What follows below is a series of example writing prompts, which stem from English composition courses that we have taught at the University of Washington. For more information on one of those courses, visit the course website for “English 131: Composing a Virtual Campus.”

Each of these prompts should help instructors (in one way or another) integrate geolocation into a composition course. In fact, the prompts are part of a single writing sequence, which begins with “personal geography” and perspective, to then move into the capturing of “encounter-possibilities” and the analysis of spatial practices, to then having students “re-map” the intersections of personal geography and the class geoblog, to finally asking students to compose an academic argument for a new campus map, which does not currently exist at the University of Washington.

These writing prompts, in particular, were drafted by Megan J. Kelly and Jentery Sayers.

Four prompts for short, “response” papers:

Writing Prompt 1: “The Autogeographical Map”

Writing Prompt 2: “Capturing Evidence”

Writing Prompt 3: “What’s Missing?”

Writing Prompt 4: “Re-Mapping”

And one prompt for a longer paper:

Writing Prompt 5: “This Map Matters”