Program Learning Outcomes

PROGRAM LEARNING OUTCOMES

These are the learning goals for courses for the First-Year Composition Program at CSUDH. In other words -- once you successfully complete your composition course, these are the practical skills you'll have.

The skills come under four headings: RHETORICAL KNOWLEDGE, CRITICAL THINKING, PROCESSES, and CONVENTIONS.

Since you haven't taken the course yet, some of the concepts and vocabulary here might be unfamiliar to you, but your composition professor can easily explain them. You can also follow the links below for a very brief introduction to each concept -- but your best guide to these concepts is your writing professor, and your own increasing experience as you take the course.

Rhetorical Knowledge

Rhetorical knowledge is the ability to analyze contexts and audiences and then to act on that analysis to understand and create texts. Understanding rhetoric is essential to clear and powerful communication. Writers develop rhetorical knowledge by negotiating purpose, audience, context, and conventions as they compose a variety of texts for different situations. By the end of first-year composition, students will be able to:

Critical Thinking

Critical thinking is the ability to identify information and interpret, analyze, evaluate, synthesize, and reflect upon it. By the end of first-year composition, students will be able to:

Processes

Writing and composing are recursive, social processes. There is no such thing as the writing process; rather, there are many strategies and tools that writers may use to read and compose. Because writers need to adapt to different contexts and occasions, reading and composing processes are flexible. By the end of first-year composition, students will be able to:

Conventions

Conventions are the formal rules and informal guidelines that shape readers’ and writers’ perceptions of appropriateness and/or correctness. Conventions help readers and writers communicate more effectively by establishing common expectations about language usage and format. By the end of first-year composition students will be able to: