Dr.

Will Kurlinkus
Spring 2018
T: 5-8 PM
Location: Cate Center 2, Room 110
Office Hours: TR 12-1 PM or by appointment
Email: wkurlinkus@gmail.com

English 5133: Teaching Technical Writing

What is Technical Writing?
Science writing and journalism, lab reports, corporate summaries, grant writing, editing,
ethnographic observation, workflow studies, user-centered design, participatory design, conflict
mediation, infographic production, website redesign—technical communication as a field
encompasses numerous streams which all coalesce around translating technical information for a
non-technical audience. Technical communicators, thus, usually have to be highly adaptable,
ready to solve any (often vague) problem a client might have in communicating to their audience
of customers, employees, funding agencies, bosses, et al. Technical writing, then, is writing in
technical fields, but it is so much more.

Who Are Technical Writers? What is This Course?

In the real world, technical communicators are usually 1. English or communications students
(that’s you) who have an interest in and/or patience for scientists and science or 2. STEM
students (that’s your undergraduate students) with a flair and interest for writing and
communication. This course is unique in that we are simultaneously going to:
1. Learn about and train to enter the field of technical communication as adults who
could theoretically get jobs as technical communicators,
2. Learn about and train to enter the field of technical communication as academics who
could theoretically perform research in technical communication,
3. Prepare to teach a specific course on technical communication to a particularly
STEM-minded group of undergraduate students (often highly appreciative to get
writing training but sometimes unclear on why they need user-centered and
humanistic training as well).
To do so, our course will be split down the middle: in each unit one day will be a professional
and theoretical day the other are our pedagogy days. Throughout the semester, I how to have a
few real technical writers (who transitioned from the university to the field) come in to talk about
what they actually do on the job and how to get a technical writing job if you are interested in the
future.

Why User-Centered Design?

Our version of technical writing is particularly focused on user-centered design; that is, we’ll
learn about creating customized documents for specific users not by guessing about what
audiences like, want, and need (commonly known as a best practices or universal principals
approach) but rather by formally studying, interviewing, and observing the ways audiences
actually use a document or communique. Standards change across audience and purpose, good
writers prepare for that change. Further, this course focuses on the rapid democratization of
expertise that is occurring in the 21st Century. From medical patients who have a particular
feeling of what treatment they need from reading WebMD, to neighborhood residents who
disagree with an architect at a city planning townhall—more and more technical communicators
must learn to write with rather than for audiences, who want to participate in the creation of the
texts and designs.

What are the Assignments?

Because this course is an introduction to the field and to teaching, assignments are numerous but
short. There will be many low-stakes activities, readings, and leadership roles that will ideally
result in you having a customized course by the end of the semester. There are, however, two 7-
10 page assignments. One asks you to connect your own interests outside of this class (whether
literary, cultural theory, or otherwise) to a concept you are interested in inside this class. The
other asks you to modify the first assignment of the course—the usability test—in your own
uniquely humanizing way. My hope is that we can then take these multiple versions of usability
tests, observe the results from them, and collaborate on a co-authored article next spring after
you’ve taught.

Required Materials
1. Book 1: Krug, Steve. Rocket Surgery Made Easy.
2. Book 2: Used copy of Paul Anderson’s Technical Communication: A Reader-Centered
Approach
3. Notebook for taking notes and collecting handouts.

Assignments
1. Digital Book Chapter
2. Video Lecture
3. Formal Proposal for “Humanizing Usability Testing”: 5-10 pages
4. Custom Syllabus: Due at the end of the semester.
5. Connector to Your Research (Text and Presentation): 5-10 pages +
Unique/Transformed Assignment.
6. 5 Roles: Complete each of the 5 roles throughout the semester
7. Weekly Reading Responses: ~1-page in which you bring in your own theoretical
critiques of the readings and/or discuss a popular reading about the topic that might be
discussed in class.
8. Digital Course Binder: File in which you will keep course materials that you will use
to teach your course
9. Finish each of the class rolls

Classroom Roles
1. Discussion Leader (Research Days Only): Provides discussion questions for the day’s
readings and reading questions that can be given to students.
2. Resource Gatherer: Gathers extra free resources (readings, etc.) for the assignment
that could be used to teach the particular assignment discussed in class that day.
3. Activity Creator: Creates a short in-class activity to teach students the unit’s goals.


T 1.16 Introduction to User-Centered Technical Writing
1. Bill Hart Davidson: “What Are the Work Patterns of Technical
Communicators?”
2. Sarah Bernard: “How the Pill Bottle Was Remade—Sensibly and
Beautifully”
3. Leana Winn: “When Patients Read What Their Doctors Write”
4. Julia Beluz: “Incredibly irresponsible chocolate milk research”
5. Edwin Cartlidge: “Appeals court overturns manslaughter convictions of
six earthquake scientists”
• Video Lecture: You can skim through this
www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=KQqbWVpcHLQ

In Class: Introductions and Sign-Up for Roles;

T 1.23 Technical Writing Scholars Study User-Centered Design
1. Donald Norman: The Design of Everyday Things, Chapters 1 and 2
2. Gaver et al: “Design: Cultural Probes”
3. Almquist and Lupton: “Affording Meaning”
4. Barbara Faga: “Ground Zero”
5. Kurlinkus: “Nostalgic Deliberations: What I Mean When I Say
‘Democratizing Technology’”

T 1.30 Introduction to Usability Testing
1. Johnson, Salvo, Zoetewey: “User-Centered Technology in Participatory
Culture”
2. Patricia Sullivan: “Beckon, Encounter, Experience: The Danger of
Control and the Promise of Encounters in the Study of User Experience”
3. Erin Friess: “Personas as Rhetorically Rich and Complex Mechanisms for
Design”
4. IDEO: Methods Cards
5. Chapter 9: Design Briefs
6. Chapter 11: Usability Plans
7. Chapter 12: Usability Reports
• Video Lecture: https://youtu.be/Lo4sixBetMo

Job Title. Design Researcher: https://www.ideo.com/jobs/design-research

T 2.6 Teaching Usability Testing
1. Steve Krug: Rocket Surgery Made Easy
2. Grace Smith: “Top 5 Web Design Mistakes that Small Businesses Make”
3. Dmitry Fadeyev: “9 Common Usability Mistakes in Web Design”
4. Cameron Chapman: “15 Common Mistakes in E-Commerce Design”
5. Vitaly Friedman: 10 Principles Of Good Website Design”
6. Nielsen Norman Group: “A step by step guide to scenario mapping”
7. Jonathan Wold: “Stop Writing Project Proposals”
 • Video Lecture:
o Intro to Web Design: https://youtu.be/MnlzBx7ZiWg
o Intro to Design Briefs:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaZWlBX0NEY
o Intro to Test Design: https://youtu.be/tTT6Tv58UvI

T 2.13 Cleanup Day
1. Grade Student Examples
2. Pamela Wilson: “8 Incredibly Simple Ways to Get More People to Read
Your Content”
3. Infographics: Smith “Ten Steps to Designing an Amazing Infographic”;
4. Creativebloq: “10 Steps to Creating the Perfect Infographic”
5. John Carroll: “Narrating the Future: Scenarios and the Cult of
Specification”
• Video Lecture:
o Intro to Lab Reports 1: https://youtu.be/GLDpbEBMdog
o Intro to Lab Reports 2: https://youtu.be/TMPnB1Qw5tg

T 2.20 Technical Writing Scholars Study Professional Writing Cultures
1. James Gee, et al.: The New Work Order. Chapters 1 and 2
2. Jeff Grabill: Chapter 5. Community Literacy Programs and the Politics of
Change
3. Richard Ocejo: Masters of Craft, “Show the Animal”
4. Kantor and Streitfeld: “Inside Amazon: Wrestling Big Ideas in a Bruising
Workplace.”

Job Title. Technical Communication Specialist: https://ohr.psu.edu/recruitment-and-
compensation/job-profiles/marketing-sales-communications/technical-communications-specialist

T 2.9 Teaching Application Packets
1. Paul Anderson: Resume and Cover Letter Chapter
2. Read and Grade Student Example Packets
3. Lydia Dishman: “A Former Google Recruiter Reveals The Biggest
Resume Mistakes”
4. Elana Gross: 12 Tips to Get Hired as a Recent Graduate
5. Mark Lyden: “3 Crucial Career Fair Tips For College Students”
6. “50 Interview Questions and Answers”
7. PopSugar: “5 Things You *Must* Do to Follow-up After an Interview”
• Video Lecture:
o Job Search: https://youtu.be/-gwWaoxFRzE
o Resume: https://youtu.be/EgWuaAo7ids
o Cover Letter: https://youtu.be/pMfRHGGlIn4
o Interview: https://youtu.be/4t_uELQgbMs

T 2.27 Cleanup Day
 1. Emails 1. James Hamblin: How to Email,” The Atlantic
2. Emails 2. Anonymous: “New Series: The Art of the Email”
3. Emails 3. Alyssa Gregory: “How to Streamline E-mail Communication.”

In Class: Practice Video Editing and Online Teaching

T 3.6 Technical Writers Study User/Maker/Technical Culture
1. John Tierney: “The Dilemmas of Maker Culture”; Morozov “Making It”
2. Marilyn Cooper: “The Postmodern Space of Operator's Manuals”
3. Jay Dolmage: “Disability, Usability, Universal Design”
4. Tom Nichols: The Death of Expertise, selections.
5. Langdon Winner: The Whale and the Reactor
6. http://blog.screensteps.com/10-examples-of-great-end-user-
documentation

Job Title. User Documentation Expert:
https://careers.google.com/jobs#!t=jo&jid=/google/technical-writer-user-documentation-google-
building-41-1600-amphitheatre-2738990359


T 3.13 Teaching Instruction Sets
1. Anderson: Chapter 27: “Reader-Centered Instructions.”
2. Grade Student Examples
3. Robert Hoekman Jr.: “The Myth of the Sophisticated User.”
4. Shlomo Goltz: “A Closer Look At Personas: What They Are And How They
Work | 1”
5. Visual Hierarchy 1: http://gibbon.co/c/e14983c1-54fd-4945-9c3e-
c433074da086/on-visual-hierarchy
6. Yuriy Sklyar: “The Best of Manual and User Guide Design”
7. Suzanne Chapman and Melissa Gomis: “Eye for Design: Achieving
Visual Hierarchy”
8. Illustrations in Technical Writing:
https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Professional_and_Technical_Writing/Desi
gn/Illustrations
o Video Lecture: https://youtu.be/qeHzqGNSI6M

T 3.20 Spring Break

T 3.27 Technical Writers Write Grants and Work with Clients
1. Write Good: Grant Writing Made Easy
2. Will Kurlinkus: “Nostalgic Negotiations: Adapting, Adopting, and Refusing
Client Expertise”
3. Mike Monteiro: Design is a Job. A Book Apart, 2012.
4. Deborah Brandt: The Rise of Writing: Redefining Mass Literacy
5. Professional Example 1

Job Title. Grant Writer.

T 4.3 Teaching Grant Writing
1. Paul Anderson: “Writing Reader-Centered Proposals”
2. Research Packet on Women in STEM
3. Grade Student Examples
4. Professional Example 2

T 4.10 Cleanup Day
1. Thomas G. Goodnight: “The Personal, Technical, and Public Spheres of
Argument: A Speculive Inquiry into the Art of Public Deliberation.”

In Class: Document Design with Canvaa and Adobe Spark

T 4.17 Technical Writers Translate Technical Information for the Public
1. Sharon Crowley: Towards a Civil Discourse. Chapter 7
2. Jonah Berger: Made to Stick. Chapter 2
3. Robert Cialdini. Pre-Suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and
Persuade. Selections
4. Matthew Feinberg and Robb Willer: “The Moral Roots of Environmental
Attitudes.” Psychological Science, vol. 24, no.1, 2013, pp. 56–62.
5. Anthony Dunne and Fiona Raby: Speculative Design.

Science Writer. Science Writer.

T 4.24 Teaching Popular Translation
1. Grade Student Examples
2. Radiolab: “Colors” and “Making the Hippo Dance”
3. Watch 3 RSA Animates or Shorts: www.thersa.org/discover/videos
4. Carmine Gallo: Talk Like Ted. Chapters 4 and 8
5. ToteMan: http://www.totemansworld.com/pdfs/ToteManEpFnd.pdf
IDEO: Design On Citizenship: https://designson.ideo.com/citizenship/
6. Research “The Flame Challenge,” watching example entries,
understanding the rules, etc.
http://www.centerforcommunicatingscience.org/flame-challenge-2015/

In Class: Bring in and present on a popular translation you’ve found.

T 5.1 Final Day of Class: Putting Our Courses Together