Assignments/grading summary:

Short Papers (6 x 5 pts. ea = 30) = 30% term grade.
Reading points (13 x 2 – 3 lowest grades) = 20% term grade.
Class participation in discussion = 10%
Field research in folklore term paper = 30%
Field documentation accuracy = 10%

SHORT PAPERS are informal, standard English writing assignments that are intended to help focus and guide your involvement with the readings, class discussions, films, slides, audio tapes, and web encounters.

You will be assigned six of these (600-800 words each, minimum), including the term paper prospectus. Your responses need to be submitted via e-mail by a deadline given in each assignment. Print copy is due at the next class meeting [most often the same day].

Short Paper submissions must arrive by noon on their due date. (You may submit entries earlier than noon) Short Paper prompts from me regarding readings or films are posted after we have discussed and/or seen the material. Other entries will respond to topics suggested by class discussion.

There will be two extra credit (optional) Short Paper topics; you may elect to respond to one. (Short Paper extra credit is available only to those who have competed the required Short Papers).

Short Papers are read for content that demonstrates your developing awareness of the ideas and materials of American Folklore. I will mark printer copies with suggested improvements for grammar, punctuation, word choice, and organization, but only the quality of your content is graded. [I assume you will spell check your text and proofread it for errors the spell checker can’t catch.] This way you can work on writing improvement without affecting your grade. You may miss two of the electronic deadlines, but you must submit late entries within 24 hours of their original deadlines — otherwise, the points for those entries are lost and you may not substitute extra credit topics for missed required work.Retain the emailed assignments and the returned printer copies until the end of term.

Short Papers earn a total of 30 points for 30% of term grade.

READING POINTS -- Participation in the development and exchange of ideas is a vital element for your success and satisfaction with the course. Participation can take many forms, but the key is preparation. Read the assignment, review and distill the major points, note any links you can make between anything you already know and what you've just read, and note questions the reading raised for you. Compose a summary statement about what you take to be a major point of the reading and one question that the reading prompts for you. Write with as much depth and detail as you can in summary form. Send an email version of each Reading Points assignment to me by noon on the class day for which the reading is listed. Be prepared to discuss your summary statement and question. Thirteen RPs will be assigned; I will drop the lowest three grades.

Reading points = 20% of term grade.

PARTICIPATION -- Come to class on time with your preparation of the reading and a willingness to engage in discussion and offer questions or related information/examples. If you regularly volunteer and you are prepared, you are a candidate for A; if you regularly are prepared, but most often have to be drawn into the discussion by being called on, you are a candidate for B; if you neither volunteer nor evidence preparation, you are a candidate for C; if you regularly disrupt the class experience for others (by coming late, leaving early, eating your lunch, reading the newspaper, preparing for another class, sleeping, chatting for long minutes with your neighbors, etc.) you are a candidate for D.

Participation in the class discussion = 10% of term grade.

TERM PAPER -- You will plan, organize, and produce a 2500-word (minimum) term paper in which you develop a thesis and discussion about an aspect of folk tradition based on your own documented field research. You will have detailed instructions and considerable in-class and elective individual guidance for this assignment. (See the instructions and descriptions for this assignment in the first two items on the syllabus home page list of links.)

Field documentation is graded for accuracy and completeness = 10% of term grade. The term paper essay is graded 2/3 for research, analysis, and discussion content and 1/3 for the mechanics of writing. The weighted average = 30% of term grade.

PLAGIARISM involved with any part of the production of your paper will result in your failing the course.

ATTENDANCE is necessary to participate. You may miss three classes (including University approved absences) without grade penalty. For each absence thereafter (up to 9, total), your term grade is reduced by 1.5%. (Ten or more absences automatically will result in a failing grade for the course.)