In my current position, I teach English primarily as composition and rhetoric. For most of my students, my class is their first experience with college level-writing. I’d like to think about ways to incorporate current open-source digital tools into the comp/rhet classroom with specific ideas for assignments, daily writing, and connection outside the classroom. Some ideas for assignments I’ve been tossing around are: using Wordle to analyze articles, the 140 character thesis statement, using Storify to learn about and manipulate the traditional “Argument by Definition”, using Zotero to organize readings and bibliography groups, and using games and gaming as an overarching theme for a writing course. I’m interested in collaborating with others about how to use open source digital tools (some of which have largely been employed for literary analysis, but I think could be adapted for comp/rhet) in order to expand the boundaries of the traditional comp/rhet classroom.
Great idea, Rebecca! There appear to be a lot of potential overlap between this idea and Shawn’s, in which he proposed integrating DH and the First Year Writing Course. Sounds like the two of you can lead this discussion!