This lecture discusses some preliminary results from an ongoing research project on the use of digital technology and digital rhetorics in the undergraduate classroom. The goal of the project is to explore how these technologies and rhetorics can address common problems in the literature classroom: weak composition skills, lack of engagement, poor preparation. Initial, at this point still largely anecdotal, results suggest that the committed integration Web 2.0 technologies and rhetorics in the classroom can greatly improve outcomes in this area. The lecture discusses how these techniques are used and some of the results we have seen.

1. Class 2.0
Digital technology & digital rhetorics
in the undergraduate classroom.
Daniel Paul O'Donnell
with research from
Jessica Bay
Emma Dering
Matt Gall
Heather Hobma
@DanielPaulOD
daniel.odonnell@uleth.ca
Funding: University of Lethbridge Teaching Centre Teaching Development Fund;
Faculty of Arts and Science; School of Graduate Studies

2. Premises
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Undergraduate English instruction is not
working well for most students
Problem is how we are teaching, not change in
quality of student
Goal of teaching is to help individual students
grow and improve on their own terms

3. What we've been doing
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Deemphasising and fine-tuning grading
practices
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Introducing Blogging
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Offloading responsibility on students

4. Grading
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Additional premises
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Students are terrified of grades
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Fear of grades creates intellectually poor behaviour
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Hiding weaknesses
Masking interests
Sycophancy
Underperforming and avoiding challenge

5. Grading
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Two approaches
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Reduce number of grades that count while
increasing those that don't (formative vs.
summative)
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Reduce reliance on qualitative grades for
summative purposes (and emphasise them for
formative)

6. Formative and Summative Grading

7. Blogging
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Use them to prep for class (student and me)
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Create community of practice/research
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Teach that scholarship/research is a public
activity
Teach them that it is a regular activity

8. Blogging rules

9. Offload responsibility
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Assume your students have the judgement to
know what to do (and guide them if they don't)
Set % and purpose of essay but very little else
(format, topic, length, etc.)
Encourage them to discover what is appropriate
for task (through you, through research,
colleagues)

10. Unessay
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Unessay is the most radical example
No requirements except submissions be
“compelling” and effective”
Goal is to show students they can write
And that goal is to learn to turn their writing into
something that we understand
Treat writing problems as a generic/register
issue

11. Unessay rubric

12. Results
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Anecdotally, extremely positive
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Very high attendance
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High student satisfaction
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Evidence of much better performance
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Lack of errors
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Idea generation

13. Requires effort
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Trust students
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Have patience
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Grade positively and constructively
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Be trustworthy

14. Thank you.
daniel.odonnell@uleth.ca