Projects and Assignments
Courses are comprised of projects, and projects are comprised of activities and assignments. These activities and assignments provide the scaffolding for the completion of the project as a whole.
For example, see the following project from Andy’s ENGL 1102 class. The final project is a collaboratively-produced website that curates instances of electronic literature. To accomplish that task—and to learn and practice outcomes in process, collaboration, critical thinking, argumentation, research, and multimodal composition—the project contains a number of assignments (twelve, in fact).
Project 2: Curated Electronic Literature Website – Project stages
Research and Planning
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- Mini-Reviews of Electronic Literature Blog Post (Individual)
- Annotated Bibliography Blog Post (Individual)
- Group Project Proposal and Collaboration Plan (Group)
Prototyping, Drafting, and Revising
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- Rough Website Wireframe and Critical Introduction Rough Draft (Group)
- Peer Review Message 1 (Individual)
- Website Working Draft 1, including Group Introduction (Group)
- Peer Review Message 2 (Group)
- Website Working Draft 2, including Group Introduction (Group)
- Peer Review Message 3 (Group)
- Website Final Draft (Group)
Reflection and Evaluation
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- Project 2 Collaboration Evaluation (Individual)
- Project 2 Reflection (Individual)
Note that the two blog posts are low-stakes assignments (quickly graded with check/check-plus/check-minus); only the project proposal/collaboration plan and website final are substantively graded. The drafts, peer review messages, collaboration evaluation, and reflection contribute toward a process grade—if students complete and submit all of the stages, they receive a certain number of points for the project.
Your projects and assignments don’t necessarily need to be as complex or as detailed as this particular example—but do consider how your 3-5 major projects are comprised of individual assignments that serve to support student understanding of process; scaffold and support student learning related to particular outcomes (e.g., use of evidence, research, etc.); and break down the project into feasible steps.
Considering the Project/Assignment Workload
While defining the amount of work in traditional, writing-based composition and technical communication courses is relatively straightforward, planning the amount of work is more challenging in a multimodal curriculum. When thinking about your course’s project workload, consider (a) the number of projects, (b) the drafting/processes/scaffolding of creating the work product, and (c) the time involved in creating the work product. All of these are factors in deciding what’s too little, too much, or just right.
All courses must require students to complete three to five discrete, major/substantive projects. (If, for example, you choose three rather than four or five, the three projects are necessarily more substantive.) For the purposes of your first semester, we recommend that ENGL instructors plan three major projects in addition to the Common First Week assignment and the end-of-semester Portfolio. We recommend that LMC 3403 instructors plan three or four major projects. LMC 3431/3432 instructors have set assignments for their courses, though you have leeway in exactly how those assignments are executed.
As you’re designing your projects, keep the following requirements in mind:
- Individual Project(s). At least one project should involve an individually authored final product.
- Collaborative Project(s). At least one project should involve a collaboratively authored final product.
- Rhetorical Situations. Each project should have a clearly-defined rhetorical situation that is communicated to students, particularly an explicit purpose and audience.
- Process. Attention to the recursive processes of composing (regardless of mode) is critical. These processes include critical thinking, planning, brainstorming, mapping, drafting, translating, transforming, designing, self-assessing, peer reviewing, expert assessing, revising, editing, publishing, disseminating, reflecting. Every project must involve multiple drafts, stages, or subparts.
- Substantial Prose Artifact. Every student must produce at least one substantively prose artifact in ENGL 1102 and LMC 3403—polished and public facing (or of a quality to be public facing). In English 1102, the prose artifact needs to make a sustained argument. Such projects necessarily include visual elements in the design of the information and, optionally, embedded visual/graphic elements.
- Writing Everywhere. Every project must involve writing during one or more phases of the project (in the planning, in the final artifact, and/or in the reflection)—even those projects that are largely oral or visual. All the modes are equal, but writing is more equal than the others.
- Reflection. Build reflection activities into your projects—make it a part of the project process.