Courses

After being hired by the Writing Department at UCSB as a graduate student to teach first-year composition and rhetoric classes, I, along with my new colleagues, went through a rigorous semester-long training seminar, covering a range of topics from pedagogy to rhetorical analysis to the writing process. It exposed me to many new ways of thinking about teaching and here I list some of the posts relevant to teaching writing. The primary audience is other instructors, but I’ve assigned them for my students to read in the past as well.

Academic Writing – First-Year Composition and Rhetoric

A first-year composition course that focuses on genre-based analysis and rhetorical awareness. It is designed to develop research skills and the processes of drafting, peer-review, and revising.

Habits of Mind

• Good Writing Is Not a Gift (It’s a Skill)
• Genre Analysis (News)
• Rhetorical Analysis (Audience)

Research & Writing Skills

• How to Find a Scholarly Source…and What to Do When You Actually Find One
• What Does a Thesis Statement ‘Look’ Like – Thesis as Metaphor
• Scholarly Writing: The Genre Scramble and the Genre Jigsaw

Concept Map

• Concept Mapping My Academic Writing Course

[For Instructors in Other Disciplines]

• Teaching Writing When You Don’t (Want to) Teach Writing
• Should We Abolish Page-Lengths When Assigning Student Papers?

My Teaching Philosophy

I firmly believe that writing is the foundation for all academic disciplines and integral to the development of critical thinking skills. Thus, through the study of writing and the consistent practice in writing, my objective is to help students cultivate communication skills that emphasize the evaluation of evidence, the examination of assumptions, and the discernment of hidden values. This is primarily accomplished through an active, student-centered learning environment.