English 101 at Illinois State University
Composition as Critical Inquiry
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Course Overview
“Composition as Critical Inquiry” (ENG 101) challenges students to develop a range of rhetorical and intellectual abilities.  Students learn how to analyze the multiple dimensions and meet the multiple demands of a variety of written rhetorical situations.  These dimensions and demands include:  topic, audience, purpose, forum, genre, media/technologies, ethos, and kairos (timing).  Students also develop an array of strategies to help them navigate any rhetorical terrain.  These strategies include:  reading, brainstorming, writing to learn and think, drafting, research (both textual and empirical), giving and receiving helpful responses, revision, editing and proofreading, publication, and critical reflection on one’s own rhetorical processes. 

Course Portfolio
Students complete several written projects in the course.  These projects require student writers to analyze a rhetorical situation, draft a rhetorical performance, gather responses from peers and their instructor, research, revise, and reflect on the entire composing process of that unit.  During the last few weeks of the course, students revise the texts they composed earlier in the course.  At the end of the course, students submit their ENG 101 portfolios, which include a minimum of 30 pages (about 8000 words) of revised writing, plus the final analytical text, for a minimum of 35 pages (about 9000 words) of polished writing.

Course Goals
Students in Composition as Critical Inquiry:

1. Develop strategies for critical inquiry, especially as it relates to rhetoric, writing, and information literacy.
2. Read critically for the purpose of using information and evidence to develop authority in their writing.
3. Use writing to learn.
4. Engage in the social and collaborative production of texts.
5. Write effectively for a variety of rhetorical situations (audiences, purposes, forums, etc.).
6. Identify and incorporate rhetorical, stylistic, and grammatical conventions appropriately.
7. Use technology effectively to compose texts and communicate with different audiences for a variety of purposes.

Four Learning Contexts for English 101 at Illinois State University

Rhetorical Processes—This learning context requires students to:

1. Become familiar with and practice various strategies for generating ideas, exploring specific topics, creating multiple drafts, revising and editing texts, and reflecting on their writing processes.
2. Consult with other writers about their own multiple drafts and respond to other writers’ drafts.
3. Evaluate the usefulness of other writers’ suggestions and incorporate appropriate suggestions into revisions of a text.
4. Use technology effectively to compose texts and communicate with different audiences for a variety of purposes.
5. Understand the differences between global and local revision.

Rhetorical Situations—This learning context requires students to:

1. Write for a variety of topics, purposes, audiences, exigencies, and forums in which they hold a personal and communal stake and interest, using varied genres and technologies.
2. Identify and incorporate rhetorical, stylistic, and grammatical conventions appropriately.
3. Demonstrate an awareness of intended audiences, purposes, and forums (etc.) for writing, and how those elements of the rhetorical situation must guide their writing decisions.
4. Revise their own texts radically and globally, and edit and proofread those texts meticulously, to meet the needs and expectations of varied rhetorical situations.
   

Research and Information Literacy—This context requires students to:

1. Develop ideas for research-worthy topics in dynamic and interactive conversations with other writers and relevant texts.
2. Make sound decisions about when, why, and how to conduct empirical (“primary”) and textual (“secondary”) research when composing texts.
3. Use appropriate research strategies to identify and integrate a variety of ideas from human, internet, and library resources into relevant, useful, original, and cohesive written texts.
4. Cite and document source materials correctly and ethically.
   

Rhetorical Analysis—This context requires students to:

1. Develop strategies to analyze various written and visual texts.
2. Identify the assumptions readers bring to encounters with new texts, ideas, and situations and analyze how those assumptions may shape their reading of and responses to those texts, ideas, and situations.
3. Analyze the effectiveness of the rhetorical, stylistic, and mechanical conventions of written and visual texts.
   

Final Portfolio and Analytical Text
After producing writing in these four contexts, students prepare a final portfolio that demonstrates achievement of the course goals (see “Course Portfolio” above for details of the portfolio’s contents). Students revise texts they produced earlier in the course as they write a final reflective text that synthesizes the contents of their portfolio and analyzes their ability to produce a variety of rhetorically persuasive texts.

ENG 101 and General Education
ENG 101 is one of the two courses that comprise the inner core of the Illinois State University General Education Program. For more information on the structure and requirements of the General Education Program, visit the General Education homepage.