Students will receive a participation mark for the unit. This will be based on the submission of:

• Contribution to class discussion, including editing of other students' work.
• 3 x writing exercises to be brought to tutorials in Weeks 3, 4 and 5 for editing by and discussion with peers.
• 4 x 200-word sections of draft memoir to be brought to tutorials in Weeks 9,10, 11 and 12 for editing by and discussion with peers.

Note: students will not be marked on the above work they bring to class; rather, failure to submit this work will result in significant loss of participation marks.

The three writing exercises must be submitted together in Week 6. The final article must be submitted in Week 14.

Assessment Criteria:

Students will be assessed on their attendance and participation in class discussions, as well as on their role in the workshops as readers and editors of their own and their fellow students' work. 

Students are to complete in advance  three writing exercises to be  brought to tutorials in Weeks 3, 4 and 5 respectively. After receiving feedback from your peers and tutor in the workshop/tutorial, the three polished exercises are to be submitted for assessment in week 6 - 10am Thursday 11 September.

Assessment Criteria:

The students' writing in the exercises will be assessed on:

• the storytelling skills demonstrated; the quality and clarity of the writing; the syntax, grammar and spelling; evidence of research and of focus or theme.
• an ethical approach to the work.

Students to submit a research portfolio and report based on the research they've completed on a topic they intend to focus on for their memoir piece. The research may involve fieldwork/observational research, interviews, and/or archive research. Students must submit a report outlining how they anticipate the research will be used in their memoir piece.

Assessment Criteria:

• whether or not the student presented the required range of sources,
• evidence of the breadth and depth of research, 
• a clear indication of how the research will be used in the memoir essay,
• evidence of a clear theme the student is investigating or developing in the memoir essay,
• evidence of the structure the student is developing in the memoir essay,
• an ethical approach to the research and use of research material.

The research report should use correct use of spelling and grammar and should comply with the word count.

Students to submit a 2000-word memoir article based on their research and draft-writing throughout the semester, plus a 500-word reflection on the process of writing the article.

Append to the story a 500-word reflection on the process of writing the story. Consider: 

• Why you chose this particular story/topic. Why is it important to you?
• Whether you found it confronting to write - and if so, how you moved through that stage to complete the piece;
• Whether you faced ethical issues in the writing (what were these? how did they affect your approach? how did you ultimately resolve them?).
• Whether the types of literary techniques you used were well chosen and worked the way you wanted them to (e.g. dialogue, a seductive opening/lead; observation and description, anecdotes, structure, etc).
• What you learned from using those techniques.
• What you learned from writing this piece. Why do you think it helped you to learn this/these thing/s?
• Other comments you would like to make.

Assessment Criteria:

• the storytelling skills demonstrated; the quality and clarity of the writing; the syntax, grammar and spelling; evidence of research and of focus or theme.
• evidence of structure, narrative flow, an enticing well-written lead and a satisfying conclusion; 
• an ethical approach to the work;
• an ability to reflect on the students' own work in light of the lessons learned over the semester and to improve it and rewrite it accordingly.