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CSTW Center for the Study and Teaching of Writing

College of Humanities

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Writing at OSU

Introduction | First-Level Writing: English 110 | Second-Level Writing: 367 | Third-Level Writing

First-Level Writing: English 110

English 110 is required of every student at Ohio State, and is a prerequisite for many upper-level courses throughout the curriculum. The course introduces students to the process of writing from the invention and brainstorming phase through revision and the completion of a final product. Moreover, the class helps students to analyze the contexts within which they will have to write in their college careers and beyond.

The First Year Writing Program in the English Department administers the course, and gives the following statement of purpose:

“First-year writing courses emphasize that writing is a primary element of active, creative learning in literate cultures. These introductory writing courses employ methods of rhetorical and cultural analysis to provide students with the tools to think and write analytically about print and non-print texts. The courses build on students' ability to practice critical analysis across a variety of texts that range from public speeches and critical essays to paintings, photographs, and films; to identify cultural, rhetorical and representational trends within these sources; and to generate texts that engage their own perceptions as well as the perspectives of scholars and cultural critics” (FYWP Handbook).

The English Department offers several different iterations of 110, including honors sections (110H), sections on literature (110.02), and sections taught in computer labs (110C) supported by the Digital Media Project. The Digital Media Project also offers pedagogical support for innovative uses of digital media in English studies, giving students an opportunity to compose across a variety of different media.

Placement into English 110

Some students can get credit for English 110 or 110H if they have sufficiently high scores on the AP English exam (a 4 or 5). Other students with SAT Verbal scores under 460 or ACT English scores under 19 must take a placement exam during orientation, and may be placed into English 109.01 and 109.02 or 110.03 and 193W, Intensive Reading and Writing courses administered by the English Department’s Writing Workshop. International students who take the TOEFL exams and do not meet exemption requirements must take a series of courses through the ESL Composition program in the College of Education’s School of Teaching and Learning.