Think of your first project as a kind of collage or quilt about yourself in relation to others. If you ever made a collage about yourself in elementary school, you probably drew or clipped from a magazine several pictures that represented something about you and then assembled them all together to form one image. If you’ve ever made a quilt (or at least looked at one closely), you know that a quilt is a weaving together of several different designs, prints, or patterns to make a whole.
For your first major writing project, you’ll create a narrative “collage” — a weaving together of written vignettes (brief stories) and, if you want, visual images. Your collage should illustrate and reflect on some aspect of your identity. You’ll think back through your own history and pull out several stories and images that will tell your readers something about who you are. You can share vignettes about one aspect of your identity, or you can weave together stories about several aspects of your identity.
Share at least two vignettes in your collage. Try to choose vignettes that relate to each other in some way; help readers see an overall theme or message in your collage.
Audience
Think of your audience for this collage as your classmates and teacher–as well as any other group (family? friends?) you might wish to share your work with. Try to make your writing come alive for your readers by using the narrative elements we’ll learn about during the Writing Project 1 unit of the course.
Format and Design
For this assignment, the formatting of the text is up to you. You may experiment with the font, font size, and spacing that work best for your purposes, especially in terms of helping readers understand where one vignette ends and another starts. (See the example collages posted in the learning modules on Blackboard.)
Process
See the infographic below for an overview of the process activities we’ll work through to create your collage, including:
Reading multiple sample collages and discussing their key features image that contains drawings to illustrate the process stages of Writing Project 1–the same process stages listed in the assignment prompt
Completing prewriting and planning activities for your own draft
Creating a first draft of your project
Getting and giving feedback on drafts
Revising your project
Designing the look of your project on the page/screen
Editing your project for clarity in terms of grammar, mechanics, etc.
Reflecting on and assessing your work
Evaluation
Your work will be evaluated based on the criteria established in the ENGL 1100 grading rubric. Specifically, you’ll be evaluated on how well you achieve the following:
RHETORICAL KNOWLEDGE: Convey a clear purpose for each vignette; provide sufficient information to meet audience’s needs; use language, voice, tone, stance, and level of formality appropriate to the audience and context
CRITICAL THINKING AND DEVELOPMENT: Reflect on some aspect of your identity; convey a clear theme throughout the collage; focus vignettes on brief, specific scenes or timeframes; use sensory images, description, dialogue to bring scenes to life for readers; meet word-count requirements
ORGANIZATION: Present an identifiable structure; design your collage in a reader-friendly manner; help readers understand the chronology of events; use visual cues to distinguish one vignette from another
CONVENTIONS OF STYLE AND USAGE: Achieve clarity in terms of style, sentence structure, mechanics, punctuation, etc.; use appropriate format. DOWN BELOW I WILL POST MY THOUGHTS ON WHAT I WOULD LIKE YOU TO WRITE ABOUT .
