| 
  • If you are citizen of an European Union member nation, you may not use this service unless you are at least 16 years old.

  • You already know Dokkio is an AI-powered assistant to organize & manage your digital files & messages. Very soon, Dokkio will support Outlook as well as One Drive. Check it out today!

View
 

Classroom Policies

This version was saved 14 years, 3 months ago View current version     Page history
Saved by Tonya Howe
on December 22, 2009 at 7:54:43 pm
 

Each professor has different expectations in the classroom, and different classroom policies to reflect them. Mine are as follows:

 

 

 

 

  • Study habits: You will be doing quite a bit of reading, and that reading will likely feel relatively unfamiliar to you, whether for cultural or linguistic reasons. It is your responsibility to engage the course material in an honest and responsible manner, with special attention to your needs as a reader, a writer, and a scholar. If you are unsure about your reading habits or your study habits, please come and see me immediately! You may also contact the Learning Resource Center in the Library for help with your essays or study habits more broadly.

  • Reading in this class means more than letting your eyes linger over the words on the page. You should look up words you don't know, take notes, underline things, ask questions, and engage your reading assignments actively, critically, and closely. Your participation in the class is largely contingent upon your ability to discuss the readings effectively.

  • Using Wikipedia and the Web: If you don't feel you have a basic grasp of readings, their fundamental sense, I encourage you to browse the web (or skim the resources in the Literature Resource Center, an online collection of full-text general library sources). However, anything that you find on the web in this way will constitute "general knowledge" for our purposes; it is a starting point, rather than an end point. Further, if you found it on the web, I'll be able to find it on the web, so keep that in mind if you have a hankering to plagiarise or use the web as an absolute authority! It's good to use the web to get your bearings, but remember that we're in a college-level course and I'm expecting you to move beyond the trite and the commonplace. Though that's not to say everything on the web is trite and commonplace--just that you need to learn how to recognize what is and what isn't!

  •  

    All assignments--including reading--must be completed by the dates indicated. If you know you will not be able, for some significant reason, to complete the work by those dates, you should see me immediately. Otherwise, late work will be penalized. After three days, I may not accept your work.

     

  • All formal writing for this class (anything that you do at home) should be formatted in

     

    MLA style from the first letter to the last. This is not because I'm obsessed with arbitrary details, but rather because I want to encourage you to turn in work that conforms to a set of arbitrary parameters. Your future employer will expect something of the sort, and I do, too. I will deduct 1/3 of a letter grade for any assignment not turned in in an appropriate format. If you have questions, look the answers up in a reliable source.

  • Grading standards: I use the full range of grades in this class, including grading participation. For a sense of how I grade your formal essays for this class, check out my page on grading standards

    . Hint: Reading through all of the grade descriptions can help you as you draft and revise!

     

  •  

    The 24-hour rule states that you cannot ask me about your grade on a returned assignment until 24 hours have passed. You must read my comments, make an appointment to meet with me, and come prepared with thoughtful responses to my comments.

     

  •  

    I expect everyone to participate to some extent. Not participating will damage your final grade, and participating effectively can definitely raise your final grade.

     

  •  

    Regular attendance is strongly suggested! However, I will not count attendance against you. Do note, however, that I give the full range of participation grades, as well as my policy on late work. More than six absences will seriously damage your grade. Skip at your own risk!

     

  •  

    In the event of an absence, it is your responsibility to speak with a peer to get notes, homework assignments, and so on. Because our schedule sometimes changes, I cannot give you daily assignments weeks in advance.

     

  •  

    Intellectual honesty is the bedrock of communal learning; plagiarism will not be tolerated, and I will refer misuse of sources to the Academic Integrity panel. To put this in perspective, two findings of intellectual dishonesty result in automatic dismissal or suspension from the University. “Plagiarism” derives from the Latin “plagiarius,” meaning “kidnapper.” To plagiarize, as to kidnap, is a kind of stealing, and it is both a fundamental transgression of the Honor System and an offense to our intellectual community. We will be doing research in this class, and students are responsible for understanding the rules of appropriate citation and turning in their own intellectual work.  Any instance of plagiarism will meet with immediate disciplinary action.  If you have any questions about this matter, including uncertainties about what constitutes plagiarism, please consult a writing handbook or ask me.  

     

  •  

    Email communication: Please be sure, on all your electronic correspondence with me, to write with care and thought—after all, this is a form of writing, and this is an English class! Also, if you do not include your name and indicate which course you are taking, I will not know who is writing me.

     

  •  

    If you have any questions or concerns at all, it is imperative that you come and see me about them! Otherwise, I will not know, and will therefore have no opportunity to address them.

     

Comments (0)

You don't have permission to comment on this page.