17 March. Design Basics & Ethics of Visual Design

Featured Image: Original Northern Hemisphere Hockey Stick Graph, of Mann, Bradley, and Hughes, 1999. 

Announcements

  • 1. Proposals due on Friday
  • 2. There’s no meeting next week, but I will post some How-To videos on Wednesday
  • 3. I’ll have everything graded by the time we meet again on March 31

Class Meeting Agenda

The Following are the topics/goals we will cover into today’s class session:
  • 1. Website Assignment Overview
  • 2. Design Basics
  • 3. Ethics of visual Communication 
  • 4. Accessible Design

Website Assignment Overview

Website Overview Video 

Design Basics

Design Basics Video

Ethics of Visual Design

Ethics of Visual Design

E

3 March. Project Description & Charts

Featured Image: Yucca Mountain, NV Nuclear Test Site Project 

Class Meeting Agenda

The Following are the topics/goals we will cover into today’s class session:

Project Description, Part I

Project Description Video 

Project Description, Part II

Project Description Part II

Composing Gantt Charts in Excel

Composing Gantt Charts in Google Sheets

24 February. Proposals & Persuasion.

Class Meeting Agenda

The Following are the topics/goals we will cover into today’s class session:

Proposal Project Overview

Overview Video

Coppola, “Rhetorical Analysis of Stakeholders”

Coppola Slidedeck Video

Composing Abstracts

Composing Abstracts Video 

10 Feb. Environmental Justice & Renewable Energy

Announcement

Calendar Update:

Class Meeting Agenda

The Following are the topics/goals we will cover into today’s class session:

Slow Violence & Creative Climate Communication Strategies

Remote Class Video 1

DQ: Breakout Session 1

Please respond to the following in your breakout sessions. Just write down as much information as you need to respond during discussion:
  • 1. What is your assessment of Nixon’s argument? Do you agree/disagree that experts, reproters, activists, and individuals need to find more engaging or symbolic ways to communicate slow violence?
  • 2. Can/does the sort of environmental storytelling that he advocates call those most responsible for environmental devastation to account/create lasting change?

Guide to Writing Academic Paragraphs

Remote Class Video 2

Use the following as a template for body paragraphs in your Paper:
  • 1. Topic sentence(s):1-2 services that remind readers of major claim/through line of specific section & introduce new info.  
  • 2. Transition: 2-3 couple sentences that develop your topic sentence and also set up (announce, contextualize) the citation you will include from the essay you are analyzing.
  • 3. Citation: 2-4 sentences (approx.) of source material. Typically the best material to cite from a text is a passage that requires your analysis, i.e. cited passages should, of course extend and support you claim, but also can/should be complex, technical, or offer several reasonable avenues of interpretation.
  • 4. Close Analysis: 2-4 sentences of “close reading”/analysis of the citation you include. What’s the main idea of the passage you cited & how do you know? That is, what phrases, rhetorical appeals (ethos, pathos, logos), metaphors, or structure in the passage suggests to you what you say the passage means? Are you reading the passage you cited against its intended goal?
  • 5. Conclusion:2-3 sentences that tie your analysis back into the larger goal of the paragraph. Now that you have responded to the question with your claim and developed you claim through an analysis of a evidence, you need to write 2-3 more sentences that put the pieces together for your reader.

Environmental Justice

Remote Class Video 3

DQ 2

Please take a minute and consider the following before we discuss:
  • 1.What is your assessment of the methodology employed here? That is, how persuasive do you find the “global systematic review of environmental justice cases” the authors conducted (p. 3)? How does their methodology or rhetorical approach compare with Nixon’s recommendations? 
  • 2. What’s your assessment of environmental justice frameworks? Do you agree/disagree that the intersection between environmental degradation and historic discrimination always need to be considered together?  

Group Preference Form

Week Four: Supporting Materials

Featured Image: Deep Water Horizon Oil Spill Lingering Oil Slick, 2010. 

Directions

Keep the following questions in mind as you read Rob Nixon’s “Scenes from the Seabed: The Future of Dissent,” 263-280. The questions are designed to guide your reading practices and our class discussions. You are not required to provide formal answers in class or online.

1.What does the epigraph mean? What’s the relationship between the epithet and the rest of the essay?

2. Why does Nixon invoke Atlantas in the first sentence, “The island of Atlantis, according to Plato, vanished into the ocean ‘in a single night and day of misfortune’” (263)? Is his opening effective, why or why not?

3. What does Nixon mean by “slow violence”? Why is the process of “slow violence” so difficult for writers to communicate?

4. Spend a minute looking at the photo of the underwater cabinet meeting, how does Nixon “read the scene” (264)? How does the president of the Maldives, Mohamad Nasheen, communicate the slow changes from climate change that his country faces? What does he want to accomplish through his “underwater cabinet meeting”? Is President Nasheen successful, why/why not?

5. What does the planting of a flag traditionally symbolize? How do the planted flags that Nixon discusses challenge older notions of the symbolic gesture (266-7)?

6. What some of intersections between human rights and environmental rights that Nixon highlights through his reading of the two “seabed scenes” in the first section of the chapter?

7. BP brands itself as “Beyond Petroleum” (268). What does BP intend for that slogan to mean? What does Nixon suggest it means?

8. What does Nixon mean by the phrase “technological sublime” (268)? What sorts of imaginative tools do people have to counter the “technological sublime”?

9. Why is it useful or important to frame the conversation about climate change as a contest over the symbols we use to represent what is happening to the world?

10.Nixon concludes the section of the reading for last week by claiming, that developed nations “sewsaw” between two risky options: domestic drilling and dependance on foreign oil. What “third option” does he suggest? Do you agree?

12. Who’s responsible for environmental devastation? How can those responsible be held accountable? Who has the moral authority to hold responsible parties accountable? Why is it so hard for transnational corporations to be called to account for their misdeeds?

13. What’s the danger of bracketing foreign disasters as “foreign”? How is the concept of “foreign” faulty as it pertains to environmental issues?

14. If we remembered spills like the 1979 Ixtoc oil explosion, would the Even Horizon spill have been avoided? According to Nixon what keeps us from holding these disasters in our memories? What can we do to remember?

15. Nixon’s book came out in 2011, which means he probably finished writing it in 2010. How does the Gross Negligence ruling and subsequent claims settlement fit into with Nixon’s assessment of power of legislation?

16. What’s lost in these disasters? What’s gained from not taking preventative measures until after the disaster have occurred? The terror of unlearned lessons…

17. What’s “Corexit” (272) and why is it so scary?

18. If, in the first half of his Epilogue, Nixon focuses on the difficulty of rendering “slow violence,” why does he turn to the impossibility of rendering “unseen violence” (273) or the terrible effects of ecological disaster that culpable parties attempt erase?

19. What accounts for the discrepancy in responses between the Event Horizon spill and the “546 million gallons of oil spilled in the Niger Delta” (274)?

20. Consider this question that Nixon asks toward the end of his book, “How will writers, photographers, video artists, podcasters, and blogger navigate the possibilities–and possible perils–opened up by a new media culture characterized both by intensive, instant connectivity and by impatient, distractive staccato rhythms?” (276).

Working Group Preference Form

2 Feb. Green IT & Big Data

Featured Image: Data Visualizations – Aerosols and Clouds, GDFL/NOAA

Class Meeting Agenda

The Following are the topics/goals we will cover into today’s class session:

Data Collection & Climate Modeling

Remote Class Video 1

 

DQ: Breakout Session 1

Please respond to the following in your breakout sessions. Just write down as much information as you need to respond during discussion:
  • 1. Check out this Carbon Footprint Calculator and then consider: according to Houser and your own experience what are the Calculator’s advantages and disadvantages?
  • 2. Check out this Climate Modeling Data Visualization page, and then consider: according to Houser and your own experience what are the Calculator’s advantages and disadvantages?

Participatory Tools

Remote Class Video 2

DQ: Breakout Session 2

Please respond to the following in your breakout sessions. Just write down as much information as you need to respond during discussion:
  • 1. Which of the tools the authors examine (Or that I covered in the slideshow) do you find most effective and why? What are the advantages/disadvantages to these participatory  tools? 
  • 2. Given the opportunity, what sorts of participatory e-tools would you design to engage audiences in topics related to sustainability and climate change?  

Annotated Bibliography & Valid Sources

Remote Class Video 3

Week Three: Supporting Materials

Directions

Keep the following questions in mind as you read Heather Houser’s, “Human/Planetary.” The questions are designed to guide your reading practices and our class discussions. You are not required to provide formal answers in class or online.

What, according to Houser, separates the “human” from the “planetary (i.e., nonhuman).”?

Why/how do the realities of climate change force us to rethink the way we conceive of human and nonhuman relationships?

What does it mean to say that human and nonhuman systems are fused or blended?

According to Houser, what are the advantages to living in “geological time” (144)? OR why must “we all get on geologic time if we are to understand and address climatic disturbance” (145)?

What’s the problem with the “(incomplete) bifurcation of human and planetary time” (145)?

How do the representational tools of “inhuman time give access at once the rift between human and planetary time, but also to their integration” (145)?

What sorts of timescales are humans used to operating on?

How is the manipulation of these timescales an example of human exceptionalism?

“One of the unique characteristics of the present, however, is that the range of time concepts keyed to human phenomenological experience will not suffice for apprehending environmental crisis.” (145).

To what does the word “Anthropocene” refer?

What are the drawbacks and advantages to a term like Anthropocene?

“How might climate change media conceptualize humanity in terms of the planetary or block that correspondence” (147)?

What makes it so hard to communicate climate change to audiences?

“Might carbon calculators make climate threat sense-able by quantifying it in the dollars and cents that fuel households, businesses, and governments rather than the datasets that fuel climatological research and modeling” (148)?

What are the representational drawbacks of carbon calculators?

What are the representational benefits of carbon calculators?

27 Jan. Sustainability & Risk Communication.

Featured Image: United Nations Sustainable Development Goals

Class Meeting Agenda

The Following are the topics/goals we will cover into today’s class session:

Sustainability: A History

Remote Class Video 1

DQ: Breakout Session 1

Please respond to the following in your breakout sessions. Just write down as much information as you need to respond during discussion:
  • 1. What’s your final assessment of “sustainability”? As a descriptive term, how does “sustainability” differ from some of the terms/movements that it subsumes? For instance, what does “Sustainability” communicate that say, “Climate Change” or “Global Warming” cannot?
  • 2. What are some drawbacks, OR how well does sustainability withstand the criticism leveled at it by guys like Bill McKibben way back when it first entered popular usage (2)
  • 3. If sustainability is such a useful term why have environmental conditions deteriorated so much since the 1970’s?

Risk Communication, 4 Models

Remote Class Video 2

DQ: Breakout Session 2

Please respond to the following in your breakout sessions. Just write down as much information as you need to respond during discussion:
  • 1. Do Grabill & Simmons have suggestions for how to communicate sustainability more effectively?
  • 2. For example, how can sustainability discourse be fit into a participatory democracy model?

Skills: Defining Key Terms in Professional Academic Writing

Remote Class Video 3

Week Two: Supporting Materials

In this post you’ll find discussion questions for this week’s reading. The questions are intended to guide you through your reading.

Caradonna, J. (2014). Introduction. Sustainability: a history (pp. 1-20). Oxford University Press.

What sorts of industries does “sustainability” cut across, according Caradonna?

What are some initial challenges leveled at “sustainability”?

Take a look at the way that the Fig.1. graph illustrates, “But since 1980 there has been an explosion of books and articles not only use those words as titles but also deal with the many facets of sustainability” (2).

How does Caradonna define the term “sustainability”? Are any of the terms Caradonna uses to define sustainability at odds with one another? Can a society be, for example, both prosperous and ecologically minded? What tools does he suggest, if any, to deal with possible discrepancies?

What other movements or terms does “sustainability” subsume?

Do you agree that “sustainability” is a “galvanizingly powerful term” (3)? That is, what or who is sustained? In whose interests do we sustain communities and ecosystems?

As a descriptive term, how does “sustainability” differ from some of the terms/movements that it subsumes? For instance, what does “Sustainability” communicate that say, “Climate Change” or “Global Warming” cannot? What do either of the other terms do that “sustainability” cannot?

When did “sustainability” first emerge as an “explicit social, environmental, and economic ideal” (1)? What were some early responses to the term?

What are the socio/economic conditions under which the term emerged?

What material processes does “substantiality” seek to redress, counter act, or adapt to?

What forces does “sustainability” seek to counteract?

Who does Caradonna call “sustainists”? What are their goals?

What’s your assessment of the rhetorical gestures in the following sentence: In short, for those who embrace sustainability in the fullest sense—as an environmental, social, economic, and political ideal—we’re at a crossroads in our civilization. There are two paths to take: continue with business as usual, ignore the science of climate change, and pretend that our economic system isn’t on life support or remake and redefine our society along the lines of sustainability” (5).

In what ways is “sustainability” necessarily interdisciplinary? What disciplines does the sustainability movement draw upon?

Is “sustainability” and endpoint or a process?

What is the etymology of the term and how does the history of the word itself help audience make sense of its contemporary applications?

What sorts of diagrams does Caradonna include? Spend a few minutes looking at the diagram on page 8, what ideas are represented and how do they overlap? How does the diagram of the “three E’s of sustainability” compare to the diagram on the facing page? What does the concentric circle model accomplish that the vendiagram cannot? Which of the two models is more successful and why?

Are economic systems both overlapping and independent, or are markets, as Daly argues, “’subsystems within the big biophysical system of ecological interdependence’” (9)?

What does Caradonna mean when he says, “an ecological point of view” (8)?

Grabill, J. T. & W. & Simmons, M. (1998). Toward a critical rhetoric of risk communications: producing citizens in the role of technical communications. Technical Communications Quarterly 7(4), 415-441

What are/were “Predominate Linear Models for Risk Communication”? How/why do Grabill, et. al. challenge those models?

What is the “critical rhetoric” risk communication?

What’s a typical definition of “Risk Communication”?

What are some drawbacks to that definition of risk communication above?

What are the current (1990’s) Approaches of Risk Assessment and Communication, Technocratic, Negotiated, Risk as Socially Constructed?

What is Participatory democracy and why do do Grabill and Simmons ultimately suggest it as a model for risk communication?

Why study Climate Change as an object of inquiry for questions of deliberative democracy?

 

Week One: Supporting Materials

In this post please find the IAC Class Blogs How-To slideshare, professional biography resources, Multimodal Basics Video.

IAC Class Blogs How-To

Professional Biography Resources

Guide to Writing a Bio (Business)

Guide to “Best Bios”

Academic Biography, Model

McKenna Rose

Marion L. Brittain Postdoctoral Fellow; WCP Assistant Director for Assessment

Dr. McKenna Rose is a Marion L. Brittain Postdoctoral Fellow at the Georgia Institute of Technology, where she also serves as the Assistant Director for Assessment. Her research focuses on Renaissance literature and the Environmental Humanities. Her peer-reviewed articles have appeared in Shakespeare and Early Modern Culture. She also has a chapter forthcoming in the edited collection, Watery Thinking, published by Amsterdam University Press. Her book project Salvage Ecology on the Early Modern Stage, turns to the material history of the Renaissance theater to uncover the relationship between objects and the people they leave behind, while also exploring the environmental implications of a culture obsessed with expressing itself through the accumulation of reclaimed material commodities.Through its framing of the early theater as salvage operation, she argues that the constant cycling and recycling of both material substrates and rhetorical figures not only encodes the history of resource depletion, but also suggest methods to redress the dangers of anthropocentric climate change. At Georgia Tech, Dr. Rose teaches First-Year Writing and Technical Communication courses on sustainability and environmental justice.

Multimodal Basics (Video)

 

 

20 Jan. Introductions!

Featured Image: Oil from Deep Water Horizon Spill, 2010. Getty Images.

Class Meeting Agenda

The Following are the topics/goals we will cover into today’s class session:
  • 1. Overview of class topic; policies; readings; deliverables; schedule; and remote synchronous & asynchronous course structure
  • 2. Multimodal Basics Review
  • 3. IAC Class Blogs How-to
  • 4. Professional Bios: How-to & First Blog Post
  • 5. Closing Question: Does Business Writing Require Information Literacy?”

Remote Class Video

20 Jan. Introductions

Class Overview

 

Follow along as I cover the following topics & don’t hesitate to stop me if you have any questions:

Multimodal Basics Review

This course builds on the competencies you developed in English 1101 and 1102, with a special emphasis on communicating in scientific, business, and technological fields. You will learn to create workplace genres, ranging from traditional print documents such as reports, proposals, and definitions to electronic forms such as podcasts and websites. Each project affords you the opportunity to skillfully assess the rhetorical situation underlying workplace genres, so you can communicate your expert, technical knowledge and skills to stakeholders.

IAC Class Blogs

Please follow along as I walk you through how to set-up your IAC blog post feed, and don’t hesitate to stop me with any questions:

Professional Biographies

Model 1: Etsy Employee Bios

Model 2: GATech LMC Faculty Bios

Your first Blog Post (Due next Monday, Jan 25) is a professional bio, which you will revise and reuse for both the Proposal and Website Projects later in the semester. To draft your Bios and get to know one another, please take 5-8 minutes and freewrite in response to the following:
  • 1. Position: What is your name, current position and/or what it is/what you do, what is your company or school name and what they are/do
  • 2. Accomplishments:what is one or two professional accomplishments of which you are most proud?
  • 3. Philosophy: in 1-2 sentences explain your work philosophy OR research interests/trajectory.
  • 4. Conclusion: how does your philosophy and/or research perspective inform your position?

Summary/Overview of Katz Article

Katz, I.R., Haras, C., & Blaszczynski, C (2010). Does Business Writing Require Information Literacy? Business Communication Quarterly, 73(2), 135-49.

On the very first page of the article, the authors of “Does Business Writing Require Information Literacy?” argue, earning a top job at a major company requires a combination of technical skill and information literacy. Irvin Katz, et. al explain, “Information literate workers know when to seek new information, how to seek that information efficiently via technology, how to judge relevance and reliability of information to reach new conclusions, and how to use technology to communicate information effectively, clearly, and ethically” (Candy, 2005). So what?

  • Keep in mind that while many of you may not become technical writers, you may be required to communicate with tech writers in your careers.
  • Furthermore, employees can have all the technical know-how in the world, but if that technical know-how is not coupled with what they call the ability seek, evaluate, synthesize, create, and transmit information, then some institutional positions will remain out of reach.
  • Beyond institutional and economic success, the careful technical communication you will practice in this class helps keep people safe and facilitates collaborative responses to complex problems.

Why organize a tech writing course around sustainability?

Because of the unique technical communication challenges that climate changes poses, in this class you will learn how to communicate effectively in workplace genres using sustainability as a vehicle for that communication practice. As a discourse, sustainability recognizes that the cumulative effects of anthropocentric climate change are both material and rhetorical. Not only do experts in all fields struggle to redress the environmental degradation caused by, for example, warming, emissions, deforestation, acidification, desertification, and pollution, they also endeavor to communicate the consequence, scale, and complexity of these processes to expert and nonexpert audiences to initiate change. Given that it spans chemical, biological, economical, and cultural spheres, consider coordinating a response to ocean acidification, as just one example of the complexities of technical communication endemic to environmental issues. What sorts of choices do you have to make to represent and transmit complex, discipline, specific data to experts in other fields? What sorts of choices do you have to make to represent and transmit complex, discipline, specific data to nonexpert stakeholders? These are just some of the dynamic challenges we will practice communicating this semester.

 

 

Professional Bio

Directions

Respond to the prompt in 200-300 words. Please include at least one photo of yourself in addition to the prose text.

Prompt

Please write a short biography of your professional accomplishments and interests.  Your bio should include the following: Your name; current position and what it is/what you do; company or school name and what they are/do; one professional accomplishment; briefly state your values or work philosophy, and how your values/philosophy inform your career.

Since the audience you imagine writing this for will shape your choices, please consider the following as you write: should you write the Bio in first or third person? Should you show what kind of person you are outside of work? Can/should you include examples, if so what kind? Should you include “jokes” and/or what sort of tone should you use?

Tools

To set up your Blog go to https://classblogs20.iac.gatech.edu/wp-iac-signup.php (Links to an external site.). Please see the IAC Blogs How-To Slideshow for more on how to create and configure IAC Class Blogs.

Assessment

As long as you publish your post to your IAC WordPress class blog on or before the assigned time/date, you will earn full points per document. Remember these activities are designed to develop skills we will use throughout the class and in the major projects. The documents also provide an opportunity for invention and revision.

Submission

Paste the URL from the post on your IAC WordPress site into the field in the Canvas Assignment Page. Don’t hesitate to email me with any questions if you run into any technical problems.

 

Key Term Definition

Directions

Respond to the prompt in 400-500 words. Please include at least one in-text citation from the assigned class readings.

Prompt

The authors we have read so far this semester investigate terms key to environmental communication. For this short response, choose a key term from one of the readings (e.g., sustainability, risk communication, futurity, green infrastructure, etc.) and define the term according to both the author(s) we read. After you define the term, please respond to the following: how does the term you chose shape relationships between experts and audiences.

Tools

To set up your Blog go to https://classblogs20.iac.gatech.edu/wp-iac-signup.php (Links to an external site.). Please see the IAC Blogs How-To Slideshow for more on how to create and configure IAC Class Blogs.

Assessment

As long as you publish your post to your IAC WordPress class blog on or before the assigned time/date, you will earn full points per document. Remember these activities are designed to develop skills we will use throughout the class and in the major projects. The documents also provide an opportunity for invention and revision.

Submission

Paste the URL from the post on your IAC WordPress site into the field in the Canvas Assignment Page. Don’t hesitate to email me with any questions if you run into any technical problems.

 

Annotated Bibliography

Directions

Please cite and annotate 2-3 scholarly sources you plan to incorporate into the final draft of your Paper. Please see the Week 3 Supporting Materials and Class Plan for annotation models and how to locate and assess scholarly sources.

Prompt

Please respond to the following to compose your annotations:

  • 1. Cite the scholarly sources in APA format
  • 2. In 1-2 sentences provide a general overview of the aims/scope of the article or book chapter, e.g., what are the main claims/goals OR what hypothesis does the article test?
  • 3. In 1-2 sentences describe the qualifications of the author(s), e.g., what are their institutional affiliations and/or where was the article or book published?
  • 4. In 1-2 sentences explain the author(s) methodology and briefly cite a passage that supports your annotation of the article or book chapter. (You may want to choose a citation that you can also use in your Paper)
  • 5. In 1-2 sentences, evaluate the relative success of the article or book chapter, e.g., how well did the author(s) meet the goals they established for themselves AND/OR explain how well (or not) the article or chapter will support your research.

Tools

To set up your Blog go to https://classblogs20.iac.gatech.edu/wp-iac-signup.php (Links to an external site.). Please see the IAC Blogs How-To Slideshow for more on how to create and configure IAC Class Blogs.

Assessment

As long as you publish your post to your IAC WordPress class blog on or before the assigned time/date, you will earn full points per document. Remember these activities are designed to develop skills we will use throughout the class and in the major projects. The documents also provide an opportunity for invention and revision.

Submission

Paste the URL from the post on your IAC WordPress site into the field in the Canvas Assignment Page. Don’t hesitate to email me with any questions if you run into any technical problems.

 

Paper Draft

Directions

Please upload a 2-3 pages of your essay draft  to your peer review group in Canvas.

Prompt

How does the language experts use to transmit environmental devastation to various audiences constrain and enable both efficacious communication and the implementation of environmentally beneficial projects? To respond to this question choose and define a term or terms key to one or more of the readings for the first unit and develop your claim through the analysis of a project or communications campaign. Be sure to include citations from both the in-class reading at least 2 more academic sources.

Tools

To set up your Blog go to https://classblogs20.iac.gatech.edu/wp-iac-signup.php (Links to an external site.). Please see the IAC Blogs How-To Slideshow for more on how to create and configure IAC Class Blogs.

Assessment

As long as you publish your post to your IAC WordPress class blog on or before the assigned time/date, you will earn full points per document. Remember these activities are designed to develop skills we will use throughout the class and in the major projects. The documents also provide an opportunity for invention and revision.

Submission

Paste the URL from the post on your IAC WordPress site into the field in the Canvas Assignment Page. Don’t hesitate to email me with any questions if you run into any technical problems.

 

Proposal Abstract

Directions

Write a Project Summary OR Abstract to help you develop and hone your topic and begin collecting sources. You can complete the assignment in any tool you choose: just upload the URL from a blog post or Google Doc, .docx, or .pdf to the Canvas assignment page.

Prompt

Collect

  • Find: 2 or 3 source articles related to your group’s chosen topic, which include abstracts
  • Provide a citation for the article in APA

Analyze

  • Read: the abstracts carefully and skim the articles as needed
  • Identify: Is the abstract effective at conveying information, why or why not? What could have been included, but was not? What should have been excluded or replaced?

Write

Write an abstract for your Proposal, as you envision it so far, in 150-200 words. Be as thorough as possible at this early stage and follow the guidelines laid out in Hewitt:

    • Open with a statement of what work needs to be done/what problem needs to be solved
    • Describe the methods that will be applied to the problem
    • Encourage your audience to care about your project, i.e., the problem, and your solution
    • Explain the context of the problem (and also your solution)
    • Finally, describe your unique contribution AND/OR possible application of your solution



Tools

To set up your Blog go to https://classblogs20.iac.gatech.edu/wp-iac-signup.php (Links to an external site.). Please see the IAC Blogs How-To Slideshow for more on how to create and configure IAC Class Blogs.

Assessment

As long as you publish your post to your IAC WordPress class blog on or before the assigned time/date, you will earn full points per document. Remember these activities are designed to develop skills we will use throughout the class and in the major projects. The documents also provide an opportunity for invention and revision.

Submission

Paste the URL from the post on your IAC WordPress site into the field in the Canvas Assignment Page. Don’t hesitate to email me with any questions if you run into any technical problems.

 

Proposal Draft

Proposal Draft Peer Response Workshop

Group: Attach a draft of your Group proposal (as a .docx or .pdf file) to the Canvas Discussions Reply window (just one file draft per group) by Wednesday, March 10 at noon.

Individual: Each student needs to respond to one draft posted by another other group in their section by Friday, March 12 at 11:59 using the Canvas Discussions Reply function

Proposal Draft Requirements

  • Summary/Abstract, which can be adapted from the week 6 Blog Post
  • 2-3 pages of “Project Description”
  • References you have collected so far, list in APA format (approx. 3-5)
  • You may also want to block out or design the whole document, and just fill the unwritten sections with Lorem ipsum. Also, feel free to reuse the bios you wrote for the first Blog Post in both the draft and the final versions.

Peer Response Requirements

Choose a peer Proposal Draft posted by one of the other groups in your section, and respond to it by answering the following questions (approx. 10-12 sentences) in the Canvas Discussions Reply function:

  • What argument does the Proposal you read make in the Objectives and Significance section?
  • What problem does the Proposal you read plan to solve, and is the proposal explicit about how a lack of clear, consistent, multimodal language precipitates that problem?
  • What sort of verifiable evidence does the proposal cite and summarize in the Background and Needs section? Is it convincing, why/why not?
  • How will the proposed solution benefit its audiences?

Infographic Draft

Directions

Please upload your responses to the following (in a format that works best for your group, i.e. .pdf, .jpeg, etc.). Please note: This is a group activity. Please submit a single document with the content below.

Prompt

Part One
Respond to the following in (approx. 200) words: Who is the audience for your graphic? What is your topic? How has your topic been politicized due to a public communications failure? How does your infographic illustrate ways you redress communications failure? What does the graphic communication to audiences that other modes on your website do not?

Part Two

Create a basic Outline of your graphic: In a design tool of your choice, arrange Headings, Subheadings, and General Findings. Include a draft of 2-4 panels of your graphic OR a draft of 2-3 main visuals, (e.g. text boxes, charts, graphs, icons, etc.)



Tools

To set up your Blog go to https://classblogs20.iac.gatech.edu/wp-iac-signup.php (Links to an external site.). Please see the IAC Blogs How-To Slideshow for more on how to create and configure IAC Class Blogs.

Assessment

As long as you publish your post to your IAC WordPress class blog on or before the assigned time/date, you will earn full points per document. Remember these activities are designed to develop skills we will use throughout the class and in the major projects. The documents also provide an opportunity for invention and revision.

Submission

Paste the URL from the post on your IAC WordPress site into the field in the Canvas Assignment Page. Don’t hesitate to email me with any questions if you run into any technical problems.

 

Feature Story Drafts

Directions

For this individual Blog Post, please submit, a draft of your Feature Story for your Website Project. You are welcome to submit the Feature Story at whatever draft stage it is in, e.g if you only have a very rough draft, upload that OR you are welcome to upload a draft that is nearly complete. Please just submit as much (or as little) as you would like to receive feedback on. You are welcome to submit the draft a format of your choice.

For Your Consideration

As I explain in this week’s supporting materials and class session, a successful Feature Story should include the following rhetorical features: direct appeal to audience; strong opening lead; description of an otherwise overlooked topic, place, event; factual supporting evidence; background information; and a directive conclusion.

Tools

To set up your Blog go to https://classblogs20.iac.gatech.edu/wp-iac-signup.php (Links to an external site.). Please see the IAC Blogs How-To Slideshow for more on how to create and configure IAC Class Blogs.

Assessment

As long as you publish your post to your IAC WordPress class blog on or before the assigned time/date, you will earn full points per document. Remember these activities are designed to develop skills we will use throughout the class and in the major projects. The documents also provide an opportunity for invention and revision.

Submission

Paste the URL from the post on your IAC WordPress site into the field in the Canvas Assignment Page. Don’t hesitate to email me with any questions if you run into any technical problems.