Digital/Multimedia Compositions; Feeder 3.2 Workshop

ENGL 105: Writing at the Research University, with Paul Blom

Section 004, Fall 2025

T, Th; 9:30am-10:45am

Phillips Hall, Room 222

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Tues. Nov. 11, 2025

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Log into our Canvas course site and then to go Modules>In-Class Activities.

Click the link to open today’s lesson plan slides (these slides).

You’ll need to have access to our daily lesson plan slides during every class session.

Open your materials for today; keep Canvas open also.

If you run into issues accessing our Canvas course site and/or our lesson plan for today, please let me know asap.

New groups for Unit 3! Sit with your NEW group members (names listed on next slide).

REMINDER: Make sure you’ve submitted a rough draft of Feeder 3.2 to Canvas>Discussions for today’s class!

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Student Working Groups

Make sure you sit with your NEW group members at the start of every class:

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Announcements

• Remind Paul to begin recording (Zoom recording available after class).
• As you read and work, please feel free to contribute to the following Google Doc, “Suggested Readings or Other Content” (Link also at Canvas>Modules>In-Class Activities).
• See the extra credit assignment prompt on Writing in Business (Canvas>Files>Extra Credit - Writing in Business). Due by 11:59pm on Mon. Dec. 1.
• Grades to be released soon! Use my feedback to guide your work moving forward (Canvas>Assignments).
• Unit Project 1, Feeder 2.1, Feeder 2.2, Unit Project 2
• Interested in a summer study-abroad class in South Africa on epidemiology and visual storytelling? I’m co-teaching a class. Contact me for more info. (It’s through Yale, but you can get transfer credit.)
• Feeder 3.1 received! Look for those grades and feedback soon. Use it to guide your work moving forward.

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Today’s Class

Last Class: Looking at genre models for literary analysis; Feeder 3.2 thesis statement workshop

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Today’s Class: Digital literacy and multimedia compositions; Feeder 3.2 workshop

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TODAY’S LEARNING OBJECTIVES - By the end of this class session, you will be able to:

• Define and describe the terms “mode,” “media,” “digital literacy,” “visual literacy,” and “multimedia composition”
• List and explain the advantages and disadvantages of “traditional” media in comparison to digital/online media
• Explain the considerations one should take when composing digitally or online
• Examine/critique examples of online/digital/multimedia compositions
• Employ best practices in designing, organizing, and composing online/digital/multimedia compositions
• Describe and use best practices for interpreting/composing visual media
• Apply best practices of peer feedback by responding to your partner’s draft
• Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of your own rough draft and your partner’s draft
• Identify specific ways in which your work and your partner’s work can be improved
• Begin revising your rough draft into a final, polished, complete draft that is effective and successful

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Preparing for Today

Everyone should have already:

• Looked through my feedback on Feeder 3.1
• Submitted your rough draft of Feeder 3.2 for today’s workshop
• Read in THWG Ch. 1-5, “Composing with Media”
• Installed Adobe Creative Cloud and, from that, installed Adobe Premiere Pro (http://software.sites.unc.edu/adobe/) and confirmed that Adobe Premiere Pro will open and function on your laptop. (This MUST be completed for class on Tues. Nov. 18!)

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Your Chosen Topics for Unit 3

• NAME REDACTED: “The Tell-Tale Heart” by Poe
• NAME REDACTED: “Lamb to the Slaughter” by Dahl
• NAME REDACTED: “Araby” by Joyce
• NAME REDACTED: “Feed the Pig” by Witherow
• NAME REDACTED: “Cathedral” by Carver
• NAME REDACTED: One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Kesey
• NAME REDACTED: “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Gilman
• NAME REDACTED: “The Tell-Tale Heart” by Poe
• NAME REDACTED: “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Gilman

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(Remember that topic selection/preliminary research is a crucial step in the writing process! Your topic scope and/or research question/thesis may change a bit as you research and compose!) 

• NAME REDACTED: “The Blue Hotel” by Crane
• NAME REDACTED: “The Tell-Tale Heart” by Poe
• NAME REDACTED: “I’d Love You to Want Me” by Nguyen
• NAME REDACTED: “The Lottery” by Jackson
• NAME REDACTED: “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Gilman
• NAME REDACTED: “L for Life” by Habashi
• NAME REDACTED: “August Heat” by Harvey
• NAME REDACTED: “Bullet in the Brain” by Wolff
• NAME REDACTED: “War” by Pirandelo
• NAME REDACTED: “The Black Cat” by Poe

Unit 3 Project Expectations

Revisit the Unit 3 Assignment Prompt (Canvas>Files>Unit 3); Questions?

• Remember, there is no “one right way” to interpret a text. Many valid arguments/interpretations are possible, as long as they are based on evidence from the text. However, there are some “bad” or invalid interpretations.
• Remember our discussion of thesis statements from Tues. 11/4. The story is doing something/commenting about something beyond the individual story itself. It is using this particular plot and various narrative/linguistic/rhetorical devices to make some larger statement.
• If you reference the title of a short story within your writing, place it in “quotation marks.” (For novels, collections, and other larger works, the title should be italicized instead.)
• When writing a date, omit the “th,” etc. Just write it as June 27 (not June 27th).
• If you have a quote within a quote, use single quotation marks (apostrophes) to avoid confusion.
• Smith said “I think the story ‘The Black Cat’ is Poe’s best work.”
• According to Johnson, “The other boys told him to pronounce his name as ‘Dellacroy.’”
• Hemingway makes it clear: “The man looked at the stove. ‘No, I don’t love you,’ he said. The meat continued to fry.”
• Be careful when copying and pasting text into your work. (This is a good general rule for all work you do.)
• We are to far into the semester four basic/casual mechanical errors or tiepos.Check your work.(Blom 2024)”.
• See the UNC Writing Center’s page on run-on sentences and sentence fragments.
• “However” is not a conjunction. It is an introductory phrase. Example: “She was afraid. However, she still resisted.”
• NO: “I have a lot of things to say, first of all, I’m very excited.”

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Document Design, Digital Literacy, and Multimedia Composition

• “Document Design, Digital Literacy, and Multimedia Composition” PowerPoint/slides (Canvas>Files>Unit 3>Digital Literacy)
• Click the link above.
• See also the various examples of digital media on Canvas at Files>Unit 3>Digital Literacy>“Digital Media Examples”

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Best Practices for Peer Feedback (start around 10:10am)

• Don’t hold back; be honest (but constructive).
• Point out both the bad and good (things they did well and things that they could change).
• Be specific and precise; provide actionable steps or suggestions.
• Suggest specific improvements: how can your partner make this better?
• Consider the rhetorical situation for this assignment (and the overall assignment instructions, grading rubrics, examples, etc.).
• Mechanics are important, but ideas are more important.
• There’s always room to improve; there’s always something that can be made better.
• Be invested in providing your partner with thorough, useful feedback that will actually help them improve their draft.
• The goal here is to give your partner written feedback to which they can later refer while also taking time to speak with them today during class, which can lead to spontaneous new ideas, solutions, suggestions, etc.
• The more you invest in critically reading the work of your peers, the more you will improve as a critical reader of your own work and the scholarship around you (and thus improve as a researcher and writer).
• See also “Tips for Discussion Forums, Peer Feedback, etc.” on Canvas at Files>Helpful Handouts and Resources.

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Feeder 3.2 Workshop

• If you don’t have a draft for today, come and see me first. Let’s talk.
• If you have absent group members today, they’re not part of this workshop. (But you can always provide them with feedback outside of class just to be kind and helpful.)
• Within your groups, partner up. Briefly discuss your draft with your partner to provide any explanation they might need and to request specific types of feedback you’re looking for, specific concerns, etc.
• Open your partner’s post. Download/save their draft to your device. In the file name, add something like “with feedback from [your name].”
• Pull up the Unit 3 Assignment Prompt (specifically, the instructions for F3.2) to reference during the workshop (Canvas>Files>Unit 3).
• Read through your partner’s draft carefully, considering both global issues (content, ideas, organization, details, and descriptions) and local issues (spelling, punctuation, proper citations, typos, etc.).
• As you read through, insert comments into your partner’s draft to note areas that need improvement as well as areas that work especially well. Use the grading rubric for Feeder 3.2 in the Unit 3 Assignment Prompt to guide your feedback:
• More workshop instructions on the next slide.

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Feeder 3.2 Workshop

• As you read through, insert comments into your partner’s draft to note areas that need improvement as well as areas that work especially well. Use the grading rubric for Feeder 3.2 in the Unit 3 Assignment Prompt to guide your feedback:
• Does the draft have a descriptive and engaging title?
• Does the introduction clearly (but briefly) indicate the chosen story, a quick summary of the story’s plot, and other relevant background info leading up to the thesis?
• Highlight their thesis. (If you can’t identify it, that’s a problem on which you should comment.) Once you identify the thesis, comment on it.
• Beware of overly simplistic or self-evident thesis statements!
• Does the thesis make sense? Is it appropriately complex? Does it address the linguistic/stylistic/rhetorical choices made in the chosen short story and somehow connect those to larger themes? Does the thesis seem like something your partner can address in the scope of this assignment? Does it need to be improved or adjusted?
• Does the body work to support/prove the thesis? Does it smoothly and appropriately incorporate quotations, etc. and analyze those quotations? Is there info or analysis missing that would be useful to include? Are outside sources appropriately interwoven into the paper? Are these outside sources cited in a way that is complete and accurate?
• Does the conclusion quickly sum up the argument and then also gesture toward larger implications of their interpretation (answering the “so what?” question)?
• What about sentence structure? Paragraph structure? Style, tone, and organization?
• What about grammar, punctuation, spelling, typos, etc.?
• Are all outside sources (including the story being discussed) properly cited within the text and at the end in a Works Cited list (in MLA 9th edition format)?
• If the draft is short, brainstorm ideas of how they can continue to build on their ideas. What suggestions can you offer? What kinds of things should they look for? If their process is struggling, help them with their process. Write out these suggestions in their draft and talk to your partner.
• Once you’ve gone through all of the questions, look back over the entire draft one more time. Overall, what works well/seems promising? What seems weak/problematic? What new ideas can you suggest? What other advice can you offer? Add in your final comments.
• Save this draft with all of your feedback. Then reply to your partner’s post for the day and attach the new document that contains your feedback.
• Confirm that both of you successfully uploaded the documents and submitted your posts and can access each other’s feedback.
• Briefly discuss the feedback/advice you have for your partner and take notes.
• Make sure you’ve provided your partner with both written and verbal feedback; don’t leave today without uploading your written feedback to your partner (Canvas>Discussions) and confirming that your post was successfully submitted.
• The goal here is to give your partner written feedback to which they can later refer while also taking time to speak with them today during class, which can lead to spontaneous new ideas, solutions, suggestions, etc.

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Workshop: If You Have Extra Time

• Begin looking through the feedback you’ve received and start revising your draft.
• Discuss your ideas with your group members, especially those who are struggling. Help them improve their draft.
• If you have a group member who posted a draft for today but is absent today and wasn’t able to participate, consider providing them with some written feedback. (This is optional, but I’m sure they’d appreciate it since otherwise, they won’t receive any feedback on their draft.)
• You could also start thinking about the kinds of media you’ll use to illustrate your content in your video essay.

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Homework

Next class, Thurs. Nov. 13: Genre models for video essays

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Homework due by 11:59pm Wed. Nov. 12:

• Next blog post: STUDENT NAMES REDACTED (reflection on week 13, due Mon. Nov. 17 by 11:59pm)
• Catch up on reading/submitting any documents/chapters/assignments you missed.
• Look above in this lesson plan at what you should have done already (“Everyone should have already…”) and make sure that you’re all caught up. You might want to also consult past lesson plans and/or the “Course Schedule” in our course syllabus (Canvas>Files).
• From now on, it’s ideal if you can bring headphones to class (so you can watch video clips without disturbing everyone else).
• Use the feedback from today’s workshop experience (and all of our previous discussions/feedback) to revise your Feeder 3.2. Submit your final draft via Canvas>Assignments by 11:59pm on Wed. Nov. 12 for a grade.
• Revisit the slides from today and the examples of various forms of digital projects (Canvas>Files>Unit 3).
• Watch/read the model video essay assigned to your group, listed below and available at Canvas>Files>Unit 3>Model Video Essays. Take notes on the design, organization, content, style, and structure of both the essay itself and, especially, the multimedia components (visuals, music, transitions, etc.). Come to class prepared to discuss. (Be sure to watch the video and read the accompanying transcript.)
• Insert Group Name: Snider’s video essay, “Flock of Feminists”
• The Avengers: Bass’s video essay, “Mummies and Masculinity”
• The Tarheel Brunch Club: Pasupula’s video essay, “Medical Misogyny”
• Core Four: Jackson’s video essay, “Environment and Minority Identity”
• You all might also find it helpful to look at the other video essays present in that same folder on Canvas, including those at Canvas>Files>Unit 3>Model Video Essays>Other models.
• Homework continues on the next slide.

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Homework continued

Next class, Thurs. Nov. 13: Genre models for video essays

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Homework due by 11:59pm Wed. Nov. 12:

• Start thinking about how you will structure and present your video essay and what kinds of music, video clips, etc. you might use. (UP3 rough cut due Mon. Nov. 24.) You might want to start finding and bookmarking various pieces of media for you to use.
• If you haven’t already downloaded and installed Adobe Creative Cloud and then installed Adobe Premiere Pro, do so immediately. You will all need Adobe Premiere Pro installed and functioning on your own devices (laptops) for UP3.
• Confirm that you have downloaded and installed Adobe Premiere Pro and that it will open and work on your laptop.
• Free download for members of the UNC community at http://software.sites.unc.edu/adobe/. For instructions on how to obtain Adobe Creative Cloud, see “How to Get Adobe Creative Cloud” on Canvas at Files>Helpful Handouts and Resources.
• For more info, see Canvas>Modules>“Start Here!” Tasks>Item 6: Get Adobe Creative Cloud.
• If you run into trouble, contact UNC’s IT Help Desk, but also keep me informed.
• Consider playing around with the program to start getting familiar with the program. We will eventually have an in-class tutorial session on how to use the program (on 11/18).
• Start collecting (or at least bookmarking) video or audio content you’ll use for your UP3 video essay.
• We will have an in-class tutorial on Adobe Premiere Pro next Tues. Nov. 18. You MUST have it working on your own laptop by then!
• Look for grades and feedback, coming soon!

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Looking Ahead

• Wed. Nov. 12: Feeder 3.2 final draft due for a grade (Canvas>Assignments)
• Thurs. Nov. 13: UNC course evaluations open (links will be in your email); these are voluntary and anonymous and highly important for all of your instructors
• Tues. Nov. 18: MDC Day - meet for class in the Undergraduate Library, Room 207
• Mon. Nov. 24: UP3 rough cut due for an in-class workshop on Tues. Nov. 25
• Thurs. Nov. 27: Thanksgiving Break (no classes or office hours held)
• Mon. Dec. 1: UP3 (embedded video essay, followed by complete transcript and bibliography), due as a post to the course website by 11:59pm on Mon. Dec. 1. As always, see the Unit 3 Assignment Prompt (Canvas>Files>Unit 3) and the sample Unit 3 post on the course website.
• Mon. Dec. 1: Extra credit assignment on writing in business due by 11:59pm
• Tues. Dec. 2: ENGL 105 final class session (to be held in real-time over Zoom).
• Wed. Dec. 3: UNC LDOC (last day of classes); UNC course evaluations close at 11:59pm
• Mon. Dec. 8: Final course grades to be reported to the University by 5:00pm

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After Class

• If you have other questions or concerns that arise after class, please feel free to email me (paulblom@live.unc.edu), visit me (in Greenlaw 509) during my office hours (Tues, Thurs, 12:30pm-2:00pm est), or schedule a time to meet with me virtually [ZOOM LINK REDACTED FOR PUBLIC SHARING] outside of office hours. (Download Zoom at https://unc.zoom.us/.)
• A few hours after this class session has ended, I will post the recording of this class session to Canvas at Modules>Class Recordings. You may want to revisit the recording, especially if you missed the class. Each recording will be accompanied by a real-time automatically-generated transcript as well as automatically-generated closed captions. You can stream these online or download these to your own devices.
• These recordings are captured through Zoom and are only available to watch/download for 30 days after the recording date.
• These recordings are solely for the purpose of reviewing class material and should not be shared with people outside of our class. (See also our course syllabus: Course Policies>Technology>Recordings of Class Sessions.)
• See also “Using Lecture Recordings: A Guide for Students” (Canvas>Modules>Class Recordings).

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