Effective: 2022-03-31

Course Description

The course outline below was developed as part of a statewide standardization process.

General Course Purpose

This course develops skills for effective written and oral communication in the business, technical, and professional workplace. Students will apply critical thinking, reading, and communication techniques, demonstrate knowledge of composing various technical reports and documents, and apply technical strategies of voice, tone, style, and content in correct formatting. Students will identify technical discourse as well as its use and purpose in technical writing.

Course Prerequisites/Corequisites

Prerequisite: ENG 111

Course Objectives

• Knowledge of Discourse Conventions of Technical Writing
• Define the purposes for technical communication and discuss, and identify various principles and techniques for effective technical writing.
• Examine and analyze technical documents to recognize ethical and legal considerations for technical writing
• Recognize, explain, and use the formal elements of specific genres of organizational communication: white papers, recommendations and analytical reports, proposals, memoranda, web pages, wikis, blogs, business letters, and promotional documents.
• Design, create, and develop clear, concise technical documents across different modalities to include but not limited to electronic mail, blogs, wikis, and web pages.
• Prepare various kinds of technical writing documents, including but not limited to memos, short reports, comparison analyses, objective descriptions, process analyses, research reports, etc.
• Rhetorical Knowledge and Application
• Identify the audience and purpose of each piece of prepared writing to establish a clear writing situation, including purpose, context, and audience.
• Adapt voice, tone, and level of formality to a variety of writing situations and adapt the writing process to focus on academic and professional audiences.
• Describe the ethical, international, social and professional constraints of audience, style, and content for writing situations.
• Use conventions of format, structure, design, and documentation appropriate to the rhetorical situation.
• Writing Process
• Apply written communication to a variety of tasks, formats, and genres in the business, professional, and technical workplace.
• Use prewriting strategies to plan assignments (e.g. create an outline to organize ideas)
• Create multiple drafts of an assignment and revise and edit according to feedback from peers and others to improve development, organization, documentation, and clarity of writing.
• Edit writing with consideration to surface features, including syntax, usage, punctuation, and spelling appropriate to the rhetorical situation.
• Disseminate and produce texts in both print and digital forms (may include written, aural, and visual modes) and reflect on assignments and writing processes.
• Research Process and Information Literacy
• Demonstrate academic integrity.
• Create researched documents based on the readings of texts, both individually and collaboratively
• Collect research materials from digital sources, including scholarly library databases and informal digital networks and investigate and evaluate resources, including digital and traditional texts to incorporate into technical forms of writing, including but not limited to white papers, recommendations and analytical reports, proposals, memoranda, web pages, wikis, blogs, business letters, and promotional documents.
• Discern between scholarly and popular sources and evaluate their merit and reliability.
• Critical Thinking, Reading, and Communication
• Read, summarize, and respond to a variety of texts.
• Produce documented essays based on multiple sources.
• Participate professionally in interactive discussions, peer reviews, and one or more formal oral presentations
• Evaluate evidence carefully to determine credibility and understand bias.
• Communicate effectively in written and oral discourse in the professional workplace and demonstrate use of active-listening skills.

Major Topics to be Included

• Knowledge of Discourse Conventions of Technical Writing
• Rhetorical Knowledge and Application
• Writing Process
• Research Process and Information Literacy