English 2: Reading & Composition 

About This Class

How and when to attend our first week: 

Our class materials will be open to you on Canvas beginning on Monday, August 27th at 7:00 a.m. You will be expected to log in and begin participating in our course discussions before the end of the day on Tuesday, August 28th. This is so that I know you still intend to attend the course. Since this class is asynchronous, you attend by logging in and participating in the online discussions. 

How this course works: 

• There are no set class times or required Zoom meetings. Instead, you will access course materials on your own schedule each week. The course is 17 weeks long, including finals week. 

• There are 18 Modules for the course--one for each week plus an Orientation Module. In each Module, I provide short videos in which I demonstrate and provide tips about how to do the assignments. 

• Every week will follow the same schedule: You will do two Discussion Posts, including responding to two of your classmates. For most discussions, you will read and/or watch 1-3 short videos or essays. The first discussion is due by the end of the day (11:59 pm) on Tuesday and the second is due by the end of the day on Thursday, with your replies to other students due by the end of the day on Friday. 

• If these are not good due dates for you, you may submit Discussion posts and replies by the end of the day on Sundays.  

• Larger essay assignments will be completed in steps following this same pattern of two posts a week. Our course syllabus will tell you more about all of this. 

Communication Essentials

How to communicate with me:

Canvas Inbox is the best way to communicate with me. You may also email me at hensonle@butte.edu.

You can expect a response within 24 hours on school days (Monday-Friday, except holidays) and within 48 hours on weekends. I am usually much faster than that, however. Monday-Thursday, I'm generally available to respond between 10:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. as well as between 3-5 p.m. On most Fridays, I'm generally available between noon and 5 p.m.  

How to share questions and answers with other students: 

I have created a Q&A Discussion for students to help each other with general questions about the course and assignments. This discussion will always be open for you. I encourage you to share your questions as well as to respond to other students' questions in the Q&A Discussion.

Week One Success Kit

The Pact

What you can expect of me:

1. As your teacher, I will respond to your questions within 24 hours and provide individualized support in response to your needs.

2. I will provide feedback on your assignments by the end of the weekend after they are submitted.

3. I will create and maintain an inclusive environment that will allow everyone to focus on learning. 

4. I will use my discretion to ensure all students are safe from disrespectful treatment and have the opportunity to learn in a supportive environment.

5. I will actively seek your feedback and when possible, make changes in response to your needs. 

6. I understand that you are busy and that you have many competing priorities. When needed, I will be flexible to support your successful completion of this course.

7. I will actively check in on you if you miss assignments without notifying me. This is not to penalize you but to help you stay on top of assignments so you can complete this course successfully. 

What I will expect of you:

1. You will log into our course each week no later than Monday evening to evaluate the work and due dates in the current module.

2. Each week, you will devote about 12 hours of time to the coursework and assignments.

3. You will aim to submit all assignments on time. If you identify a concern with meeting a due date, you will contact me directly early in the week to discuss your concern and come to an agreement about an extension if needed.

4. If necessary, you will apply feedback to assignments and resubmit them to earn a completion.

5. You will be brave and challenge yourself to lean into discomfort. This is the space where growth occurs.

6. You will challenge yourself to try new things, keep an open mind, and recognize that mistakes are a vital part of the learning process. We all make them and we will celebrate them together.

7. You will interact thoughtfully with your peers, being mindful of the assumptions we can all make about others and taking extra care to show respect for diverse perspectives.

Teaching Philosophy

Learning happens when people feel safe to try new things. You can't feel safe if you're worried about getting laughed at, disrespected, or punished because you made a mistake or interpreted something differently. That's why I actively welcome differences in the classroom! That includes differences of nationality, ability, gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, language, immigration status, religious belief, or anything else. Supporting each other's differences improves the learning environment for everyone! We all think differently. Learning different perspectives gives us more ways to understand any topic. So I encourage students to be their bravest, best, most authentic selves in my classes. To make that safe, I make sure everyone is treated with respect, and I grade based on learning and effort over the whole semester, not on what you already know coming in or on one assignment you didn't understand the first time you tried it. By treating everyone respectfully, we can challenge each other to learn and grow together, even when we see things differently.

Course Goals

Upon successful completion of this course, the student should be able to:

1. Read, analyze, and evaluate a variety of primarily non-fiction, diverse texts for content, context, and rhetorical merit with consideration of tone, audience, and purpose.

2. Apply a variety of rhetorical strategies in writing unified, well-organized essays with arguable theses and persuasive support. A minimum of 5000 words of formal writing will be required.

3. Develop varied and flexible strategies for generating, drafting, and revising essays.

4. Analyze stylistic choices in their own writing and the writing of others.

5. Write timed/in-class essays exhibiting acceptable college-level control of mechanics, organization, development, and coherence.

6. Integrate the ideas of others through paraphrasing, summarizing, and quoting without plagiarism.

7. Find, evaluate, analyze, and interpret primary and secondary sources, incorporating them into written essays using appropriate documentation format.

8. Use style, diction, and tone appropriate to a diverse academic community and the purpose of the specific writing task; proofread, edit, and revise essays so English grammar, usage, and punctuation do not impede clarity.

My Advice For Success

From past experiences, the following tips have helped many students be successful in online learning. Here are a few of the tips to help you be successful too! 

1. Canvas works best when using Chrome, so take a minute if you haven't already and download Chrome now.

2. Log in to the course each Monday to get yourself oriented and organized by taking notes of assignments due. Adding due dates to your calendar (digital works best) will help keep you on track. 

3. Give yourself grace. You are not expected to know everything up-front. Each lesson will build on the next. If you continue to do the readings, complete assignments, and ask questions you will be successful in this course. 

4. Acknowledge your strengths in everyday communication and other areas. This will help you to be more open to the vulnerable feeling of learning new things.

5. Login multiple times throughout the week and start on the course homepage. This will change each week and will provide you with the information you need for that week. 

6. Be sure to have Canvas notifications enabled so you get alerts for new announcements. You'll learn how to do this in the "Orientation" module. I will post announcements during the week with helpful reminders or changes that may arise during the course. 

7. If you are not able to meet a due date due to an unforeseen circumstance, please contact me immediately. We'll look at a possible extension that will support you but also keep you on track for success.

8. While technology and academics can be frustrating at times, you will find there's a lot of experience in our group, so post a question in the Q&A discussion and someone will get you the answer you need. We all want you to stay on track and be successful!

9. Reach out to your instructor. I am here for you and want to help! This may be something for the course or if you need additional resources. I will do my very best to get you connected to the right resources.

Support for You