Helpful Online Resources for WIC Instructors and Their Students

RESOURCE CATEGORIES
Comprehensive Web Sites
Assessment Criteria and Rubrics for Writing and Thinking
Devising Effective Writing Assignments
ESL Student Resources
Grammar and Spelling
Oral Communication Skills
Peer Review Guidelines
Research Paper Resources
Writing to Think/Writing to Learn

Comprehensive Web Sites

http://wic.oregonstate.edu
Oregon State's WIC Web site. Program information, newsletter archive, and teaching/writing resources for instructors and students, including a new link to discipline-specific "Grammar Errors and Solutions."

http://wac.colostate.edu/links/index.cfm?category=Teaching
An extensive listing of links to online resources for WAC instructors, on Colorado State's WAC Clearinghouse Web site.

http://www.owc.umn.edu/onlineresources.html
The University of Minnesota Online Writing Center's "Online Resource" page. Internet resources for instructors and staff address writing-intensive course development; teaching strategies; sample syllabi and assignments; and a bibliography of research. Online resources for students address the writing process; business, technical, and scientific writing; grammar and style; special topics; and samples of student writing.

http://www.ag.iastate.edu/grants/home.html
AgComm Clearinghouse site: "…for faculty who want to find ideas for improving their students' communication skills in agriculture and food sciences." Funded by the USDA and Iowa State. Includes these pages:

http://www.ag.iastate.edu/grants/strategies.html
Teaching strategies for improving students' communication: "Tips for incorporating communication activities into your classes to help students learn the course content." (Not limited to AgComm field.)

http://www.ag.iastate.edu/grants/courses/coursescurr.html
Courses that use communication to help students learn the material—and improve their communication. Links to course information, assignments, and other materials instructors might find useful.

http://www.ag.iastate.edu/grants/professions.html
"Virtual Visits with Professionals": interviews with agriculture and food science professions, "to give faculty and students an idea of the vast range of speaking and writing and designing that professionals do—and how they learn to do it on the job."

http://dianahacker.com/writersref/
Student "companion web site" for Diana Hacker's A Writer's Reference, Fifth Edition (Bedford St. Martins. Includes links to online writing exercises, research exercises, grammar exercises, and research and documentation guidelines. Also links to "Looking at Yourself as a Writer" problems and solutions related to writer's block, developing thesis statements, using passive voice, etc. (these are .PDF files).

Assessment Criteria and Rubrics for Writing and Thinking

http://pandora.cii.wwu.edu/cii/resources/writing/writing_rubric.asp
Western Washington University's "Discipline-Based Writing Rubric."

http://www.edb.utexas.edu/resta/cscl2002/syllabus/rubric_topicpaper.html
A useful grading rubric for papers, part of an online course called "Computer Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL)"—more information at http://www.edb.utexas.edu/resta/cscl2002/syllabus/

http://humanities.lehman.cuny.edu/WACAC/WAC-on-web.htm
Contains links to five writing assessment rubrics.

http://wsuctproject.ctlt.wsu.edu/ctr.htm
Washington State University's Critical Thinking Rubric, a "seven-dimension critical thinking rubric [developed] to provide a process for improving and a means for measuring students' higher order thinking skills during the course of their college careers." Useful for evaluating content of both formal papers and informal writing assignments. Faculty adaptations of the rubric for teaching and learning, history/humanities, physics, and crops and soils are available at http://wsuctproject.ctlt.wsu.edu/fa.htm.

http://www.owc.umn.edu/index.asp
University of Minnesota Online Writing Center's "Evaluation Criteria for Communication Assignments."
From the link above, select "Especially for Faculty & Staff" on the left hand side. Then select "Suggestions for Developing WI Courses," and finally select "Developing Evaluation Criteria."

Devising Effective Writing Assignments

http://web.mit.edu/writing/Faculty/createeffective.html#sequencing
"Creating effective writing assignments"—includes approaches to sequencing assignments. MIT site.

http://pandora.cii.wwu.edu/cii/resources/writing/writing_assignment_guidelines.asp
Western Washington University's "Writing Assignment Guidelines."

ESL Student Resources

http://wac.gmu.edu/teaching/esl.html
George Mason University WAC Web site's "ESL Resources" page.

http://a4esl.org/
Links to over 1,000 quizzes, exercises and puzzles to help develop English writing and language skills. Project of The Internet TESL Journal. Fun resource!

Grammar and Spelling

http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/
Website developed by Paul Brians, Dept. of English, WSU, clarifies hundreds of common word misspellings (consensus, embarrass, etc.), confusions (affect/effect, allude/elude, compliment/complement, immanent/imminent/eminent, principal/principle, etc.), redundancies ("point in time," "please RSVP," "PIN number," and other usage errors ("tongue and cheek," "second of all," "beyond the pail") in American English. Both entertaining and helpful; a good resource to point students to. (And by the way, if you're thinking there's something grammatically wrong with the last sentence, see Brians's "Non-Errors" page at http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/nonerrors.html, which includes an entry on "ending a sentence with a preposition.")

http://www2.ncsu.edu/ncsu/grammar/
North Carolina State's Online Writing Lab and Grammar Hotline no longer is in active service, unfortunately (lost its funding), but this web page contains some helpful tips and links to many other grammar resources.

Oral Communication Skills

http://www.onr.navy.mil/onr/speak_tips/
"Tips for Preparing and Delivering Scientific Talks and Using Visual Aids" - an excellent resource on public speaking, developed by The Oceanographic Society for the U.S. Office of Naval Research. Contrary to the title's assertion, these tips are NOT limited to scientific presentations.

Peer Review Guidelines

http://wac.colostate.edu/intro/pop2j.cfm
Colorado State WAC Program's "How can I get the most out of peer review?" page.

http://writing.colostate.edu/references/teaching/peer/index.cfm
Peer review recommendations from Colorado State University's writing center.

http://www.owc.umn.edu/index.asp
University of Minnesota OWL guidelines for implementing online ("virtual") peer review.
From the link above, select "Especially for Faculty & Staff" on the left hand side. Then select "Teaching Resources and Classroom Strategies" on the right hand side. Lastly, select "Using Virtual Peer Review through the Online Writing Center."

http://www.bedfordstmartins.com/technotes/workshops/peerview.htm
Bedford St. Martins "Strategies for Teaching with Online Tools" peer review page.

Research Paper Resources

http://ica.library.oregonstate.edu/Course_Assignment_Page/761
This page on the OSU Library site provides links to many sources students might use, especially in developing argument papers.

http://www.bedfordresearcher.com/index.cfm
;Welcome to The Bedford Researcher Web site, an interactive part of the The Bedford Researcher integrated system for teaching research writing in the electronic age. Use this site to manage all aspects of your research project using the Research Log-a structured electronic portfolio with built-in advice-below. The site also includes interactive tutorials, research activities, checklists, student writing samples, and links to other online research resources."

http://www.dianahacker.com/resdoc/
Diana Hacker's (A Writer's Reference, fifth ed., Bedford St. Martins) suggestions for locating and documenting sources for research papers in the humanities, social sciences, history, and sciences (MLA, APA, Chicago, and CBE styles, respectively). Sample research papers showing proper documentation.

http://www.aresearchguide.com/
"The goal of this Web site is to provide all the necessary tools for students to conduct research and to present their findings."

And not to be missed by students and instructors alike:

http://www.millikin.edu/staley/fluff/peep_research.html
"Peep Research: A Study of Small Fluffy Creatures and Library Usage" conducted by Susan Avery and Jennifer Masciadrelli, Office of Fluffy Research, Staley Library, Millikin State University:
"Although scientific and health research has been conducted on Peeps, most notably that appearing on the Peep Research website (see http://www.peepresearch.org), we have noted an absence of research focusing on the ability of Peeps themselves to actually do research. To address this lack, we invited a small group of Peeps to visit Staley Library at Millikin University during the week of March 17-21, 2003 so that we could more closely observe their research practices. This was determined to be an ideal week for the Peeps to visit the library, as Millikin University students were on spring break. The research that follows documents their visit to the library and provides some evaluative commentary on our assessment of Peeps and library usage."

Writing To Think/Writing To Learn

http://wac.colostate.edu/intro/pop2d.cfm
Colorado State WAC Program's "What Is Writing To Learn?" page, with links to classroom and computer-based WTL activities, WTL evaluation strategies, print resource bibliography, other WTL Internet sites, and more.

http://pandora.cii.wwu.edu/cii/resources/writing/writing_as_thinking.asp
Western Washington University site: Strategies for "Using Writing as Thinking: Question->Hypothesis->Question."

http://pandora.cii.wwu.edu/cii/resources/writing/writing_to_learn.asp
http://pandora.cii.wwu.edu/cii/resources/writing/using_writing_to_learn.asp
Western Washington University writing-to-learn sites. WTL strategies and activities.

This resource list was compiled by Tracy Ann Robinson, OSU WIC Program, October 2003. This is a list-in-progress. I welcome feedback and recommendations for additional links. Please email your comments/suggestions to WIC Web Ms.@oregonstate.edu