Angela Morales

English 189/Notes

Friday

March 25

Class Overview:

Students worked in the lab today. They began composing their paragraphs on “Spending a Day with a Celebrity.” Yesterday students composed their outlines in class, so today they worked directly from their outlines and began writing. Chris gave them a model outline/paragraph to study. The sample outline “Spend a Day with Martha Stewart” is written out with three supporting reasons (underlined) and three details to support each reason (highlighted in a white box). Also, transitions are clearly emphasized in bright blue. At the end of class, Chris asked students to print their final version and proofread with a pencil on the printed page.

Comments:

Students seem to know how to compose a paragraph very efficiently. With the models and the outline templates, students can work very nicely on their own with minimal instruction. Most students in the class appear to be well-focused and determined to write as much as possible. Now that students know that their instructor will select the five or six best paragraphs and post them on the class website, I’m sure they are even more motivated to write even better paragraphs than they did last time. The Web CT software can really allow for teachers to exchange information with their students. Also, the software, if used in this manner, can encourage a healthy competition that allows students to understand their progress in relation to the rest of the class.