What to Expect in ENC 1102

In ENC1102 you will be building on the skills you learned in ENC1101. In ENC1101 you focused on personal writing; on exploring your own personal experience and point of view through writing. In ENC1102 your experiences and opinions are still important, but now you will also explore the opinions of other authors. You will read from texts that have diverse viewpoints and enter into a conversation with these texts. You will also explore your own reading process, and learn techniques to become both a better writer and reader. This is not a class in literary analysis, but in ENC1102 you will explore connections between reading and writing. Here's what some former ENC1102 students had to say about the reading assignments:

"I was worried about ENC1102 because I'm not a very good reader. But we kept a reading journal and it helped me organize my thoughts."

"I liked it that we were expressing our own opinions of the essays, not just summarizing what the author had already said."

"Class discussions helped a lot. Sometimes I couldn't make sense of the readings until we discussed it in class."

"Make sure you keep up with the readings! Most of the time we would either write our response to a reading assignment or discuss it in class."

Another differences between ENC1101 and ENC1102 is the research component of the class. In ENC1102 you will write a longer, research-based paper. You will learn techniques for organizing longer papers and finding sources at the library. This paper will help introduce you to the kind of academic writing you will do in many of your college classes. But don't be afraid! As former students attest, the research paper can even be fun:

"I was really scared about doing a research paper. In high school we would just find a bunch of quotes and string them all together. It was pretty boring to write. But in ENC1102 we needed to express our opinion about our topic. This helped make it more interesting because it was my argument, not somebody else's."

"I liked it that we could choose our own topic. With other research papers I've written the teacher would assign the topic. I picked the topic of dolphins in captivity since I'm a marine biology major."

"At first I had some trouble with the research paper because I fell behind. I didn't do my library research until the last minute and I missed a workshop. My advice is to keep up with the work. The research paper isn't that hard unless you put it off."

"I found The Curious Researcher to be extremely helpful in writing my research essay because this book provides students with a step by step process to follow when writing a research essay."

"At first I picked a topic I didn't like, 'gun control,' because I couldn't think of any other topic. But after a week I switched to the topic of college football and playoffs. My advice is to choose a subject you're really interested in or have some experience with."

Similarities between ENC1101 and ENC1102

We've looked at some differences between ENC1101 and ENC1102, but there are also plenty of similarities. In both classes you will use a process approach to writing. You will write rough drafts and get responses to your drafts from your peers and the teacher. You can expect to workshop your papers in ENC1102, just as you did in ENC1101. The personal writing you did in ENC1101 will help you develop your own opinions of the texts you read in ENC1102.