ENGLISH 101: Composition & Reading

My goal is to help make your experience of our class valuable to your education and relevant to your everyday life. 

Please look over the details of our syllabus and let me know if you have any questions or concerns. I typically respond quickly to emails, pretty much always within 24 hours, though often within just a few hours. 

I look forward to working with you!  I hope you enjoy the course! 

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Instructor Contact Information


Course Overview Video & Course Description 


English 101 is a composition course that focuses on fundamental skills in reading and writing at the college level. Emphasis on exposition, argument, research, and information competency. A minimum of 5,000 words is required requirement, at least 2,000 of which must be research-based writing with MLA formatting and documentation. 


Course Learning Outcomes

Students successfully completing ENGL 101 should be prepared to

Course Expectations

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Support

Contact Me 

My office hours are as follows: 

In-Person: Tues & Thur (11 am-12:15 pm). These are in-person, face-to-face hours at my East Campus office (260E Founders Hall).

Online: Mon & Wed (11 am-12:15 pm). These are online hours. You can see me via Zoom, or you can email or call and expect quick replies during that time, though reply times will vary based on the volume of requests.

Zoom appointments are also available by request. For more information, see our Canvas home page.

The MJC library has face-to-face visiting hours, and this link has chat, text, call, and Zoom options to help with research and citation

Use Canvas Discussion Forums

Take advantage of our Canvas module that has an open space for "Course Q&A Discussion" and a virtual "Student Lounge."

Contact Classmates

Build a student support network by connecting with classmates.

Access Canvas Help & MJC Services

See the end of our syllabus for details about the Canvas Help Desk and MJC Support Services.

Course Theme:

Increasing Self Awareness

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Materials, Pace, Grades, and Extra Credit

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Required Reading Materials

Print copies of Cristina Henriquez’s The Book of Unknown Americans (ISBN #978-0345806406) are available for purchase at MJC’s East Campus Bookstore (and through online retailers). 

A print copy is required. It puts us all on the same page.

Success tip: have the book by the end of week eleven. 

All the rest of the reading for this course is either linked inside the course itself or connected to a homework assignment involving online research.


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Pace of the Class

A great thing about fully online courses is how they offer flexibility to work at the convenience of one's own schedule. But don't let that convenience slow you down. Please don't forget that all coursework is due according to the dates posted in our weekly modules. For easy reference, due dates for essays (including the final) are also listed below under "Essay Due Dates." Sometimes it's possible to work slightly ahead of our schedule, but you'll want to avoid falling behind. Staying on pace with the schedule helps keep us connected as a class as we read, discuss, draft, and do peer review activities. When you're on pace, it not only benefits you; it also benefits the class because when we move together we stay connected and motivate one another to keep going!

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If you ever find yourself falling behind, please don't hesitate to contact me.

Think of me as your coach: I'm here to support you, and often that means being flexible, but I'm also here to support your success, and sometimes that means being firm with policies and deadlines to encourage you to stay on track. I want you to be connected with the course, and I want to see you fly across the finish line at the end!

We're online, so stay connected! 

Basic Grading Information 

Course Grades are determined by five weighted parts: our four essays (one essay is the final) and the Other Work category, which refers to all our other coursework and activities, such as quizzes, peer review, group work, and other brief assignments. More details about grades are listed in our Canvas rubrics.

Essay 1 = 15%, Essay 2 = 15%, Essay 3 = 30%, Final = 20%, Other Work = 20%. 

Course Grades: 100-89.5% is an A; 89-79.5% is a B; 79-69.5% is a C; 69-59.5% is a D; Less than 59.5% is an F.

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Extra Credit

A little extra credit is offered on occasion, but it mainly serves students who have missed or submitted late some of our minor assignments. Extra credit in this class only adds points to the Other Work category, and if points exceed the maximum of that category, they cannot be transferred to essays. While extra credit can definitely boost the Other Work category, Canvas limits the maximum of that category to 100% when we reach the end of the semester.

Completing Assignments

"Other Work": Assignments That Help Prepare Us for Essays

This section addresses "Other Work," such as quizzes, group work, peer review, and brief submitted homework assignments. For information about essays, please see the next section.

Quizzes: Quizzes are included in this class to help ensure learning is happening along the way. They're incorporated in modules to enhance the learning process. More than one attempt, and sometimes unlimited attempts, are allowed because, more than anything else, the quizzes are there to promote learning. It really helps to take quizzes on time, but just in case students fall behind, quizzes can still be taken up to one week late (except when we reach week 15, the end of the semester. Our last quiz needs to be completed by its due date). 

Class and Group Discussions: Aim to submit posts and replies on time. Think about our goals of teamwork and class connection. When class discussion is submitted late, the class has already moved on. Instructions for discussion activities come with their own rubrics when they're assigned. In the rubrics, there's information about how each activity is assessed and scored, including if it's late. Late posts and replies don't earn as many points as work that's submitted on time, and late discussion work can only be submitted up to one week late (except when we reach week 15, the end of the semester. Our last discussion needs to be completed by its due date).   

Peer Review: Peer Review is a kind of group discussion project centered around drafts of essays. Like all group discussions, it's time sensitive, so much so that rough drafts and peer reviews need to be submitted on time to earn credit.

Brief Submitted Homework Assignments: This includes any brief work that isn't one of the activities above or a graded essay. Expectations for these, including matters of timeliness, are included in the rubrics accompanying them when they are assigned.

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Late Essay Policy

One essay can be submitted late, without penalty, but the late essay must be received within 72 hours (three days) of the essay's due date, and this policy only includes our first three essays, not the final.

If a late essay doesn't fit the description above (either because one late essay without penalty was already submitted by the student or because it's past the 72-hour deadline), it will still be accepted (up until the end of Week 14), but students need to notify me that I'll be receiving the work late, and it will be graded accordingly:

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Essay Revision Policy

Doing revisions for a higher mark can be a great learning experience, and this class offers certain opportunities for it, but all of the following limitations apply:

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Essay Due Dates

Important Administrative Dates:

Participation & Other Keys to Success

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The Importance of Participation

When students in online courses are enrolled but often are not "there" regularly participating, it goes against regulations put in place to support student education. Logging in by itself is not sufficient. If you miss five consecutive assignments, you may be dropped.

Participation is for the benefit of you and your classmates. 

Participation also helps me see who is present and how everyone is doing. Quizzes, for example, function as a kind of class survey for me to see how students are doing with the material. Your input matters!

Participation means staying involved in the course, and it includes doing assignments such as these:

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"The Core Rules of Netiquette"

We strive to create a welcoming and supportive learning environment for everyone, so please follow "The Core Rules of Netiquette" when interacting with me and your fellow students.

Improper conduct in any course-related communication will not be tolerated. Ask yourself, “Would I say this if I were at my desk at school?” If you are experiencing a communication problem with another student, please bring it to my attention.

Our netiquette goals, listed briefly, are below:

Note: You can find detailed explanations of our list of "The Core Rules of Netiquette" posted in our Course Introduction module on our Canvas site.

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Time Commitment

Be prepared for about 10 hours of work per week in this course. A three-unit "lecture" course, by virtue of what is known as the Carnegie Unit, mathematically establishes a standard amount of work expected from a student (and the instructor) in a 16-week course.

Reminder: Please contact me as soon as you can, in advance if possible, whenever you become aware of any issue that may prevent you from participating. I'm glad to help whenever I can. 

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Regular Substantive Interaction

To help make online courses the equivalent of face-to-face courses, online teachers are expected to demonstrate “regular substantive" faculty-student interaction. I'll address that instructional goal in this course in the following ways: 

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Enrollment/Drop Policy

To help ensure that students enrolled in our class are benefiting from being "there," present and participating, our class enrollment/drop policy works as follows:

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Academic Honesty

At MJC, we expect academic honesty and integrity in all of the work you submit. This means completing your own, original work for every assignment.

Course policy: Any assignment where academic dishonesty is involved may receive an F (zero points), which can result in the student failing the course and a report being filed.

For additional information, see the link below from MJC's Office of Student Conduct:

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Avoiding Plagiarism

In this course, plagiarism detection software such as Turnitin may be used on assignments you submit.

Plagiarism includes copying writing or even ideas from the published or unpublished work of another person without full, clear acknowledgment of the source. 

If you paraphrase or summarize ideas someone else deserves credit for, you must acknowledge that source even when you put those ideas into your own words. 

You are plagiarizing if you cut and paste bits and pieces of writing from the internet or any other source and make it appear as if you wrote those words. To include words of others, use quotation marks and cite sources. 

Plagiarism also includes copying from yourself--that is, turning in the material you wrote for another course or in a prior attempt of a course.

For more information on avoiding plagiarism, check out the brief videos and tutorials at the MJC Library link below: 

Artificial Intelligence Policy

Depending on the situation, using artificial intelligence (AI) can foster learning or reduce the likelihood it will occur. The way our assignments are currently designed, using AI is more likely to hurt than help students trying to strengthen their thinking and writing skills. (In the near future, this class will likely include AI--not as a shortcut but as a focus of study--but we're not quite there yet.) 

This is the English Department's AI policy: Unauthorized use of AI is considered a form of plagiarism. This means that AI-assisted work is not allowed in this course, except when the instructor approves of its use and the student acknowledges using it.

In our class, using AI (such as ChatGPT, Bing AI Chat, and the Bard) is not allowed, but students can use basic grammar-checking programs, such as Grammarly, to identify issues with spelling, punctuation, and grammar. In other words, students can use grammar detectors to check their own writing but not to compose their writing. Use of basic grammar checkers doesn't need to be acknowledged. More sophisticated AI tools, such as GrammarlyGO and other online paraphrasing tools, are not allowed because they can work against the goal of composing one's own writing when they instantly write or paraphrase a lot of text without a student's word-by-word involvement in the writing process.

If you have any questions about plagiarism or our artificial intelligence policy, please let me know. I'd be glad to help. 

Mental Health Support

I want this class to provide a positive educational experience, so it's my goal to create a safe and caring learning environment where students can do their best. At the same time, I recognize that it's not uncommon for emotional, psychological, and/or physical issues to create learning challenges for students. If you experience such issues, please don't hesitate to let me know. I'm here to help. We can also discuss campus resources available to students.   

TimelyCare 

MJC's Health Services website includes a variety of mental health resources,  such as this one: "Modesto Junior College students have FREE, 24/7 access to virtual care services with TimelyCare--the virtual health and well-being platform from TimelyMD, designed for college students." It also mentions that TimelyCare services include "TalkNow: 24/7 on-demand emotional support to talk about anything, including anxiety, relationships, depression, and school-related stressors." 

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Where to Find Help: Technical Assistance & MJC Services

MJC offers many valuable services for students. Here's an especially useful one for us:

CANVAS HELP DESK

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Let MJC help you succeed! 

In our Course Introduction module of our Canvas site, on the "Where to Find Help" page, there are many links to helpful MJC Services, including these:

For more MJC Student Services, you can also set up your Starfish account for integrated support services. For further information about Counseling, Health Services, the Career Center, Veteran Services, Student Government, ASC, and other resources, check out the link below:

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