Course Outcomes - WR 122

WR 122: English Composition: Style, Argument, and Research

Prerequisite:  Appropriate scores on Lane's Writing Placement Test or a passing grade (C- or better) in WR 121.
While continuing the concerns of WR 121, WR 122 focuses on persuasion and argument supported by external research. This includes the processes of finding and evaluating sources, citing, documenting, and integrating source material into the student’s own text, using argument as a means of inquiry as well as persuasion. Both subjects—argument and research—are presented in the context of critical reading and the writing of academic source materials.

A. Engage in and value a respectful and free exchange of ideas.

B. Demonstrate critical thinking and reading skills:

• Practice active reading of challenging college-level texts;
• Evaluate sources for adequacy, sound reasoning, and validity;
• Distinguish between observation, fact, inference, etc.; understand invalid evidence, bias, fallacies, and unfair emotional appeals; distinguish between objective and subjective approaches.

C. Make appropriate and effective rhetorical choices during all stages of the writing process: invention, drafting, revising, and editing:

• Write argumentative essays that present a clear thesis or claim that is arguable, unified, and sufficiently narrow;
• Address issues of purpose and audience, including audiences beyond the classroom;
• Choose appropriate language (voice, tone, style, etc.) to persuade an informed and educated reader or to assert a position taken by a writer.

D. Exercise Appropriate methods of development and support:

• Support conclusions with evidence by using appropriate outside sources;
• Select appropriate methods for developing ideas in paragraphs and essays, such as the use of analysis, facts, explanations, examples, descriptions, quotations, and synthesis of source material.

E. Demonstrate successful use of the research process:

• Use a library, online databases and the Internet to locate information and evidence;
• Integrate ideas and source material, being careful to differentiate between the source materials and the students’ ideas and carefully credit sources and ideas;
• Select and apply appropriate documentation style, using a handbook or other documentation resources.

F. Effectively and correctly use accepted conventions and formatting:

• Demonstrate the ability to use Edited Standard Written English (ESWE) to address an academic audience;
• Type and format final drafts with appropriate headings, titles, spacing, margins, demonstrating an understanding of an appropriate documentation style;
• Use the handbook or other resources for formatting, style, grammar, and citation.