Fall 2026 – The Building Blocks of Writing: Crafting Compelling Prose

Course Information

This is a 3-credit course that carries the academic commitment, workload, and tuition associated with university-level study. Please review the course details and tuition information carefully before registering. If completed with a passing grade, the credits may be eligible towards a future degree or certificate program.

Course Description

This course develops the core skills of effective, expressive writing through close reading and sustained practice in structure, tone, and style. Students analyze exemplary prose across genres while strengthening sentence craft, paragraph coherence, clarity, and rhetorical awareness of audience and purpose. Through workshops and iterative assignments, students learn to move from summary to interpretation and from early drafts to polished prose, engaging diverse global voices, including works by Muslim women writers, as models for developing a confident and purposeful writing voice.

Writing is treated as an ethical practice grounded in Islamic values and epistemology. Students cultivate habits shaped by niyyah (intention), ṣidq (truthfulness), amāna (responsibility), and iḥsān (excellence), alongside explicit instruction in academic integrity, ethical source use, and APA and Chicago citation styles. The course also addresses responsible and transparent AI-assisted writing, emphasizing revision support while maintaining authorship and intellectual honesty. Major assessments guide students through a progressive sequence demonstrating growth in clarity, revision, and ethical communication.

Course Learning Outcomes

By the end of this course, students will be able to:

• Write clear, purposeful, and well-structured prose demonstrating control of sentence structure, paragraph development, tone, and style.
• Apply rhetorical and analytical reading strategies to interpret texts across genres, cultures, and historical contexts.
• Move from summary to interpretation by developing claims supported by textual evidence and analysis.
• Demonstrate ethical source use and academic integrity by accurately summarizing, quoting, paraphrasing, and citing sources using APA and Chicago formats.
• Employ responsible and transparent AI-assisted writing practices, distinguishing acceptable revision support from inappropriate content generation.
• Identify and work within major literary genres and global writing traditions, recognizing diverse voices and stylistic approaches.
• Revise writing through a structured, multi-stage process to improve clarity, coherence, argumentation, and voice.

Course Prerequisites

Course Materials

Students are responsible for purchasing all required textbooks before the start of class.
Ribāṭ textbooks are available at the Rabata Bookshop

Registration Information

Questions?
Contact registration@rabata.org

Attendance Policy

Students are expected to attend all scheduled class sessions and participate actively in their learning.
Consistent attendance supports academic success and helps maintain a collaborative classroom environment.
If an absence is unavoidable, students are responsible for communicating with their instructor, reviewing
missed material, and completing any assigned work.

Technology Requirements

To ensure a successful online learning experience, all students must have regular access to a personal
computer and reliable high-speed internet. Courses at Ribāṭ University are delivered through Canvas and may include video lectures, interactive discussions, digital readings, and multimedia assignments.
Students are responsible for maintaining the technology needed to participate fully.

Minimum Technical Requirements

Technology Skills

Additional Notes and Technical Support

• Students are expected to check course announcements and email regularly.
• Technical support is available for login issues, course access, and basic troubleshooting.