THE ARTS CENTRE FOR ACADEMIC WRITING COURSES

The Centre is offering a number of group workshops dealing with the major elements of effective essay writing. All Arts students are welcome to enrol. We ask that you announce these course offerings to your classes.

THE REGISTRATION DATES FOR EACH OF THE FOLLOWING GROUP WORKSHOPS WILL BE POSTED IN THE CENTRE, ROOM S329, ROSS. STUDENTS ARE ADVISED THAT SPACE FILLS QUICKLY SO THAT SPEEDY ENROLMENT IS NECESSARY.

A. HOW TO DEVELOP A THESIS

This one-hour session will help you get a good start on your essays. Learn how to develop an effective thesis statement that tells the reader where you are headed. Monday October 17 @ 10:30 a.m. OR Tuesday October 25 @ 11:30 a.m.

B. WRITING ‘FROM THE GUT’ AND OTHER PRE-WRITING STRATEGIES

In this workshop we will prepare you to move from gut reactions – the emotional, visceral reactions you might have to a text – to writing down an actual response to an argument. This task will also help you build on good note-taking habits and critical thinking skills. Thursday October 20

@ 1:30 p.m.

C. ‘UNDER CONSTRUCTION’: THE PARAGRAPH

In this workshop we will prepare you to move from taking effective notes to constructing a basic paragraph. You’ll learn to identify topic sentences and then develop your own topic sentence and offer an expanded explanation of that topic. Fri October 21 @ 11:30 a.m.

D. ELIMINATING BASIC SENTENCE ERRORS

Do your essays come back with comments such as sentence fragment, run-on sentence, comma splice, or short choppy sentences? Learn to recognize and correct some of the most common errors of sentence structure. Tuesday October 18 @ 12:30 p.m. OR Wednesday October 26 @ 1:30 p.m.

E. QUOTATIONS

This session will look at the difference between quotation and paraphrase and when and how to use and cite both of these in an essay. Wednesday October 19 @ 11:30 a.m.

Please turn over....

F. STRATEGIES FOR BUSINESS WRITING

The objective is to help you become a better business writer, whether your audience is a professor, a TA or a businessperson. Audience, prewriting strategies, language, style, formatting, resources and the appropriateness of various communication channels to specific messages will be touched upon. Tuesday October 18 @ 2:30 p.m.

G. WHAT ARE TAS LOOKING FOR WHEN GRADING YOUR PAPER

A veteran TA, who has experience teaching in social science and humanities, will address the components that are integral to getting top marks on university level essays. Before lamenting “All marking is subjective, anyway,” learn some strategies to avoid abysmal results. Wednesday October 19 @ 2:30 p.m.

H. EFFECTIVE EDITING

Do you lose precious essay marks due to grammatical and stylistic errors? The Effective Editing Workshop will teach you to analyze your work logically and systematically to improve the quality and consistency of all your academic assignments. You will learn to assess content, correct common errors and proofread for accuracy. This is a hands-on workshop, so bring a writing sample and be ready to use what you learn right away! Thursday October 20 @ 2:30 p.m.

Students are welcome to enrol in any one or all of the above mini-courses, but please remind them that their signature is their commitment to attend.

For a copy of this flyer go to http://www.arts.yorku.ca/caw