UPDATED 8/21/07
"Only connect! That was the whole of her sermon. Only connect the prose and the passion, and both will be exalted, and human love will be seen at its height. Live in fragments no longer.” E. M. Forster, Howards End (1910), ch. 22
"We go for a walk in nature, we see a beautiful sunset — we breathe the order in through our senses, we feel connected. The inside begins to mirror the magnificent outside. In the Vedic tradition that connectedness is called 'yoga.'”
Chris Adamason, Vedic Architecture
‘One day when I was twenty-three or twenty-four this sentence seemed to form in my head, without my willing it, much as sentences form when we are half-asleep, ‘Hammer* your thoughts into unity’. For days I could think of nothing else and for years I tested all I did by that sentence [...]”* William Butler Yeats, Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature (*cited in Frank Tuohy, Yeats, 1976, p.51 )
"If I Had a Hammer .... I'd hammer out love between my brothers and my sisters/ All over this land” words and music by Lee Hays and Pete Seeger
FS 301, First-year Seminar , Explore
U. T., Fall 07
Unique No. 66915
Computer-Assisted Instruction*
Substantial
Writing Component**
2-3:30 PAR 6
office hours: Tu. + Thur.: 9:45-10:45
and
by appointment.
one of the inspirations for this course:
“Larger universities must find ways to create a sense of
place and to help students develop small
communities within the larger whole.” Carnegie’s Reinventing Undergraduate Education: A Blueprint for America’s
Research Universities (http://notes.cc.sunysb.edu/Pres/boyer.nsf)
We will introduce you to some of the key values and places of the university. We will focus on three values -- Discovery, Leadership,and Diversity -- and we will create a sense of this state, this town, and especially this university, as your place, your Alma Mater (nurturing mother). The places we may explore include the Humanities Research Center, the Blanton Art Museum, the Story of Texas Museum, Waller Creek, the Tower, Tower Garden, Battle Hall, Sutton Hall, the Littlefield Home, the L. B. J. Library, and J. Frank Dobie’s house.
Inspired by the Discovery Learning program of the College of Natural Sciences, as you explore “your place,” you will write answers to basic questions about your self and your environments, such as "why am I here?"; “what is this?”; “where did it come from?”; and “why is it here?” We will discover that objects around us are palimpsests with layers of meaning we can trace through time back to other eras and other places. Some class meetings will devoted to drawing and writing about nature, buildings, and works of art on campus; buildings downtown; the Japanese garden, and Hindu and Buddhists temples in and around Austin.
We will begin with the origin and purpose of universities in general, and this one in particular, and get to know its alumni and faculty who have made it famous, setting leadership examples for us all.To deal with the stress of the first semester, we will read Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass as a commentary on undergraduate life as well as selections from Newman, Giametti, Brickley, Arnold and others on the purpose of university education.
Writing
About 50% of the final grade will be determined by the multimedia web projects: 10% for Project 1 —100 points; 20 % each for Projects 2 and 3 — 200 points each. 14% will come from the portfolio grade (140 points). 36% will be determined by informal writing (360 points), primarily the Discussion Board entries. 10% will come from class participation (100 points); "class participation" includes the art of listening as well as speaking in public. 1000 points (out of 1,200 or more) are required for an A-; 900 for a B-; 800 for a C-; 700 for a D-. Because more than 1200 points will be available, students can emphasize formal over informal writing or vice versa, class participation more than the portfolio, etc. At the end of the course, students will receive exactly the grade recorded in the online gradebook, even if it is one point short of the next higher grade.
Students’ "formal writing," their
multimedia web projects, will focus on their role model(s). For these assignments
especially, students should be prepared to think for
themselves. Discovery learning
means that there will be fewer instructions for projects than what students
may be used to from other courses. This can be frustrating for some, especially
those who want a detailed formula that will guarantee them a good grade.
Instead students will be encouraged to be creative and write about what
is most important to them. Initial grades and comments on the projects will
be made online by the other students in the class, with the instructor
then focusing on polishing the final drafts. Rewriting and preparing
almost perfect final
drafts will be stressed. Because the secret of writing is rewriting, procrastination
will be heavily penalized. Obviously, time management is essential.
PRINT LITERACY
Printed Texts for the first semester consist of the course anthology*, the Annotated Alice (Pub: Norton, 0-393-04847-0); and Lester Faigley’s The Little Penguin Handbook (Pearson Longman 2007 032124401X).
BUY ONLY THESE EDITIONS. Pts. will be awarded for bringing these editions to class.
*FOR THE FIRST ASSIGNMENT, students
will need the course anthology, a collection of xeroxed materials from
Jenn's, 2000 Guadalupe (basement of the Church of Scientology at 22nd ,
473-8669). It will cost from $40 to $50. Jenn’s takes major credit
cards, of course. If you don’t get there within the first few days
you might want to call ahead to make sure they have a copy reserved
for you (sometimes they do not print them all right away).
VERY IMPORTANT INFORMATION:
**SWC: All students are required to pass at least two substantial writing component courses to graduate from U.T. All First-Year Seminars are substantial writing component courses. " To be certified as a substantial writing component (SWC) course, the following criteria must be met: 1 The course must include at least three writing assignments per semester, exclusive of exams and quizzes. 2 The three or more writing assignments must total approximately 16 typewritten, double-spaced pages (about 4,000 words.) 3 A major rewriting of an assignment that requires additional original writing and not merely editing can be considered a separate assignment. 4. Students must receive timely and detailed critique following each writing assignment concerning the quality of their writing and suggestions for improvement. 5 The performance on the writing assignments must be an important component of the student’s course grade." (http://www.utexas.edu/provost/policies/writing/)
Only two of these
courses need be passed in your U. T. career. So it may not be a good idea
to take one your first semester if writing is not your strong suit. In the
first semester, many students make the mistake of studying like they did
in high school and/or trying to do too many extracurricular activities, with
the result that they fail out of U.T. or start off in a big hole. This is
especially true if they take a substantial writing component course in that
first semester without realizing all the work involved. For example, I only
know one student, a valedictorian of Strake Jesuit, who was able to both
join a fraternity and do well in a SWC course in his first semester. All
the others in that situation I have known have had to choose between the
two.
*DIGITAL LITERACY
Because two of the "Five Characteristics of a Successful Student at U.T." are *"Good computer skills" and **"Strong writing skills," we will emphasize digital as well as print literacy. We will use U.T.'s Blackboard software (courses.utexas.edu) to receive and send email several times a week, and to post and reply on its Discussion Boards. You will also save your writing documents as multimedia web projects and upload them to U.T.'s Webspace or a similar system and to the SWORD peer editing system. Finally, you will produce an electronic portfolio of your work in the course on a CD. The latter will include some of the materials you have submitted to Facebook, where we will have a closed group "to help students develop a small community within the larger whole"(Carnegie's Reinventing Undergraduate Education: A Blueprint for America’s Research Universities).
Another small community we will create will be on Second Life, where we will create avatars of our role models. For one session in Second Life students will “become” their role models and interact with other leaders. The transcript of that discussion will be then help them revise their writing projects on their role models.
If students believe they will need more training in digital literacy, theyare encouraged to sign up as soon as possible for some of the free classes and workshops offered by ACITS, TeamWeb, or the General Libraries. See
http://www.utexas.edu/computer/classes/
http://www.utexas.edu/cc/training/handouts/tutorials.html#internet
previous incarnations of the course
06 version: http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~bump/FS3013/
05 version: http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~bump/FS3012/
04 version: http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~bump/FS3011/
03 version: http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~bump/FS301/
About the
Professor
Jerome
Bump has been a Woodrow Wilson Fellow and a National Endowment for the
Humanities Fellow. He was
awarded the Jeanne Holloway Award for undergraduate teaching, the
Dad's Association Centennial Teaching Fellowship for instructing
Freshmen, the Rhodes Centennial Teaching Fellowship for directing
the Computer Writing and Research Laboratory (devoted primarily to
lower division instruction), and chosen as a Mortar Board Preferred
Professor. He is the author of Gerard
Manley Hopkins and
sixty chapters and articles. For more information
about him, his teaching philosophy, or his courses see http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~bump/
