This book is designed for a first college course in poetry. Assuming no prior knowledge of poetry, it guides the student through the most essential aspects of poetics, the tricky question of interpretation, and the importance of form. It also outlines, in several chapters, the ways that poetry has evolved over time.

Introduction to Professional and Public Writing is dedicated to introducing students to a lifelong commitment of engaging with these problems that matter. As an academic discipline, Writing Studies’ contribution to engaging with problems can be applied to all areas of study and to all types of problems because we focus on the way language itself—discourse—is created and exchanged in the service of engaging problems. Writing Studies deepens students’ rhetorical awareness of how the ongoing conversations between groups of people shape and express the problems that matter. According to Aristotle, being rhetorically aware means understanding “the best means of persuasion in any given situation.” It means understanding the deep logic that explains why an author has selected a particular genre to deliver a particular message to an audience. We all know writing is hard, but we commit to writing well because of the vital work it does in the world in helping humans preserve and extend our ability to come together. As theorist Anne Beaufort writes, “[w]hat writing expertise is ultimately concerned with is becoming engaged in a particular community of writers who dialogue across texts, argue, and build on each other’s work” (18).

1: Chapter 1 Reading Skills
1.1: Use Pre-reading Strategies
1.2: Annotate and Take Notes
1.3: The Reading-Writing Connection
1.4: Critical Reading and Rhetorical Context
1.5: Reading Strategies - Previewing
1.5.1: 3.4 Annotation Basics
1.6: Questioning Strategies
1.7: Inferences
1.8: Vocabulary
1.9: Reading Strategies - Taking Notes
1.10: Main Ideas and Supporting Details
1.11: Paraphrazing and Summarizing
1.12: How to Read Like a Writer
1.13: Key Takeaways
2: Chapter 2 Writing Process
2.1: Apply Prewriting Models
2.1.1: Outlining
2.1.2: Outlining
2.1.3: Drafting
2.2: The Writing Process - How Do I Begin? (Exercises)
2.3: The Reading-Writing Process
2.4: Steps in the Reading-Writing Process
2.5: The College Essay Assignment- Analysis, Rubrics, and Critical Thinking
2.6: Argument
2.7: Purpose, Tone, Audience, Content in an Assignment
2.8: Prewriting Strategies
2.9: Outlining
2.10: Key Takeaways
2.11: Revising and Editing
2.12: Chapter 4 Revising
2.12.1: Revising and Editing
3: Chapter 3 Essay Essentials
3.1: Writing a Thesis
3.2: Working Thesis
3.3: Elements of a thesis
3.4: Where is the thesis?
3.5: Tips for writing a thesis statement
3.6: Resources
4: Chapter 4 Writing Basics
4.1: Moving Beyond the Five-paragraph Theme
4.1.1: The Three-story Thesis- From the Ground Up
4.2: The Three-story Thesis- From the Ground Up
4.3: Three-story Theses and the Organically Structured Argument
4.4: Exercises
4.5: Verb tense
4.6: Passive and active voice
4.7: Run-ons, fragments, comma splices
5: Sentence Clarity
5.1: Chapter 5 Sentence Clarity
5.1.1: Sentence Variety
5.1.2: Coordination and Subordination
5.1.3: Parallelism
5.1.4: Writing Introductions
5.1.5: Writing Conclusions
5.1.6: Writing Summaries
5.1.7: Paraphrasing
5.1.8: Quoting

A freshman composition textbook used by the English Department of Virginia Western Community College (VWCC) in Roanoke, Virginia. It aligns with ENG 111, the standard first-year composition course in the Virginia Community College System (VCCS). The ten chapter headings are:

1. Chapter 1 - Critical Reading
2. Chapter 2 - Rhetorical Analysis
3. Chapter 3 - Argument
4. Chapter 4 - The Writing Process
5. Chapter 5 - Rhetorical Modes
6. Chapter 6 - Finding and Using Outside Sources
7. Chapter 7 - How and Why to Cite
8. Chapter 8 - Writing Basics: What Makes a Good Sentence?
9. Chapter 9 - Punctuation
10. Chapter 10 - Working With Words: Which Word is Right?

This book was created by the English faculty and librarians of VWCC using Creative Commons -licensed materials and original contributions.

The layout of our book implies there is a beginning, middle, and end to a writing course, but because writing is both an art and a skill, people will find their own processes for learning, improving, and using these skills. Writing processes differ because we are each looking for a workable schemata that fits our way of thinking. Try out a variety of writing processes and strategies, and find what works for you. If you are not uncomfortable on this journey, you simply are not stretching yet.

A quick glance through the book will show you that it deftly covers the basics, which are always important to review as you get ready to build onto your scaffolding. Reminders of terminology that form the foundation of a discipline—as well as explanations, descriptions, and examples of their use in a basic education—are in chapters such as “Critical Reading,” “Writing Basics: What Makes a Good Sentence,” “The Writing Process,” “Punctuation,” and “Working with Words.” These are, of course, fundamentals that you have worked with throughout your education, learning in each course skills and habits that elevate your reading, writing, and thinking abilities. This college writing course will ensure that you take another step up to college and professional writing.

This text is different in its emphasis on research skills and research writing. The form you will learn, the building blocks of that form, the formality, and the sacrosanct crediting of sources is explained here from English professors and our instructional librarian at the college. Leaning on questions that lead to searches for answers that lead to arguments that present your understanding, the chapters “Critical Reading,” “Rhetorical Modes,” and “Argument” will fill out your growing appreciation of and comfort with the research form in everyday life. From the discussion of source types to guidance through the research process to the models of essay deconstruction, you will find that the expectations and language of this text begin with the college-level student in mind.

Working through this text will elevate you into the next stage of writing for a 21st century student and professional.

This composition and rhetoric text guides students through the writing and research process with a focus on argument. It offers tools students can use to take their writing to the next level.

This open educational resource (OER) was compiled for use in ENGL 1010 – Expository Writing, the first of Middle Tennessee State University’s two first-year writing courses. This OER is divided into five main sections, all of which are designed with ENGL 1010’s course objectives in mind. Each of those sections contains a number of readings related to the section’s topic, with many of those readings curated from other open-access texts.

The first-year writing sequence at Middle Tennessee State University takes a rhetorical approach to writing. This means that students are asked to consider how “good” writing is situational. There are no hard and fast “rules” for writing. Instead, there are conventions or norms and expectations specific to particular contexts. In ENGL 1010: Expository Writing, students practice identifying writing conventions across modes and contexts.

CARL SCHURZ ON THE GUBERNATORIAL CONTEST IN MASSACHUSETTS.

letter from the Hon. Carl Schurz has been received by a gentleman in Boston: written in New York, Oct. 16, 1886

example of persuasive writing

Welcome to Mindful Technical Writing: An Introduction to the Fundamentals, an open textbook designed for use in co-requisite course pairings of developmental writing and introductory technical writing, or indeed in other lower-division college writing courses that focus on building study skills alongside effective workplace and academic writing skills. It offers a no-cost alternative to commercial products, combining practical guidance with interactive exercises and thoughtfully designed writing opportunities.

This book’s modular design and ample coverage of topics and genres means that it can be used flexibly over semester-long or stretch courses, allowing instructors and students to select the chapters that are most relevant for their needs. By blending new material with reviews of key topics, such as academic integrity, the chapters provide fresh perspectives on matters vital to the development of strong writing skills.

Welcome to Mindful Technical Writing: An Introduction to the Fundamentals, an open textbook designed for use in co-requisite course pairings of developmental writing and introductory technical writing, or indeed in other lower-division college writing courses that focus on building study skills alongside effective workplace and academic writing skills. It offers a no-cost alternative to commercial products, combining practical guidance with interactive exercises and thoughtfully designed writing opportunities.

This book’s modular design and ample coverage of topics and genres means that it can be used flexibly over semester-long or stretch courses, allowing instructors and students to select the chapters that are most relevant for their needs. By blending new material with reviews of key topics, such as academic integrity, the chapters provide fresh perspectives on matters vital to the development of strong writing skills.

Table of Contents:
Unit I: Exploring Technical Writing Fundamentals.
Unit II: Writing Documents.
Unit III: Attending to Design.
Unit IV: Working With Sources.
Unit V: Conducting Research.
Unit VI: Employing Strategies for College Success.
Unit VII: Producing Correspondence.
Unit VIII: Producing Instructions, Short Reports, and Presentations.
Unit IX: Producing Academic Writing.

Welcome to Mindful Technical Writing: An Introduction to the Fundamentals, an open textbook designed for use in co-requisite course pairings of developmental writing and introductory technical writing, or indeed in other lower-division college writing courses that focus on building study skills alongside effective workplace and academic writing skills. It offers a no-cost alternative to commercial products, combining practical guidance with interactive exercises and thoughtfully designed writing opportunities.

This book’s modular design and ample coverage of topics and genres means that it can be used flexibly over semester-long or stretch courses, allowing instructors and students to select the chapters that are most relevant for their needs. By blending new material with reviews of key topics, such as academic integrity, the chapters provide fresh perspectives on matters vital to the development of strong writing skills.

This book was made possible through grant support from Montana Technological University and the TRAILS OER program, funded by the Office of the Commissioner for Higher Education, Montana University System.

This assignment titled “My Interdisciplinary Perspective on Climate Change” was developed in Fall 2020 as the signature assignment of the STEM Learning Community LC50 for students enrolled in the Biology program of the Natural Sciences department, at LaGuardia Community College, CUNY. The assignment targets Integrative Learning and Global Learning Core Competencies, and Digital/Oral Communication Abilities.
For this STEM Cluster, “Climate Change” is the shared theme that connects learning from the different disciplines and helps build students’ overall knowledge on an imperative issue that our planet currently faces. Work on this assignment entails a narrated digital student presentation on the various aspects of Climate Change such as causes, global effects and manifestations, and possible remedial solutions or suggested actions. Students also practice summarizing the research and learning on this theme from the various courses undertaken in the first semester.
The main goal of this signature assignment is to make connections among the ideas, experiences and learning acquired among the different courses, assignments and co-curricular activities of this semester that contributed to the students’ understanding of this global phenomenon. This high-stakes assignment is worth 20% of the final grade in NSF 101: First Year Seminar for Natural Sciences (program-core course). Students are guided by all four instructors of the Learning Community, which comprises of the courses- NSF 101, MAT 115: College Algebra and Trigonometry, ENG 101: Composition I, and HUC 106: Public Speaking, through a 12-week scaffolded process to complete work and showcase their findings as a well-informed Biology major and responsible citizen of society. This assignment meets the NSF101 learning objectives and helps the students to hone their skills on the targeted Core Competencies (Global/Integrative Learning) and Communication Abilities (Digital/Oral), thereby increasing their chances of being successful in the subsequent 200-level classes of their major.
LaGuardia's Core Competencies and Communication Abilities
Student artifacts were deposited for this assignment at the end of the semester for college-wide Benchmark Readings 2021, and the Fall 2020 Learning Communities Seminar (as the LC assignment). Due to the serious COVID-related situation in New York state in Fall 2020, including high incidence of the disease and the associated challenging and technical issues at some students’ end, more emphasis was placed on helping the students learn how to prepare a digital presentation embodying their work on science, data analysis, writing and communication skills, while incorporating elements of integrative and global learning from all four classes on Climate Change. However, when the assignment is implemented again in the future, both Digital and Oral Communication Abilities will be fostered in all student work. It is noteworthy that some students managed to cover both these abilities in their work in Fall 2020 also.

While essays and research papers are likely the most common types of writing assignments you’ll receive in college, more and more, students are being expected to write in digital environments. In the 21st century, you’re likely to be asked to create a PowerPoint or Prezi to present the main points of your research paper, or you may be asked to create an electronic portfolio to share all of your work for a semester. Students in online classes will write discussion board posts every week, and some professors are even replacing some of your traditional essay assignments with assignments like photo essays or video essays.

In this class, we questioned the very parameters of what counts as American literature. Is American literature defined by geographical boundaries? Experiences? Histories? Themes? What is the difference between American literature and American history? Who determines what counts as American literature? How does the in-depth study of early American literature prompt us rethink representations of American culture today? In our global era, it is clear that past definitions of American literature must be revisited. This anthology moves to answer the question “what is American literature?” by framing the texts in new and provocative ways that fit the modern age.

"This book presents technical writing as an approach to researching and carrying out writing that centers on technical subject matter. Each and every chapter is devoted to helping students understand that good technical writing is situationally-aware and context-driven. Technical writing doesn’t work off knowing the one true right way of doing things—there is no magic report template out there that will always work. Instead, the focus is on offering students a series of approaches they can use to map out their situations and do research accordingly"--Open Textbook Library.

In Placing the History of College Writing, Nathan Shepley argues that pre-1950s composition history, if analyzed with the right conceptual tools, can pluralize and clarify our understanding of the relationship between the writing of college students and the writing's physical, social, and discursive surroundings. Even if the immediate outcome of student writing is to generate academic credit, Shepley shows, the writing does more complex rhetorical work. It gives students chances to uphold or adjust institutional codes for student behavior, allows students and their literacy sponsors to respond to sociopolitical issues in a city or state, enables faculty and administrators to create strategic representations of institutional or program identities, and connects people across disciplines, occupations, and geographic locations. Shepley argues that even if many of today's composition scholars and instructors work at institutions that lack extensive historical records of the kind usually preferred by composition historians, those scholars and teachers can mine their institutional collections for signs of the various contexts with which student writing dealt.

The scientific community must be effective in communicating the results of its work to the public in a way that can be understood and used. The need for this is acute, for the complexity and difficulty of environmental and resource problems require full use of all the knowledge scientists can muster. The wisdom of the actions of both the government and private sectors depends in large part on their understanding of resource characteristics.

The U.S. Geological Survey is uniquely qualified to provide much of the required knowledge about natural resources through its many reports and maps and can be proud of the products of its work. Too often, however, reports are couched in words and phrases that are understandable only to other scientists, engineers, or technicians. But, who, really, are the ones to whom the Survey wishes to convey its findings? Other scientists and engineers, yes. But beyond them, by far a larger audience: teachers, students, businessmen, planners, and Federal, State, county, and municipal officials–in short, the public.

More than 50 years ago former Director George Otis Smith recognized the same problem. His plea for “Plain Geology” was a classic, just as applicable now as it was in 1921. It is herewith reprinted to make it generally available.

persuasion example

Let’s start with an inescapable fact: you’ll be writing and communicating for the rest of your life whether you’re a second grade teacher, a corrections officer, an ER nurse, or a district manager at Target. You don’t want to sound like an idiot on paper or in person. People lose interviews, jobs, and respect when they write or communicate poorly. Simply put, developing effective writing and speaking skills can help you succeed far beyond the classroom.

This handbook is the product of much collaboration. In creating this resource, the faculty at KCC have attempted to distill their collective wisdom about writing and present that material in a concise and accessible way. This is by no means a complete reference for every English question you might encounter in your life; however, it is a collection of common issues and areas of concern that professors across all disciplines address.

The Process of Research Writing is a web-based research writing textbook (or is that textweb?) suitable for teachers and students in research oriented composition and rhetoric classes.