Designing Writing Assignments You Actually Want to Read 

Of the many writing assignments I’ve taught, one stands out as particularly fun for me to read. In a technical writing course for STEM majors, the students wrote and illustrated instruction sets (manuals to walk a user through a process). This assignment sounds bland, but its secret spice was student choice. They could choose any process to write about, as long as they knew it well. Many chose to write instructions for dishes important to their family or culture, giving me a delightful window into their heritage. Other topics that linger in my memory years later include caring for orphaned baby rabbits, restringing a guitar, building a cornhole board, and creating a leather wallet. While some students chose more generic topics like changing a tire, many opted for subjects with rich connections to their lives, and I loved the chance to get to know a bit about their passions beyond academics.  

How does my story of enjoying student work compare to your recent experiences? Especially when you have 25, 50, or 100 assignments to respond to in limited time, “enjoyment” might not be a word that comes to mind. The situation worsens if all the student work sounds similar, whether that’s because the assignment doesn’t allow students to select a topic or because of overreliance on generative AI.   

Teaching necessitates reading and responding to student work, and I want to make that part of the job more fun for you. This semester’s series of writing-across-the-curriculum workshops culminates with Designing Assignments You Actually Want to Read (12/16, Wells Library and Zoom). After considering five features of engaging assignments, we’ll hear from several faculty members. Then, participants will have time to apply these ideas to their own spring assignments and exchange ideas with other attendees. Here’s a preview of the faculty speakers—hear more from them and get their materials at the workshop!  

Writing in Teams in a Large Humanities Course: Dr. Tim Bell, Media School 

One of Tim Bell’s regular classes is a 200-level film course enrolling 80 students. With so many students, offering assessments beyond exams or simple tasks requires some logistical ingenuity. He has used group writing projects regularly, in part to make the grading load manageable, and in part to help students practice teamwork. However, students’ default method of “teamwork” has entailed individually completing sections of the paper with little exchange or synthesis. This semester, he modified the assignment to encourage more conversation, reframing it as “Dueling Theoretical Lenses.” Each team member needs to argue for a particular lens, introducing a competitive element into the group that encourages them to read and respond to each other’s work. He has found this new framing yields essays he enjoys responding to. 

Grappling with Controversies in an Applied Field: Sarah Clark, Business 

Sarah Morin Clark gets students in her business writing course engaging with timely controversies in their field from Day 1. She selects an issue in the business world—for example, return-to-work mandates or artificial intelligence—and asks students to assume a role (e.g., boss or employee). Initially, she provides loose instructions to give students freedom to explore the issue. In a subsequent session, she asks students with different roles to share out their writing, so the “CEOs” can hear the “employee” perspectives and vice-versa, helping everyone better understand audience needs. She finds these exchanges and the process of circling back to this Day 1 assignment to be engaging for both her and the students. 

Learning through Writing in STEM: Dr. Heather Reynolds, Biology 

Writing is infused throughout Dr. Heather Reynolds’s 300-level class on biodiverse cities, which centers on community-engaged learning. But, as with many synchronous courses, students need to read outside of class to prepare for in-class discussions. To help them think through the readings, Dr. Reynolds assigns a low-stakes, writing-to-learn style assignment: a pre-class “engage” post in a Canvas discussion forum. She configures the forums to require that students post before they can see classmates’ responses, which she sees as encouraging individual reflection. The forum format ultimately allows everyone to read one another’s thoughts, providing a pool of ideas for class discussion, and giving her a view of each student’s understanding.
  

Get more inspiration for creating projects you and your students will enjoy by attending Designing Writing Assignments You Actually Want to Read (12/16 at 1 p.m.). For more resources, visit the Campus Writing Program. Sign up for the monthly WAC newsletter to learn about upcoming opportunities by emailing writing-l-subscribe@iu.edu.