Writing Coherence for AP and College-Level Writing, Grades 9-12
Unlock your potential for the challenges ahead!
8 class sessions, 1.5 hours per class (12 hours of instruction)
January 14 - March 4
Wednesday, 4:00 - 5:30 p.m. PST
Course Description:
Making it ALL “work”--How do we make sure our critical readers for AP and college-level writing understand exactly what we mean in our writing? How do we strengthen our writing so that it is vivid and poignant? How do we work all the requirements into something that communicates effectively? Our course focuses on strategies to help high school writers develop their skills with detail, specifics, and support, selecting the best kind of information to be clear and coherent. For those who crave to be understood (or want to avoid being misunderstood), who want strategies to read confidently for evidence that is required for their essays, who want to feel secure about having more to “say” in their work, who want to see what they say come across the way they intend, who want to benefit from tips to blend required texts with their creativity, imagination, and interpretation—this class is for YOU. Even more, for your inner scholar—because you will exercise powerful critical thinking and unlock your writing talent. You can discover the right clues to solve your writing “cases”—especially the experiences that will move you toward your college and career writing goals.
Students will use technology during instruction including MURAL, PREZI, and AI (GPTs) and will adopt the stance of a presenter to a “Shark Tank”-style audience.
Course Objectives
Students will:
Instructor Biography:
Ilona Missakian has taught both high school AP courses and college English classes in Southern California, specializing in composition and rhetoric. Missakian infuses all courses with the strategies from the UCI Writing Project that promote students’ skills in reading and writing and recently completed UCI’s Writing Pedagogy Certificate. Her recent activity in projects like i3 (Invention and Inclusive Innovation)--which embraces technology--and the Puente Project from U.C. Berkeley--which embraces culturally relevant content--have informed her approach to helping students shape their voices and craft effective communication. She enjoys working with all grade levels and individual learners to maximize their academic preparation. She has Master’s degrees in English and in Education, and a Ph.D. degree in Education, specializing in Language, Literacy, and Technology.
Making it ALL “work”--How do we make sure our critical readers for AP and college-level writing understand exactly what we mean in our writing? How do we strengthen our writing so that it is vivid and poignant? How do we work all the requirements into something that communicates effectively? Our course focuses on strategies to help high school writers develop their skills with detail, specifics, and support, selecting the best kind of information to be clear and coherent. For those who crave to be understood (or want to avoid being misunderstood), who want strategies to read confidently for evidence that is required for their essays, who want to feel secure about having more to “say” in their work, who want to see what they say come across the way they intend, who want to benefit from tips to blend required texts with their creativity, imagination, and interpretation—this class is for YOU. Even more, for your inner scholar—because you will exercise powerful critical thinking and unlock your writing talent. You can discover the right clues to solve your writing “cases”—especially the experiences that will move you toward your college and career writing goals.
Students will use technology during instruction including MURAL, PREZI, and AI (GPTs) and will adopt the stance of a presenter to a “Shark Tank”-style audience.
Course Objectives
Students will:
- Understand the role of specifics and support in writing to combat ineffective generalizations
- Understand the value of concrete language, description, examples, key quotes, and imagery; understand how to detect these features; and understand how to provide them in one’s academic writing
- Explore how evidence in readings and experiences can “beef up” how one presents ideas
- Gain insight about phrases that signal, connect, and clue-in the readers for meaning
- Read powerful writing samples and learn how to adapt the outstanding models into one’s writing style
- Practice expanding and enhancing ideas with different writing tools (both on documents and in digital formats)
- Collaborate on a class project to create a hypothetical community space for youth (and propose it to an audience of “investors”!)
Instructor Biography:
Ilona Missakian has taught both high school AP courses and college English classes in Southern California, specializing in composition and rhetoric. Missakian infuses all courses with the strategies from the UCI Writing Project that promote students’ skills in reading and writing and recently completed UCI’s Writing Pedagogy Certificate. Her recent activity in projects like i3 (Invention and Inclusive Innovation)--which embraces technology--and the Puente Project from U.C. Berkeley--which embraces culturally relevant content--have informed her approach to helping students shape their voices and craft effective communication. She enjoys working with all grade levels and individual learners to maximize their academic preparation. She has Master’s degrees in English and in Education, and a Ph.D. degree in Education, specializing in Language, Literacy, and Technology.