You must begin this assignment by finding a real assignment sheet--that is, a sheet actually used for a college writing class--which is based on a college writing "mode."  See below for more about college writing modes.

You can find assignment sheets on the internet, or you might ask your colleagues and teachers if they know of any good assignments.

One of the goals of this activity is to get you to think about what makes a good writing assignment.  One of the assumptions is that, any time you give an assignment to students, you should also try writing in response to that assignment yourself.

What ARE "Modes"?

The term "mode" came into widespread use in the 1950s to refer to common types (or "forms," or even "genres") of writing that became widely required of American college writing students.  There is no systematic or definitive list or even an agreed-upon exact definition of what constitutes a writing mode.  Rather the writing modes are a set of conventions that evolved informally, over time.  But a list of the common modes will be familiar to almost any modern American college student.  It includes the following, or their equivalents:  narrative, description, compare and contrast, process analysis, argument.

Here are two mode-based assignments that I've developed for my engl 1010 course:
  -- Viewpoint 
  -- How-to