Literacy-Narrative-Assignment-Fall-2019
For this assignment draw on your on your own experiences with speaking, reading and writing and reflect on how these experiences have shaped your current verbal and written language practices. Try to focus on one specific experience, situation, or event in your past, whether inside or outside a classroom, and explore how it has affected your learning methods and practices today.Use your memory and your senses to describe specific, concrete details.
You may build on the writing you have already done on the class readings (Tan’s “Mother Tongue” or the James Baldwin essay) or start from scratch. Either way, keep the key features of a literacy narrative (that we reviewed in class from Norton’s Field Guide to Writing) in mind as you write: https://wwnorton.com/college/english/write/fieldguide/writing_guides.asp#06
This assignment, the literacy narrative, is a personalessay; you are being asked to write about yourexperience. Narrative refers to story-telling, and literacy refers to your ability to understand, interpret, and communicate in a particular context such as reading and writing. So, be sure that you write about specific experiences, events, and situations.
Final Draft of about 800 words is due on Monday, Sept 23. (You will be asked to upload the final draft on OpenLab as part of your English 1101 Portfolio)
The final draft will be graded the following criteria:
- Use of concrete, specific details to support claims and statements,
- Thoughtfulness of ideas
- Clarity of organization (the order in which ideas are expressed)
- How carefully the assignment has been proofread
- How timely the assignment has been handed in
Some General Essay Requirements (for the final draft):
- Paper length: ~800 words (~3-4 pages double-spaced)
- DO use the first-person pronoun “I” in your essay
- Give your essay a unique title. Hint: trying to come up with a title can help you clarify your main idea
- Do not use or cite any other secondary sources (unless you want to refer to something in one of our class readings). Do not use the www. to find an opinion, statistic, or fact. Do not use the Internet to think for you.
- Note: if you do choose to cite something from one of the readings (not required for this assignment, but only if you do), be sure to say where it came from. We’ll talk about in-text citations and accurate documentation later in the semester, but do remember to give the author credit by saying his/her/their name for now.
- Paper format: Use MLA guidelines for paper formatting (double-spaced, 1-inch margins, etc.)
