ENG2575 Technical Writing, Section OL70, Fall 2020

I hope that you all are doing well physically and mentally. It’s a tough time of year even before the pandemic, but I think it can be even more so given how things are now.

I wanted to give you all a gentle reminder that everything in our class is due by the end of the day on Monday, Dec. 21.

It’s important to give me something for all of the assignments even if might be incomplete or not your best work.

That said, I don’t want anyone to feel compelled to plagiarize or copy the work of others without proper citation just to get an assignment turned in. As I’ve discussed in lecture, it’s important to engage the words and ideas of others, but we have to do so ethically and give credit where credit is due. This is why the professional style that we use–APA–is so important. It gives us a system for quoting the words and ideas of others and giving them credit for their writing that we discuss and engage in our own writing. This page on the Purdue OWL website answers a lot of questions about plagiarism. You can also email me if you have any questions about plagiarism.

My overall advice at this point in the semester is to keep your eye on the prize, see the class and your team project through to completion, and reach out to me if you have any questions leading up the final deadline of Monday, Dec. 21.

Good luck!

• If you have any questions about the class or assignments, reach out to me by email at jellis at citytech.cuny.edu. We can talk over email, or we can make an appointment for office hours.
• Please fill out the Student Evaluation of Teaching (SET) for our class! You can find this in your school email (if you don’t see it, check your spam folder). In particular, your comments, which are anonymous, are very helpful.
• Check your grades. As I’ve discussed in past lectures, you can check your project grades and read my feedback by clicking on “Check My Grades” on the left side of our OpenLab site. If you don’t see a grade for one of your major projects, you should send me an email. Also, you can go into our Site’s Dashboard > Comments to check some of your weekly writing assignments.
• I want you all to know that your collaborative project is difficult even in the best of circumstances when we were holding in-person classes. Now, those challenges are compounded even more with distance learning. As you all work to complete these final projects, please keep these things in mind:
  • Be kind and understanding to one another. Work things out as a team as much as possible. However, you can loop me in at any point if it’s big issue or something that you cannot find a way to resolve. I want to help you as much as possible, but I also want to give your team the space to discover solutions, too.
  • Maintain good communication channels. Don’t go silent.
  • Work out responsibilities within your team. Be aware that depending on circumstances, you might have to shift or adjust these.
  • Do your best. I know you all have terrific affordances (skills and knowledge) and realistic constraints (time, energy, and resources). Do the best that you can by finding the middle way between your affordances and constraints.
• Be well, stay safe, and have a strong finish to the semester!

As discussed in the Week 12 lecture, your team needs to quickly choose a topic and begin working together to do the research and writing of your analytical research report. As I discuss in the lecture, this is a secondary research report, meaning it is based on research that you find done by others. You are not required to perform primary research or building/testing your topic on your own. This is the foundation for the rest of your collaborative project, which also includes a presentation, a website, and report on collaboration. I will discuss these latter parts next week.

With your analytical research report problem/topic identified, you can begin researching it with the library’s databases and books, periodicals like the New York Times, and the World Wide Web.

Evaluate and vet your sources so that you can account for their veracity, accuracy, credibility, etc.

To get started with writing your report together, check out this week’s Weekly Writing Assignment and the lecture. You will need the following outline:

Introduction (topic and why your report is important)

Objectives of the research (what were you attempting to do?)

Method (methodology–what kinds of research did you do, how did you do it, and why is the research sound?)

Results (what did you find in your research? facts, quotes, figures, interviews, surveys, etc.)

Discussion (how do you interpret your results? what story does your data tell us? results and discussion can be combined, but title this section appropriately if you do so)

Conclusions (what conclusions do you draw from your results and discussion? what is the significance of what you discovered?)

Recommendations (what do you think should be done to solve the research problem based on your research? this section is what all of your work is leading up to.)

Also, here are some resources and examples that I discussed in this week’s lecture to help you with writing and designing your analytical research report.

• Doodle (for finding meeting times for your team)
• Explanations of report parts (look under Primary Research Report, but remember you are writing a secondary research report)
• Example Student Research Report on Solar Panel Manufacturing and Waste
• Example Student Research Report on 5G
• Sample Research Report (note the layout and design)

While you are finishing up your last individual project in the class, we are moving ahead to begin the team-based collaborative projects in the class.

Think of each of the following projects as part of an interconnected larger project. Each team member should contribute to each part, but individual team members may take the lead on one part versus the others depending on their skill set and interests. For example, one team member may take the lead on the research report and collect contributions from the other team members for the first draft, and another team member may take the lead on the presentation or the website.

These are the parts of the collaborative project from the syllabus:

• Collaborative: 4000-6000-Word Analytical Research Report, 20%
• Each team member contributes 1000-1500-word contribution to a 4000-6000-word analytical research report on a scientific or technological problem that demonstrates: 1) knowledge of the history and context of the problem, 2) knowledge of the causes and nature of the problem, 3) ideas for solving the problem, 4) the ability to explain the problem and offer possible solutions to a general audience, 5) the ability to integrate written work with the written work of a partner or partners in a coherent report, and 6) knowledge of proper research report format. At least six library-sourced citations must be included (non-library-sourced citations are encouraged, but they do not count toward the six library-sourced sources). Any outside sources cited should be documented according to APA format.
• Collaborative: Seven-to-Ten-Minute Oral Analytical Research Report on a Scientific or Technological Problem, 10%
  • The goal of this part of the project is to transform your written report into an spoken presentation anchored by a PowerPoint or other visual presentation supplement. As a team, adapt and present your analytical research report as an oral presentation that demonstrates: 1) knowledge of oral presentation techniques and conventions, 2) the ability to organize a presentation effectively, 3) the ability to incorporate various media into the presentation, including appropriate computer software, 4) awareness of audience, 5) the ability to communicate the value of the product or service in clear spoken English, 6) the ability to answer audience questions, 7) the ability to collaborate productively with a partner or partners, and 8) the ability to explain the problem and offer possible solutions to a general audience.
• Collaborative: Website Advertising a Product or Service Responding to the Analytical Research Report and Oral Presentation, 10%
  • The goal of this part of the collaborative project is to imagine a service or product that your team can offer that is related to your research report and oral presentation, both of which will be featured on the website in some way. The website should demonstrate: 1) knowledge of the product or service offered, of pertinent market forces, and of the potential customer base, 2) basic knowledge of web page design and composition, including appropriate software. The website will be based on your presentation and it is encouraged to be integrated into your presentation (perhaps to demonstrate how your team is promoting your product or service). All graphics, logos, design, and text must be created by your team.
• Collaborative: 500-Word Report on Collaboration, 10%
  • During the collaborative project, the team as a whole needs to track and document their progress, challenges, and successes, and each individual delegated responsibilities needs to keep track of what they contribute to the project. As the last component of the collaborative project, write a brief report of 500-750 words reflecting on how the team worked together and what each individual team member contributed to the overall effort. Each team should submit only one report.

Another way to consider these interconnected projects is through the following illustration:

The main part of the collaborative project is the research report. It anchors everything else. It should be completed first and adapted or transformed for use in the other deliverables: the website and the presentation. The report, website, and presentation will be submitted on our OpenLab Course Site. Also, throughout the project, the team should keep track of the work that each person does and compile that into a reflection report that will be submitted via email to me after your collaborative project is completed.

To distribute the workload better, you will work in a new team of five or six persons. These teams are randomly assigned using a number list that I generated on random.org.

For your reference, I am including the teams below. I will get in touch with each team via email for this week’s weekly writing assignment.

Remember, don’t confuse these teams with your peer review teams on the first three projects in the course. If you are still working on individual projects and need peer review feedback, you should give and receive it with your peer review teams that you’ve already been working with.

Separately, you will begin working with this new team on the collaborative projects. There may be some overlap between your peer review team and the new collaborative teams–this was just by chance and not by design. In addition to reaching out to you by email, I will detail how I would like you to begin the project together in this week’s Weekly Writing Assignment, which I will post soon.

And, make sure that you all watch this week’s lecture and listen carefully to the details that I provide about the collaborative project.

Team 1
Barbu L.
Tan
Arias
Romanowski
Clarke
Beauge

Team 2
Requena
Dominique
Barbu T.
Anny
Anika

Team 3
Abdulla
Persaud
Ferreira
Patterson
Htut

Team 4
Andiappen
Cifuentes
Chan
Pritom
BK

Team 5
Adeyemi
Campbell
Su
Lin
Bah

While we will be moving ahead to the final, collaborative projects in the class this week, I wanted to go ahead and provide you with instructions for submitting your 1500-2000-Word Instructional Manual.

Since we are running a week behind on the syllabus, your instructional manual is now due by Nov. 11. If anyone needs additional time, reach out to me at jellis at citytech.cuny.edu and let me know how much more time you need to complete the project.

To submit your Instructional Manual, please do the following (which I will also discuss in this week’s lecture).

First, you need to publish your Instructional Manual to the Web from inside Google Docs. This is a great feature of Google Docs that I wanted to make you all familiar with. Essentially, it allows you to quickly publish content on the World Wide Web from Google Drive (Docs, Sheets, and Present). To do this, follow these steps:

After opening your instructional manual in Google Docs, click on File > Publish to the web as shown below.

Then, click “Publish.”

Next, click “Ok.”

Finally, copy the link to your now published instructional manual and click the “x” in the upper right corner to return to Google Docs.

That completes the first half of this process.

The next phase is creating a post on our OpenLab Course Site that includes the link that you just copied. To do this, open another tab in your web browser and go to our OpenLab Course Site. Then, click the “+” icon to create a new post as shown below.

Then, add a check next to “1500-Word Instructional Manual.”

Then, type in a title for your post that includes your name and a descriptive title, such as “Jason Ellis’s Instruction Manual for Assembling a Skateboard.”

Next, add a sentence into the body of your post describing your project, such as “For this project, I created an instruction manual for assembling a skateboard.”

Then, highlight the part of your sentence that corresponds with “an instructional manual for [your topic].”

Next, click the icon above the text that looks like three chain links, paste your link into the box that appears, and click the “Enter” or “Return” line-and-arrow icon to the right of the link as shown below.

After reading over everything and correcting as needed, click the “Publish” button in the upper right corner of the page.

And, click “Publish” again to confirm.

To see if your post is live, click on the title of our OpenLab Course Site in the center of the page, click on down carrot next to Student Work in the left menu, and then click on “1500-Word Instruction Manual.” Yours should be at the top of the posts that appears.

Individual: 1500-2000-Word Instructional or Training Manual, 15%
Individually, you will write a 1500-2000-word instructional or training manual that demonstrates: 1. ability to explain a task/process in clear, concise language. selection and definition of appropriate terminology and concepts. 3. awareness of the intended user/audience. 4. knowledge of instructional manual format. All diagrams, illustrations, or photos must be created by the student and integrated into his or her manual. Any outside sources cited should be documented according to APA format.

Since we modified the schedule and pushed things back a week, this project will now be due by the end of Week 11 (Nov 4-Nov 11). Originally, this was due during Week 10 according to the syllabus.

Instructional or Training Manual

• For our purposes, we will say instructional manuals are external facing, meaning they are meant for end users, customers, or clients.
• Training manuals are internal facing documents, meaning they are meant for employees, contractors, and colleagues.
• You choose your audience (internal or external).
• Its word count should be 1500-2000 words.
• Combine words with pictures, illustrations (drawings), and/or screenshots. Any images that you use must be created by you or taken by you.
• Clearly define the purpose of your manual. What does it teach? What does it help a person do? What task or tasks does it help someone complete in a straightforward and easy manner?
• Telling versus showing. Always aim for showing, but provide the telling as context, clarification, and additional information.
• Use the body of your document for writing, steps, etc. Don’t be afraid to include text boxes and end notes.
• Provide a cover sheet, table of contents, introduction/purpose, and glossary of important terms. It can be as few or as many pages as needed.
• Be consistent with your explanations and learn from similar kinds of manuals about what terms you should be using to explain how to do something (e.g., tapping, pressing, clicking, holding, dragging, typing, etc.).

Let’s look at some examples (using Google, enter terms including “instructions,” “user manual or guide,” and “filetype:pdf” modifier to find others).

• Chemical Safety Manual for Small Businesses (telling)
• IKEA Billy Bookcase (showing)
• LEGO Instructions (listing of Millennium Falcon sets) (showing)
• Training Express’ Windows 98 Level I Training (telling and showing)
• Beats Studio Quick Start Guide (telling and showing)
• Official User Guide to Mint Linux (telling and showing)
• Suse Raspberry Pi Quick Start (telling and showing)

Find your own examples for ideas and inspiration. The reading for this section of the class has to do with your own research into what instruction manuals look like.

Think about what you know enough about that you can teach it to someone else and it is something that you want to include in your professional portfolio.

Of course, choose a task or process that you have realistic access to the hardware, software, etc. that you will need for creating your instruction manual.

As you write and revise your instructions, you will want to test them with the intended audience to ensure that they are correct and easy to understand. Obtaining user feedback ensures that your instructions work, but if they don’t, you can use feedback to revise your instructions accordingly.

Look at this week’s weekly writing assignment to begin the brainstorming and initial research for your instruction manual.

Now that you’ve had an extra week to catch up on the Expanded Definition project and perform peer review, this week I will show you how to submit your final draft to our OpenLab Course Site, which you should do before next Wednesday’s lecture (Oct. 21).

As noted previously, your document should resemble this model with headings for each section. Please remember that the bracketed information should not appear in your final document–it’s only for explanation from me to you.

Your Name's Expanded Definition of YOUR TERM

TO: Prof. Jason Ellis
FROM: Your Name
DATE: Due Date
SUBJECT: Expanded Definition of YOUR TERM

Introduction [Heading Level 2]
What is the purpose of this document? What term are you defining? How are you discussing the way it is defined and the way it is used in context? Describe a road map for what follows (definitions and context). This content should be published as paragraphs, unlike the heading for this section, which is a level 2 heading.

Definitions [Heading Level 2]
Quote several definitions of the term that you selected. Provide quotes and parenthetical citations for each definition, and include your sources in the References section at the end of the document. Each definition that you include deserves discussion in your words about what it means and how it relates to the other definitions that you include. Consider how they are alike, how are they different, who might use one versus another, etc.

Context [Heading Level 2]
Quote several sentences from a variety of sources that use the term in context. A range of sources would provide the best source material for your discussion of how the term is used in these contexts. For example, a quote from an academic journal or two, a quote from a newspaper or magazine, a quote from a blog, and a quote from social media would give you a range of uses that might have different audiences. For each quote, you should devote at least as much space as the quote discussing what it means in that context and how it relates to the other quotes in context. Each quote should be in quotes, have a parenthetical citation, and a bibliographic entry in your references at the end of your document.

Working Definition [Heading Level 2]
Based on the definitions that you quoted and discussed, and the contextual uses of the term that you quoted and discussed, write a working definition of the term that's relevant to your career field or major, which you will need to identify (this is the specific context for your working definition).

References [Heading Level 2]
Order your APA-formatted bibliographic references by the author's last name, alphabetically. In your posted version, they do not need a hanging indent. And, they should not be in a bulleted list.

For APA citations, refer to the Purdue OWL’s APA guide and if you do any indirect quotes, use this guide on the Simon Fraser Library’s website.

To turn in your work, you will create a new post on our OpenLab site as you did for the 500-Word Summary project. The steps below should get you started.

If you have questions about posting, please email me at jellis at citytech.cuny.edu.

Refer to this week’s lecture for more details on how to post your 500-Word Summary project to our OpenLab Course Site.

Below, I am including some screenshots to guide you through the process of creating a post for your 500-Word Summary.

To begin your own Post, login to OpenLab, navigate to our Course Site, mouseover the “+” icon, and click “Post.”

Before typing anything, look under Categories on the right and add a check next to “500-Word Summary.”

Click in the “Add Title” section to enter your title (e.g., Summary of Lin’s “3D Layering of Integrated Circuits”). Then, click in the “Start Writing” area and copy-and-paste your 500-Word Summary memo from your word processor into this area.

After copyediting your work to ensure everything is as you want it to be, click on “Publish” and then click “Publish” on the next screen. Verify that your post is live on the site by clicking on “ENG2575 Technical Writing” at the top center to return to our Course Site.