Topic outline

  • Course Overview

    Collapse all Expand all

    Reading & Writing for College Students

    College Writing Lab (1 credit)

    Instructor: Gabriela Pike (email: gtijerina-pike@christianleaders.net)

    ********* Please: Do not send your papers via email, there is no way to grade them. ********

    Enroll me

    Note: The Leadership Excellence School Admissions course is a prerequisite for the College Writing Lab.  


    Overview: College Writing Lab is a companion course to College Writing. Degree-seeking students of Christian Leaders College should enroll in both classes at the same time. In this lab, students write and submit essays and research papers that apply the principles taught in College Writing. Together, these companion courses teach college-level essay writing and research writing rooted in critical and analytical reading. 

    Course Objectives:

    1. Acquire strategies to read efficiently and identify a text's important ideas
    2. Activate intellectual skills to understand and critically evaluate the assertions of a text
    3. Develop basic writing strategies (research, planning, summarizing, organizing, avoiding plagiarism, referencing, and proofreading)
    4. Become proficient in key elements of essay writing (argument and discussion, cause and effect, definitions, style)
    5. Pursue economy of language (precision, clarity, conciseness, academic vocabulary, word choice) 
    6. Learn to structure and develop an academic research paper (thesis development, evaluating sources, organizing, revising, and APA documentation)

    Assignments:

    1. Write and upload two essays. You should complete the first eight English 121 College Writing units before uploading your essays here. Length: 400 words 
    2. Write and upload a research paper. You should complete all twelve English 121 College Writing units before uploading your research paper here. Length: 600 words
    3. If you took College Writing some time ago and are doing the lab separately, you should review the materials posted below before writing your essays and papers. The materials are from Writing for Success. This book is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

    Grading Scale:

    A 95-100%   A- 90-94%   B+ 87-89%   B 83-86%   B- 80-82%   C+ 77-79%   C 73-76%   C- 70-72%    D+ 67-69%   D 63-66%   D- 60-62%   F 0-59%

    Your average grade for all assignments in the class must be at least 60%. Otherwise, you will fail the class and will receive no course credit.

    Deadline: You have 180 days to finish the course. Complete all assignments before the final deadline, or you will be automatically unenrolled, and all coursework will be removed. You will have to start over and take the class again to receive credit. 

    Note: Grading papers take time, be sure that you submit your paper at least 3 or 4 weeks before your course deadline. Sometimes there are some other papers ahead of you. Take your time!

    Course Forum: Each course forum is at the beginning of the course, right before the first-course content section, and has comments and questions from other students in the class. The forum is a great way to post a question or comment for other students who are currently enrolled in the course to see. Additionally, you can search the forum to see if anyone in the past has addressed or discussed the issue, question, or comment you wanted to post about.

  • Writing Guidelines

    Below are materials from Writing for Success. If you are currently in the College Writing class, you are already studying these. However, if you took College Writing some time ago, you may need to refresh your knowledge in some areas before writing and submitting your papers.

  • Basics of Correct English

    Here are some basics of correct English from Writing for Success, in case you need to review these areas.

  • Upload Your Papers

    Please, do not send your assignments vía email. 

    Please do not send a link.

    Grading happens on Friday, Saturday or Monday - every 10 days. 

    #1. Descriptive essay about the concept of SELF-CONTROL as a gift of the Holy Spirit.
    • Do not focus in describing your personal experience. This is not a testimony.
    • Length of the essay: 380 - 420  words long. 
    • Use good English: grammar, punctuation, spelling, redaction
    • Do some research, quote your sources and list your references. When you use sources, quote them in APA or Chicago style.
    • Please, avoid plagiarism - it is useless to copy others' thoughts. 
    • Use short sentences, clear paragraphs, grammar connectors.
    • Do not write proper names with small letter (Jesus, God, Holy Spirit, Holy Scriptures, Bible, Christ...)
    • Include title (2 points), introduction (8 points), body (x points) and conclusion (8 points).
    • Include references or bibliography. (8 points)
    • Include a sentence in which you assure your honesty of having done this assignment on your own, without any technological assistance as ChatGPT or A.I.  
    • Be creative! 

    Our God is holy!

    #2. Write a persuasive essay about one concept listed here:

        1. Do children need to worship with adults? 
        2. Do adults and children have to worship separated? 
        3. Do children feel welcomed in church services?
        4. Do  children feel not welcomed  in church services?
        5. Are children a distraction in church services?
        6. Or any other topic related to persuade church's membership about the nourishment of children's spirituality through worship and prayer in corporate settings.
    • Research on your own, prepare your sources of knowledge.
    • Clearly state your position, present evidence supporting your position, deal fairly with arguments against your position, and seek to persuade an undecided reader. 
    • Length of the essay: 500 - 600 words long.
    • Use good English: grammar, punctuation, spelling, redaction
    • Do some research, quote your sources and list your references. When you use sources, quote them in APA or Chicago style.
    • Please, avoid plagiarism - it is useless to copy others' thoughts. 
    • Use short sentences, clear paragraphs, grammar connectors.
    • Do not write proper names with small letter (Jesus, God, Holy Spirit, Holy Scriptures, Bible, Christ...)
    • Include title (2 points), introduction (8 points), body (x points) and conclusion (8 points).
    • Include references or bibliography. (8 points)
    • Include a sentence in which you assure your honesty of having done this assignment on your own, without any technological assistance as ChatGPT or A.I.  
    • Be creative! 
    #3. Write a research about one concept listed here:
        1. Describe the relevance of conditional sentences in the Scriptures
        2. Describe the meaning of one conditional sentence (explicit or implicit) in the Gospel of Luke
        3. Describe the meaning of one conditional sentence (explicit or implicit) in the book of Acts
        4. Describe one conditional sentence that people say nowadays as a reason to disobey God
        5. Describe the purpose of commandments in the Bible
        6. Describe the value of preaching about commandments nowadays 
        7. Describe the challenge to teach about commandments to new converts
    • Research on your own, prepare your sources of knowledge.
    • Clearly state your position, present evidence supporting your position, deal fairly with arguments against your position, and seek to persuade an undecided reader. 
    • Length of the essay: 800 - 1000 words long.
    • Use good English: grammar, punctuation, spelling, redaction
    • Do some research, quote your sources and list your references. When you use sources, quote them in APA or Chicago style.
    • Please, avoid plagiarism - it is useless to copy others' thoughts. 
    • Use short sentences, clear paragraphs, grammar connectors.
    • Do not write proper names with small letter (Jesus, God, Holy Spirit, Holy Scriptures, Bible, Christ...)
    • Include title (2 points), introduction (8 points), body (x points) and conclusion (8 points).
    • Include references or bibliography. (8 points)
    • Include a sentence in which you assure your honesty of having done this assignment on your own, without any technological assistance as ChatGPT or A.I.  
    • Be creative!