COLLEGE NOW
ENGLISH BW

COURSE MATERIALS

To Our BW Students:

“American Dreams, American Voices” is a series of assignments specifically designed for students in the College Now program. We would like to tell you a few important things about these readings so that you take a more active role in adapting them for your own use.

One thing that you will soon notice is that the readings are relatively brief, and that they are in pairs. You’ll also notice that there are several different types of practice tests and essays based on these readings. All of these assignments begin with an interview from Studs Terkel’s American Dreams: Lost and Found. Mr. Terkel is a well-known journalist who has traveled with his tape-recorder all over the country, talking with people about their dreams, their failures, and their desires. After these readings, you will find numerous types of assignments that will require time and effort. Which of these assignments will you be doing? That will depend on you, your instructor, and an analysis of your goals.

Many of you will eventually be going to four-year colleges, and many of these schools will use “writing portfolios,” not just in English classes.  There are many skills that you will develop in college, but the major difference between high school and college students is their ability to read different kinds of complex texts and to use the Internet as a learning resource. Whether you are an accountant, a nurse, a lawyer, or an engineer, you will be asked to read and analyze different points of view about a professional situation. The “revised essay” assignments you will experience here represent the various forms of writing that you will do in college.

Today computer technology offers students a wealth of possibilities for learning more effectively.  Understanding how to use the Internet as a tool for learning is important for you as a student in the 21^st century. The skills you will learn in this course will be useful to you in your future courses and when you enter the workforce.

To help you enrich your learning experience and enable you to build your skills quickly, we have developed the ENG BW web site.  The site contains several different sections, each of which provides you with a variety of learning resources.

The Course Description section gives you a detailed description of the content and requirements of ENG BW.  You can find your course syllabus and other relevant materials in the Course Materials section of the web site.

The Assignments section lists weekly online assignments that you will complete in addition to the assignments from your print textbook. The Internet assignments are designed to teach you critical research skills and to build upon and expand your knowledge of the topics and issues presented in Terkel’s American Dreams, American Voices. Each of the assignments directs you to additional online readings that focus on key issues presented in Terkel’s text. Each week you will be asked to think deeply and critically about these issues and then to respond actively to them through writing.

While the Internet can be a very useful tool for research and study, first you must learn how to find information and then you must know how to determine whether that information is reliable and valid. You will develop these skills through the first online assignment, which is designed to teach you how to search for and evaluate information on the Internet.

The Search Resources section of the ENG BW web site gives you direct links to several different search engines so that you may continue to practice and perfect your online research skills.

In addition to the weekly assignments posted on the ENG BW web site, you will also find a section called Student Resources that contains links to sites that can help you build your writing skills. The resources linked from this page will offer you many opportunities to practice the various elements of writing. This page also contains links to resources that can help you practice and answer your questions about grammar and mechanics.

We know that you each will have something important to say about the issues presented in Terkel’s text. Therefore, we encourage you all to take advantage of the opportunity to share your work and your voices with a global audience. You can publish your writing on the Student Work section of the ENG BW web site.

We hope that you will enjoy working with the online materials in this course and that you will make use of the resources provided on the ENG BW web site to gain a richer, more rewarding learning experience.