This French upper-division course is required of all French majors and serves as the exit course. It is worth 3 credits and it has always been taught F2F. I am in the process of turning it into a Hybrid course, and soon one of my colleagues will be developing it as a fully online course. It fulfills the Baccalaureate Core requirement for the WIC category. It does so through formal and informal writing assignments and substantial revisions. Formal writing assignments include drafting and revising a 2000-word paper in French over the course of the term. Informal writing assignments consist of weekly in-class and online short texts in the different genres studies in class, including description, summary, narration, review, argumentation, information, etc. This course also aims to foster cultural awareness and literacy by presenting new voices, issues, and perspectives from France and the Francophone world. Students’ analytical and critical skills will be thoroughly solicited. Active participation is expected.
Unlike my other advanced classes which all focus on content (literature, culture, cinema, history, etc.), this WIC course centers around writing, even though we rely heavily on texts in various disciplines (journalism, literature, history, film, etc.). So, in class we combine mini-lectures with several writing activities. We also review advanced grammar as it is an essential element of writing.
The course is conducted primarily in French. Each week will be devoted to a specific genre of writing. Tuesdays are reserved for lectures, lessons on writing techniques, student presentations. The online part is reserved to complete writing assignments and peer reviews.
I am convinced that the Hybrid version will improve the quality of this course, thanks mostly to some of the features on Canvas, such as “Collaborations” and “Discussions.” Through experimentation, I realized that specific activities like peer-reviewing are better performed online. Class time will then be devoted to explanation of writing techniques, advanced grammar, and discussions of challenges, problems, etc.
