FAME: Sustained Writing Assignment < Genres of Writing

Sustained Writing Assignments:
Research Papers, Critical Writing, Creative Writing

The most common sustained writing activity in college classrooms is the research-based term paper.

"Research" asks students to engage in their own ongoing search. Research typically involves a longer paper that is due near the end of an academic term. It usually involves additional study and sources beyond those provided in the classroom. Research may come from traditional library resources, the World Wide Web, public records, observation or interaction with people, etc. This kind of writing will ideally be "sequenced" for the student by having them create drafts or parts of the whole assignment before the final complete paper is due. Other forms of sustained writing include:

Annotated bibliographies:

An annotated bibliography is an expanded bibliography that is best connected to a larger research project or paper. Such bibliographies provide notes on a select number of sources around a subject, and they can develop the following skills: searching library sources; evaluating and analyzing sources; using citation formats; reading comprehension; formulating research questions. The annotations of sources may be descriptive, simply describing the general points of the source, or evaluative, offering quality judgments of the source's usefulness based on certain criteria—or some combination of both. Annotations are typically of equal length; this length may vary from one sentence to a complete paragraph.

For some examples of annotated bibliography assignments (and how they can be sequenced) with other writing assignments, visit the assignment and syllabus bank of the Ohio State University's First-Year Writing Program:
http://english.osu.edu/programs/fywp/teacher_resources.htm

Arguments:
An argument asks a writer to attempt to persuade an audience to adopt a certain position or behave in a certain way. In the Little Rhetoric and Handbook (Wiley, 1977), Edward P.J. Corbett outlines how argument requires a writer/speaker to achieve any one or more of the following ends:
- To reinforce the reader's present position;
- To persuade readers to modify their present position;
- To persuade readers to reject their present position and to adapt another one;
- To persuade readers to act in a certain way;
- To dissuade readers from acting a certain way.
Critical Reviews:
Writing a critical review can be a basic step in doing larger research; thus, it can be a sequenced assignment leading up to a larger research paper, or it can stand alone. A critical review is a kind of extended annotation of a bibliographical source. Students are asked to summarize the content of the original source (description) but also to evaluate the source according to some established criteria. Book reviews in academic journals or newspapers make good models for students in completing such an assignment.
Analytical Essays:
An analytical essay requires a student to make an organized critical assessment of certain elements and effects of a given text or set of texts. The elements and effects to be analyzed should be predetermined by the student (before he/she begins to write an analysis) or given by the instructor. For example, students might be asked to analyze the strategies a given author uses to make his or her argument in a newspaper editorial, or might be asked to analyze the research methods used in various disciplinary approaches to an issue such as teenage pregnancy (by looking at several articles from several different fields), etc.
Creative Works:
Creative writing assignments can often work to enable students to make connection between the course material and their personal lives. Furthermore, translating course content into a creative medium can be a fun and educational way for students to come to deeply understand complex concepts. Examples of creative assignments include:
- Poems
- Plays
- Short stories
- Personal essays
- Memoirs/ autobiographical narratives
- Creative non-fiction