Department of English

English 103: Rhetoric and Composition I

Fall 2019
Instructor: Ms. Elisa Klaassen
Meeting time/place: Mondays: Graham Hall 140; Wednesdays/Fridays: Reavis Hall 301
Office address/phone: Reavis Hall 314
Office hours: Wednesdays from 1:00PM—2:00PM, or by appointment as necessary
Email: eklaassen1@niu.edu
URL: https://webcourses.niu.edu
Course description and objectives:
The primary goal of this course is to help you become a better writer. Writing is a continual
process of thinking, discovering, learning, communicating, and reflecting. You will need these
skills to succeed as an engaged citizen of NIU and the world beyond. You have things to say and
voices with which to say them. You have much to contribute to the classroom conversations at
each class meeting. You also have a good knowledge of English that comes from many years of
use—speaking, reading, and writing.
English 103 offers you the occasion to explore the purposes, intents, and audiences of
expressive, informative, and persuasive writing, as well as the rhetoric of electronic
communication. The course provides the opportunity for you to become more conscious about
the strategies involved in shifting the focus between the writer, message, audience, style, and
medium. It asks you to become more sensitive to the ways all writing emerges from the
expressions of community and in turn influences the nature of community.
Finally, this course affords you the opportunity to become more aware of yourself as a writer by
creating an electronic portfolio. This portfolio is a collection of materials that you will select and
assemble to demonstrate the course competencies identified in the English 103 Outcomes.
Reflective writing both generates material for your portfolio and serves as the glue that holds
your portfolio together by showing how its pieces demonstrate course competencies.
Required texts:
Lunsford, Andrea and John Ruszkiewicz. Everything’s an Argument: Custom Northern Illinois University
Edition. Macmillan, 2019.
Khan-Cullors, Patrisse, Asha Bandele, and Angela Y. Davis. When They Call You a Terrorist: A Black Lives
Matter Memoir. Macmillan, 2018.

Course Requirements:
We learn to read and write better by reading and writing regularly. Consequently, this will be a
workshop course where we will write often. We will spend significant time not only on individual
writing, but also in small groups where we will work collaboratively, sharing and responding to one
another's writing. We will analyze and evaluate language, experiment with language, play with
language, and get very serious with language.
By the end of the semester, you will produce an electronic portfolio that demonstrates the
competencies identified in the English 103 Outcomes. Along the way, however, you will produce
a great deal of texts—notes, lists, scribbles, drafts, responses to drafts, and other reflective
pieces.
English 103: Rhetoric and Composition I 2

Evaluation:
The primary vehicle for evaluation in English 103 will be your electronic portfolio.
Summary of Graded Work:
Personal Narrative 1 5%
Personal Narrative 2 15%
Resume & Cover Letter 15%
Visual Analysis 15%
Persuasive Essay 20%
E-Portfolio 10%
Class/lab preparation and participation: 20%

This system of evaluation rewards you for timely, serious effort on daily assignments and in
workshop. It gives extra weight to your highest level of achievement near the end of the
semester. It does not penalize you for mistakes or experiments that go awry, as mishaps will
teach you how to produce a quality finished work. In fact, this system assumes that finished,
effective communication is often the end product of a very messy creation process in which you
take risks, follow false leads or trails, make lots of mistakes, and return anew to your writing
task. This system encourages you to engage in the recursive and sometimes chaotic process of
becoming a productive, confident, and fluent writer.
Early in the semester, we will arrive at an understanding of the standards by which our writing is
judged, both within the community of our class and within the larger public audience of readers.
The course assumes that your final revised essays will observe the conventions of grammar,
spelling, and punctuation of written academic American English. If you need extra support with
these conventions, I will help you. You may also seek writing assistance from the University
Writing Center, Stevenson South Lower Level, 753-6636.
Grading:
NIU has recently moved to a plus/minus grading system. The following scale will be used in
determining course grades:
A 93-100
A- 90-92
B+ 87-89
B 83-86
B- 80-82
C+ 77-79
C 70-76
D 60-69
Attendance/Participation:
Writing never occurs in a vacuum, but within the context of audience, and the immediate
audience for writing in this course is our class. This course requires a commitment to this
community, a commitment most obviously demonstrated by your presence, punctuality, and
engagement. Thus, your attendance and punctuality in class and lab are required (habitual
tardiness and/or unexcused absences will negatively affect your grade and may ultimately result
English 103: Rhetoric and Composition I 3

in failure for the course). Further, assignments not submitted on time may receive a lowered
grade. Please alert me to excused absences due to illness, medical emergency, family emergency,
or religious observance so that we can agree upon the submission of missed assignments.
Plagiarism:
The English Department has developed a formal policy concerning plagiarism to supplement the
University statement in the Undergraduate Catalog. This policy is available online at
http://www.engl.niu.edu/academics/composition/plag.shtml. Since plagiarism can jeopardize
your academic future, we will review the policy together early in the semester and discuss its
implications for us as writers.
Computer-Mediated Composition:
Class will meet once each week in a computer lab. Remember to back up your files in more
than one place to prevent inconvenience or even disaster.
You need to have your network LOGIN ID and password and your email account operational by
the end of the first week of class. Write your username and password down to be kept in a safe
place. You may use your own computer if you wish, or you may use the residence hall computer
labs or any of the general access labs on campus, but all writing assignments must be saved in a
format that is accessible in class on lab days. Unless you are otherwise instructed, all work
should be submitted both electronically and on paper.
Conferences:
We will schedule three required conferences during the semester (weeks 4, 10 and 13); you are
also encouraged to make an appointment or drop by during my office hours to discuss any aspect
of the course or your progress as a writer.
Accommodations:
If you need an accommodation for this class, please contact the Disability Resource Center as
soon as possible. The DRC coordinates accommodations for students with disabilities. It is
located on the 4th floor of the Health Services Building and can be reached at 815-753-1303
or drc@niu.edu.
Also, please contact me privately as soon as possible so we can discuss your accommodations.
Please note that you will not be required to disclose your disability—only your accommodations.
The sooner you let me know about your needs, the sooner I can assist you in achieving your
learning goals in this course.
Shameless Plug:
If you enjoy this class and find it useful, please consider taking additional English classes and/or
signing up for the major or minor in English. For additional information about these options,
please contact askenglish@niu.edu or come visit us in Reavis 216!
English 103: Rhetoric and Composition I 4

EAA = Everything’s an Argument

WTCYAT = When They Call You a Terrorist
Date  Reading Writing Products and
* Additional readings will be assigned – always check our course Deadlines
website for assignments*
Week 1
8/26
Week 2 WTCYAT 1-46 (Readings due on Fridays) Due Wed., Sep. 4:
9/2 Composition #1: Personal
(no class Mon.) Narrative
Week 3 WTCYAT 47-108 Due Fri., Sep. 13:
9/9 Composition #2: Personal
Narrative 2.0 (draft)
Week 4 WTCYAT 111-181 Due Fri., Sep. 20:
9/16 Composition #2: Personal
Narrative 2.0 (revision)
Week 5  WTCYAT 182-253
9/23
Week 6 EAA 391-412 (Multimodal) Due Fri., Oct. 4:
9/30 Composition #3:
Resume/Cover Letter (draft)
Week 7 EAA 33-58 (Pathos, Ethos) Due Fri., Oct. 11:
10/7 Composition #3:
Resume/Cover Letter
(revision)
Week 8 EAA 99-133 (Rhetorical Analysis)
10/14
Week 9 EAA 353-369 (Visual Rhetoric) Due Fri., Oct. 25:
10/21 Composition #4: Visual
Analysis (draft)

Week 10 Due Fri., Nov. 1:

10/28 Composition #4: Visual
Analysis (revision)
Week 11 EAA 59-79 (Logos); 81-98 (Fallacies)
11/4

Week 12 EAA 327-352 (Style in Arguments) Due Fri., Nov. 15:

11/11 Composition #5: Persuasive
Essay (draft)
Week 13 EAA 371-389 (Presenting Arguments) Due Fri., Nov. 22:
11/18 Composition #5: Persuasive
Essay (revision)

Week 14 Thanksgiving Due Fri., Nov. 29: E-

11/25 Portfolio Reflection (draft)
due Monday 11/25
Week 15   Due Fri., Dec. 6: E-Portfolio
12/2 Reflection (revision)
Week 16  Final Exams E-Portfolio final due
12/9