List of Instructional Activities

Here are some examples of activities that faculty sometimes do during SWS classes.

Teaching the writing process: 

• Model some aspects of the writing process. 
• Teach students how to create a rough draft, outline, or visual representation of their ideas. 
• Teach students a method of note-taking during the research process.
• Teach students how to holistically revise rough drafts to improve logic and clarity. 
• Teach students some time management strategies for getting to the writing. 
• Discuss and practice strategies to manage the stress associated with the writing process. 

Teaching an understanding of genre: 

• Critically analyze the typical genres (forms and types of texts) that professionals compose in this field. 
• Explain how you define an “A” paper. 
• Study well-written sentences and/or paragraphs. 
• Analyze an example of the kind of text that students were assigned to write.
• Discuss the writing style and structure of assigned readings. 
• Teach how to locate and use reliable sources of information. 
• Teach how to prompt LLM AI, how to verify its output, and how to cite it ethically. 

Teaching an awareness of audience: 

• Read and respond to a student’s draft as a whole class. 
• Teach students how to respond in helpful ways to classmates’ drafts. 
• Students respond to each other’s drafts.  
• Discuss the needs and expectations of readers. 
• Explain the purpose(s) of the writing assignments. 

Teaching the conventions of revised written English:

• Teach some of the conventions of revised written English. 
• Address the linguistic equality and power of different dialects of English.
• Teach students how to edit surface level mistakes. 
• Share your understanding of the mistakes students commonly make when writing.