Undergraduate students at ÇÑ×ÓÊÓƵ fulfill part of the Rhetoric Across the Curriculum requirement by earning a Rhetoric in Disciplines core tag. Academic departments tag courses in their major curriculum (that is, courses that carry the departmental prefix) as rhetoric intensive. In tagged courses, students receive rhetorical instruction in the discipline, from scholars and practitioners in that discipline. Such courses also serve as a locus for assessment of core curriculum outcomes for rhetoric and information literacy.
Each academic program must tag a sufficient number of courses to ensure that students are able to satisfy the tag requirement in the ordinary course of completing their major.
- Courses must be required courses in the major at the 200-level or 300-level.
- Ordinarily, courses may not carry other core tags (DD, ES, or GRC).
- Courses may not carry CCEQ tags. CCEQ courses are not permitted to carry additional tags.
Rhetoric encompasses speaking, writing, visual design, and information literacy. Rhetorical products are often multimodal, with these forms of rhetoric working together to meet the demands of a rhetorical situation. For tagged courses, the nature of the discipline should guide decisions about the proportion of written to oral to visual rhetoric as well as the principal information literacy practices.
Rhetoric-Intensive Course Features
Tagged courses must have these characteristics:
- Students produce at least 3,000 words of revised prose, or the oral equivalent of about twenty minutes, across one or more major assignments.
- Faculty teach (not simply assign) writing, speaking, design, and/or information literacy skills, devoting the majority of two–three class periods (200 minutes) to explicit instruction and/or practice.
- Students produce multiple drafts of the major rhetorical assignment(s) and revise their work; faculty and peers give feedback on early drafts as part of the revision process.
- The instructor requires students to have a session at the Rhetoric Center, or the instructor seeks support from the core fellows or the Hekman librarians.
- At least 25% of the final course grade is based on major rhetorical assignments.
- The faculty member reports assessment data using university-wide rubric categories.
Rhetoric Intensive Syllabus Features
When they teach rhetoric-intensive courses, faculty should plan for at least 150–200 minutes of rhetorical instruction throughout the term. The course syllabus should also have these clearly identifiable features:
- Rhetorical outcome(s) included in the student leaning outcomes for the course.
- Descriptions of each of the major rhetorical assignments; descriptions should include the word and/or minute count as well as their contribution to the final course grade.
- The Rhetoric Center Syllabus Blurb: The Rhetoric Center provides free assistance for all students as they plan, compose, and revise writing, speaking, design, and research projects. You can work with a trained peer consultant develop ideas and content, to work on organization and structure, to receive feedback from an attentive audience, and to work on polishing final products. You can schedule an appointment online, and drop-in appointments may be available.
- The Hekman Library Blurb (for courses with research components): If you need help with an assignment that requires library resources, contact our department’s librarian, [NAME], at [EMAIL] or find her in [OFFICE]. If [NAME] is not available, you can get research help in-person or online from another librarian; see your options (including 24/7 chat) here: https://library.calvin.edu/research/help
Explicit Instruction and Practice
Faculty are encouraged to consult with the Rhetoric Program Director about specific pedagogical strategies for their disciplines and assignments. Class activities for signature assignments may include generating questions about the assignment, discussing evaluation criteria, guiding students as they construct ideas and arguments, modeling a component of the assignment (a thesis statement, topic sentence, organizational structure) as students practice with their own topic, analyzing sample assignments, and sharing and critiquing drafts in pairs or small groups.
Revision and Feedback
Revision is central to successful rhetorical products, so students are required to revise their work through a series of drafts. Faculty are encouraged to offer their most substantial feedback at the draft stage, when that feedback can be incorporated, rather than at the final stage; they are also encouraged to develop a schedule that allows time for feedback and revision and a grading system that rewards revision.
Assessment
Assessment criteria should align with specific assignments in specific disciplines. The Rhetoric Program has established , and departments should characterize each level—that is, fill in the boxes—for rhetoric-intensive courses and signature assignments. Departments report performance data using the common categories and levels.
Annual Reporting Process
At the end of the term, rhetoric-intensive course instructors will report on student performance using an . Instructors should be prepared to provide these items:
- Course syllabus;
- Assignment sheets for the major writing and/or speaking assignment(s);
- The rubrics or other materials used to assess the assignments;
- Assessment results reporting student performance on the rubric categories; instructors report simply how many students performed at the basic, developing, or competent level.