Welcome to the introduction to Literature. This course is designed to meet the new Florida guidelines for Core Courses in the Humanities. It's also designed to meet USF's requirement for a Humanities course in the Foundations of Knowledge and Learning categories. Furthermore, it meets your requirements for a Gordon 6A Writing Intensive Course. 

I'm Dr. Cynthia Patterson. I'm an Associate Professor in the English department and the Undergraduate Program Director. I designed this course in conjunction with the staff at the Office of Innovative Education. I have over 10 years of experience designing and teaching online learning experiences, and I tried to bring to this course design the best practices in the field of online learning. Although I designed this course, it will be taught by multiple instructors and each will customize the course to suit his or her own strengths and desires. 

However, there are certain teaching practices that we share in common. Among them, we're committed to self-directed learning. You as a learner will need to take responsibility for your own learning in this course. We're also committed to writing as a process. That is, you will need to demonstrate all stages of the writing process in this class from brainstorming, to organizing, to drafting, to the peer review process, and to final editing and publishing. We are also committed to hands on real world learning. So you will be creating, writing proposals, memos, correspondences that you can use in the workplace. You'll also be practicing oral communication skills suitable to the workplace. 

In the Introduction to Literature course, you will be studying the four major literary genres, short fiction, longer fiction, poetry, and drama. We will be using the Pearson eText. It's an interactive text that provides you with videos and other information about the course. We will also be using the Pearson media sharing platform to create video blogs. You'll be taking short quizzes. You'll be participating in a group project. You'll also be doing short discussion posts. 

This course addresses three of USS dimensions, analytical and critical thinking, oral and written communication, and inquiry based learning. In this course, you will learn a number of applications that you can take with you. You will learn how to create websites. You will learn how to create video blogs. You will learn how to use digital media communications such as virtual classrooms. You will learn how to write analytical essays and you will work collaboratively in a group on a project that you will publish at the end of the semester. 

Most students think that online courses will be easier. In fact, they're usually way more demanding. You should expect to spend at least six to nine hours per week working on the learning activities inside each module. In the English department, we consider the Introduction to Literature to be an exploration of what makes us human and what makes us humane in an increasingly complex and global society. This is a journey. A journey of exploration of the self and of others through the world's great literature's. We invite you to join us on this journey.