GE Program Goals

A1 Educational Objectives and Criteria - Introduction

The three lower-division courses in Area A provide a foundation in the skills of clear thinking, speaking, and writing. Courses in this area provide extensive practice in the principles, skills, and art of reasoning in both oral and written communication. Writing and speaking are fundamental modes of expression that rely on the principles of rhetoric and clear reasoning, and instruction in logic is an essential support for these modes. The sequence assumes that the mastery of reasoned communication must be developed and practiced over time and that this mastery is crucial to students' success at the university and beyond. By placing basic skills in a larger context, these courses also provide a vision of why this area is an important component of general education.

Lower-division courses in A1 must fulfill EACH of the following objectives:
After completing the first foundation course in writing, students are expected to have achieved facility in expository writing and should have an enhanced ability to:

A1:  Lower-Division Educational Objectives

EO 1   explore and express ideas through writing;

EO 2   understand all aspects of the writing act--including prewriting, drafting, revision, editing, and proofreading--and their relationship to each other;

EO 3   assess the writer's audience and apply the appropriate organizational approaches and language;

EO 4   recognize that writing and rewriting are necessary to the discovery, clarification, and development of a student's ideas;

EO 5   write essays that are clear, unified, coherent at all levels, and free of significant errors in grammar and spelling;

EO 6   read critically to derive rhetorical principles and tactics for the student's own writing;

E7   understand the importance of ethics in written communication.

Lower-division courses in A1 must meet EACH of the following criteria:
The course proposal and expanded course description must clearly indicate how the course will include at least 4,000 words of original writing for evaluation and provide both instruction and practice in:

A1:  Lower-Division Criteria

CR 1  the writing process (including prewriting, drafting, revising, editing, and proofreading);

CR 2  structuring effective paragraphs which focus on a single issue and reflect both unity and coherence;

CR 3  the major organizational approaches to expository writing (e.g. comparison and contrast, process, classification and division);

CR 4  writing expository essays (which incorporate narration and description) that are appropriately adjusted to the writer's audience;

CR 5  precise and concrete usage with the appropriate levels of diction, voice, imagery, and figures of speech adapted to the intended audience;

CR 6  the use of standard grammar and punctuation;

close critical reading;

CR 7  critically assessing students' own and others' papers;

CR 8  writing both in- and out-of-class analytic essays (with approximately one-third of the course exercises involving "speeded" writing).