- W1: J 13-19
- W2: J 20-26
- W3: J 27 - F 2
- W4: F 3-9
- W5: F 10-16
- W6: F 17-23
- W7: F 24 - M 2
- W8: M 3-9
- W9: M 10-16
- W10: M 17-23
- W11: M 24-30
- W12: M 31 - A 6
- W13: A 7-13
- W14: A 14-20
- W15: A 21-27
- W16: A 28 - M 4
- W17: M 5-11
January 14
Read (emailed PDFs):
- Bitzer, “The Rhetorical Situation”–scanned
- Vatz, “The Myth of the Rhetorical Situation”–scanned
- Biesecker, “Rethinking the Rhetorical Situation from Within the Thematic of Differance“–scanned
January 14
- Freewrite: What is a network?
- Write non-stop for 4 minutes
- Circle 2-3 key/focus words
- Write again for another 4 minutes
- Circle 2-3 key/focus words
- Enter everything into Google form to share with class (the results)
- intro course/syllabus (late work policy)
- discuss readings: Popplet mindmap of the rhetorical situation – In groups of 3-4, draw the rhetorical situation of a given rhetorical situation based on the assigned reading.
- What is to be learned from comparing them?
- What do they each miss that is critical to the rhetorical situation as you see it?
- Do you buy it; is “the rhetorical situation” a form of network, why or why not?
- upcoming work:
- Shared Scanned Reading Folder (Google Drive)–email Shelley your preferred
- Introduce “reading notes” assignment (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
- Introduce “mindmap assignment” (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
- weekly asynch activity (see below)
- due 1/21: How Stuff Works (select topic); assign How Stuff Works? Reading Activity Prompt
- due 2/4: Digital Writing Assessment & Evaluation (select chapter)
- Ticket Out
January 19
- Pick your object for the Case Studies project (check under “Assignment Prompts” for more details).
- Email Shelley with the URL to your blog.
January 20
- Read:
- Assigned section from How Stuff Works? (check How Stuff Works? Reading Activity Prompt)
- start Foucault, Archeology of Knowledge (Part 1 & 2)
- Reading Notes (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
January 21
- Synchronous class canceled due to forecast of snow.
- Post your blog entry for the How Stuff Works? Reading Activity Prompt
January 26
- Read one another’s blog entries for the How Stuff Works? Reading Activity Prompt
- Complete all of the Asynchronous Activities about the various How Stuff Works? Topics.
- Update your MindMap.
- Email “signed” syllabus contract document (from your official ODU email to Shelley’s official ODU email)
- Complete the Ticket Out

With or without context
Cropped Creative Commons licensed image posted at Flickr by mike
January 27
- Read: finish Foucault, Archeology of Knowledge
- Reading Notes (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
January 28
- Comments from Last Week’s Ticket Out–we adapted tonight’s activity based on your comments
- Foucault Activity Worksheet
- upcoming work
- Ticket Out

Creative Commons licensed image posted at Flickr by mike
February 2
- Update your MindMap.
- Complete Foucault Activity Worksheet

Networks of knowledge making in class!
February 3
- Read:
- Miller, “Genre as Social Action”–scanned
- Miller, “Rhetorical Community: The Cultural Basis of Genre”–scanned
- Bazerman, “Speech Acts, Genres, and Activity Systems: How Texts Organize Activity and People”–scanned
Bazerman, “Systems of Genres and the Enactment of Social Interaction”–scanned - Popham, “Forms as Boundary Genres in Medicine, Science, and Business”–scanned
- Foreword, Preface, and Afterword from Digital Writing: Assessment & Evaluation
-
Creative Commons licensed image posted at Flickr by Yoel Ben-Avraham
Assigned reading for Digital Writing: Assessment & Evaluation
- Summer: Eidman-Aadahl, et. al
- Chvonne: Poe
- Maury: Van Kooten
- Daniel: Crow
- Amy: Bourelle et. al
- Jenny: Reilly & Atkins
- Suzanne: Zoetewey…
- Leslie: Brunk-Chavez & Fourzan-Rice
- Reading Notes (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
- Annotated Bibliography for Assigned reading in Digital Writing: Assessment & Evaluation (post in your blog; make sure to summarize article and discuss how/why relevant to the class; discuss readings from this week as well as past weeks)
February 4
You’ll want to at least have access to, possibly reskim, the Biesecker article.
- Comments from Last Week’s Ticket Out
- discussion of pedagogical goals of the class
- discuss gradesheets
- Debrief Foucault Activity Worksheet (evaluate the theory)
- What/how does the theory circumscribe and emphasize the “network/object” of study?
- What/how does the theory obscure and devalue elements of the “network/object” of study?
- Discuss/Assign Case Study Week #5 (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
- discussion/activity: Genre Rubric Activity
- upcoming work…
- Ticket Out
February 9
Read and respond to two other classmate’s annotated bibliographies from Digital Writing: Assessment & Evaluation. Post a new blog entry that links to your two responses and summarizes what/how/why you learned.

Creative Commons licensed image posted at Flickr by woodleywonderworks
February 10
- Read: Spinuzzi, Tracing Genres
- Reading Notes (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
February 11
DUE: Case Study #1
- Comments from Last Week’s Ticket Out
- discussion/activity
- Write and/or draw your own writing practices in terms of Spinuzzi’s 3 levels analysis (macro, meso, micro). Make it available via a link and share it in the Google Form (the results).
- In each of your groups look your assigned subject. Talk about which of Spinuzzi’s layers it is operating at; operationalize it in the ways that Spinuzzi did with an object of your choosing.
- Rhetorical Situation: Dan, Amy
- Foucault: Leslie, Suzanne
- Genre: Chvonne, Maury
- Hardware/Software: Summer, Jenny
- upcoming work…
- go over 2/16, respond to Case Study work
- Sign Up for CHAT readings
- Ticket Out
February 16
- Read the two case studies of the two people after your name: Chvonne, Summer, Suzanne, Maury, Jenny, Amy, Daniel, & Leslie.
- Respond/reply, use the following questions as guides:
- What did you like? Why?
- Where were you confused? Ask questions!
- Where would you like to see more? Ask questions!
- Post a new entry in your blog. Link to your two replies and discuss what you learned.
February 17
- Read: Prior et. al, “CHAT” (assigned readings listed HERE)
- Reading Notes (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
- Set up a Build With Chrome account; spend some time in the “Build Academy”
February 18
- Comments from Last Week’s Ticket Out: Boundary Thoughts
- What were your reactions during/after reading the Core CHAT piece and a few of the “data nodes”?
- Visualizing Theory helps to Operationalize Theory: Visualize CHAT (specifically the Take 2 Remapping); if the 3D Lego Builder doesn’t work for you…try something else. Be ready to share (Input/Results).
- Discuss
- upcoming work…
- Ticket Out
February 23
Develop your own “theory assessment” rubric (one that can be used for both production and assessment) of how to apply/implement a “theory”; test the rubric by reading/responding to someone’s Case Study #1 (someone you didn’t read/respond to last week). Post a new blog entry that includes a “clean” copy of your rubric as well as the applied rubric. Discuss how it worked, what/how/why you might revise, etc. (Make sure you somehow notify the person you “assessed.”)
February 24

Photo Credit: believekevin via Compfight cc
- Read:
- Johnson-Eilola, Nostalgic Angels (Chapters 1, 5, & 6)–scanned
- Joyce, Othermindedness (Chapters 4 & 5)–scanned
- Joyce, Of Two Minds (“Hypertext & Hypermedia”)–scanned
- Latour, Reassembling the Social (up to page 86, end of “Third Source…”)
- Reading Notes (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
February 25
- Discussion: Theory Assessment Rubric
- Comments from Last Week’s Ticket Out: Boundaries
- Discussion: Why are reading Joyce and Johnson-Eilola’s older theories still important? Why are they so dated and thus somewhat problematic?
- Activity: Google Doc Worksheet
- upcoming work…
- for the next week, take photos of your writing spaces
- outline for case study #2: outline of applying theories, not of what you are writing
- Ticket Out
March 2
- Put in the hyperlinks into your table of content you have thus far (maybe even finish your entire TOC).
- Read and “comment” upon one another’s stories and outlines.
March 3
Read:
- finish Latour, Reassembling the Social
- Spinnuzi, Network (Chapter 3)–scanned
- if interested: Slides about Chapter 3
- Reading Notes (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
- Robust outline of Case #2 (applying 2 theories)
March 4
- Comments from Last Week’s Ticket Out:
- complementary vs. franken theories
- reading notes: ok to focus, at least draw in/summarize others (we grouped for a reason)
- discussion about hypertext
- ANT Activity :
- Use the photographs that you have taken of your writing spaces over the past week and Latour’s ANT. Share them with your assigned partner.
- by 7:30pm: Take 5-6 minutes and use your partner’s pictures to develop a short series of questions.
- by 7:50pm: Conduct a 10 minute interview (for each person) with the aim of creating an ethnographic narrative/description of their writing practice.
- upcoming work…
- Ticket Out
March 9
1. Read the two case studies of the two people BEFORE your name: Chvonne, Summer, Suzanne, Maury, Jenny, Amy, Daniel, & Leslie.
2. Respond/reply, use the following questions as guides (you are more than welcome to use the “theory rubrics” you designed; however, you are not required to):
- What did you like? Why?
- Where were you confused? Ask questions!
- Where would you like to see more? Ask questions!
3. Post a new entry in your blog. Link to your two replies and discuss what you learned.
Although it is technically spring break, you probably want to be working ahead!
Asynchronous week!
Due Tuesday 3/18

Creative Commons licensed image posted at Flickr by Kai Schrieber
- Read:
- Bateson, Steps to an Ecology of Mind (“Form, Substance and Difference” and “Comment on Part V”)
- Gibson, “The Theory of Affordances”–scanned
- Norman, “Affordances and Design”
- Reading Notes (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
Due Sunday 3/23
-
Case #2
-
Map the ecology of one of the following “learning spaces” in terms of distributed consciousness as outlined in various ways by readings from this week; discuss in terms of the affordances of at least four technologies/applications:
- Our Course Environment: website, blogs, mind map, google docs, Chrome lego builder, etc.
- CCCCs Conference Environment: exhibit hall, presentation room, hallway, conference mobile application, notebook/laptop, etc.
- Your Course (that you teach) Environment: at least four objects…
-
Mindmap update
March 24
- Read (in the order recommended below):
- Guattari, The Three Ecologies
- Cary Institute, “Definition of Ecology”
- Spellman, Ecology for Nonecologists (Chapters 1 & 4)-scanned (and check out the video post)
- Syverson, The Wealth of Reality (Chapter 1 – development of a Frankentheory)–scanned
- Reading Notes (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
March 25
- Comments from Last Week’s Ticket Out
- discussion/activity:
- upcoming work…
- Ticket Out
March 30
-
Re-propose your OoS (or propose a new one!) and discuss/defend how/why useful study, how/why need to think about as a “network,” etc. (revisit the Case Study prompt for week 1)
- Mindmap

Cell signaling image from Brain Tour at alz.org
March 31
- Read:
- Neurology (All content in menu on the left side including 30 minute, interviews, animations, etc.)
- start Castells, The Rise of the Network Society, read:
- Preface 2010 & other acknowledgments
- Prologue
- Chapter 1
- consider more (look at next week’s reading assignment)
- Reading Notes (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
April 1
- Comments General and from Last Week’s Ticket Out
- Theories, Application & Frankentheories
- Subjectivity–of course you don’t get it!
- Researcher/Observer’s subjectivity
- discussion/activity
- Theory as Metaphor
- Group 1: Maury, Summer, Suzanne, Jenny
- Group 2: Daniel, Chvonne, Leslie, Amy
- upcoming work…
- NEXT Week: 3-D arts & crafts preparation
- Ticket Out
April 6
April 7
- Read: finish Castells, The Rise of the Network Society
- Daniel, Summer, Amy, Jenny: Chapters 2 & 3
- Maury, Chvonne, Suzanne, Leslie: Chapter 4
- Chapters 5-7 & Conclusion
- Reading Notes (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
- FOR CLASS: 3-D arts & crafts preparation
April 8
- Comments from Last Week’s Ticket Out
- Spend 40 minutes developing a 3D visualization of Castells (as best you can in that time period!). Share link to your visualization (if you do a real-world object, consider taking multiple pics and uploading to a set in Flickr, a folder in Google, or as slide on a Google Presentation). Results!
- upcoming work…
- Ticket Out
April 13
- Weekly Mindmap
- Weekly Work – Theory Tree
- Group 1: Daniel, Chvonne, Suzanne, Jenny
- Group 2: Maury, Summer, Leslie, Amy
- Case #3

Photo Credit: Bibliothèque universitaire d’Angers via Compfight cc
April 14
- Read:
- Deleuze and Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus (Introduction/Chapter 1)-scanned
- Scott, Social Network Analysis (Chapters 1, 2 & 3)-scanned
- Raine & Wellman, Networked-scanned
- Everyone: Chapter 1
- Group 1 (Summer, Maury, Jenny) : Chapters 2 & 5
- Group 2 (Chvonne, Suzanne, Leslie) : Chapters 3, 7 & 8
- Group 3 (Daniel, Amy) : Chapters 4, 6, & 9
- Reading Notes (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
April 15
- Comments from Last Week’s Ticket Out: We’re all full!
- Walk Through & Debrief Theory Tree Activity
- Group 1: Daniel, Chvonne, Suzanne, Jenny
- Group 2: Maury, Summer, Leslie, Amy
- Activity: Social Network Analysis (Results: Input, Output)
- upcoming work…
- Ticket Out
April 20
- Start Revising Mindmap: Concept Groupings (not author/weekly topic)
- Case Study: Scaffolding Synthesis
- Take ODU’s Course Survey
April 21
- Read:
- Althusser, “Ideology and Ideological State Apparatus”
- Hall, “Encoding, Decoding”-scanned
- start Rickert, Ambient Rhetoric (Introduction & Part 1)
- Reading Notes (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
- Take Networks Course Learning Survey (have completed before class begins on 4/22)
- Take ODU’s Course Survey
April 22
- Comments from Last Week’s Ticket Out & other Thinking
- “flattening”–what do you/we/they mean by it?
- Learning Networks Activity
- upcoming work…
- Ticket Out
April 27
- Finish Revising Mindmap: Concept Groupings (not author/weekly topic)
April 28
- Read: finish Rickert, Ambient Rhetoric
- Reading Notes (check under “Assignment Prompts“)
- Take ODU’s Course Survey
April 29
- Gradesheets
- Activity: Ambient Teaching & Learning
- upcoming work…
- Ticket Out
May 7
11:59pm: Submit Week 16 PhD Synthesis