive
way while you provide immediate feedback. Some teachers offer conferences
on a voluntary basis; others require them. Some encourage students to come
to a conference by offering extra credit. Most WL faculty have discovered
that the
personal conference
has a direct positive effect on the quality of the final paper the student
turns in. Your conference policy can include expectations, such as that
the student give you a rough draft before the conference time and that the
student come with specific questions to discuss.
WL courses typically involve much student participation, both orally and
in writing. For this reason, attendance is important. Your syllabus
should specify the expectations for attendance and name the penalties
for missing class. Many WL faculty allow three or four misses a semester
without penalty but state that they will drop a student from the course
if a certain number of classes are missed. If you wish to give special
consideration for particular circumstances, you can mention that, also.
It is safer to write your policy on plagiarism right into the syllabus than
to wait until an incident occurs. Because of the ease with which students
can access essays on the web, plagiarism is a persistent problem in classes
that involve writing, so you might want to be proactive about it.
See your departmental policies on plagiarism (and the university statement).
Go to
How Can I Prevent Plagiarism below for policy ideas.
Good writers go to the
Writing Center. If you can encourage your students to make use of this valuable resource,
the essays you read as the semester goes on will be better. Your syllabus
can explain where the Center is (114 Grubbs Hall) and how it works
(free peer tutors). If certain students have serious problems with
writing (whether mechanical, organizational, or in idea development),
you can require that they use the Writing Center and have a notice sent
to you that they went.
From the WAC Web Page, students can access a grammar handbook,
suggestions on how to write particular kinds of papers, and
ideas on using outside sources. To encourage students to use
this page as a writing resource, include the url on your syllabus:
www.pittstate.edu/wac
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