Today’s Plan:
- Review
- Article #4
- Upcoming Schedule
- Homework
Review
I wanted to open today highlighting what I consider to be the most important things we have covered in class this semester.
- Does your article have a clear claim?
- Are your paragraphs driven by ideas?
- One idea per paragraph?
- Do the last sentences in your paragraphs make it clear how the whole paragraph supports the overarching claim?
- Do you transition into sources?
- When you bring in a source, do you provide context/ethos for it:
- When was it published?
- What was its purpose(s)?
- What was its evidence?
- What methods did it use to get its evidence?
- What conclusions did it draw, what recommendations did it make?
- Are you capable of ethically handling an opposing viewpoint, such that a reader cannot immediately identify whether you agree or disagree with that perspective/idea/argument?
While we’ve talked about other things–like establishing kairos / a shared problem in the introduction and crafting active / readable sentences–these are the foundational skills I want you to carry forward into your other classes.
Article #4
To help further develop these skills, I want you to look back at your first two articles. This week you will select one of those articles and rewrite it: adding new material, reorganizing, and improving the style.
We are going to talk about how to revisit and expand the article in class today. In terms of adding new material, let’s think about some of the following questions:
- Do you think the argument in the first version was clear? Was it murky? Has your position on the subject changed?
- What new things have happened since you wrote the original article?
- What new things might you research to further develop the article? What information did you wish you had when you wrote it that you might go find?
- Did you have an authentic/quality counter-argument in your original piece?
Upcoming Schedule
Here is how I see the next few weeks playing out:
- Wednesday, Oct 24 (computer lab): In class I’ll have classmates read through your revision candidate.
- Friday, Oct 26: We will workshop writing in class
- Monday, Oct 29: I will go over the academic research assignment, including the proposal project
- Wednesday, Oct 31: I believe we will meet in the library for research / otherwise an academic reading activity on concise writing
- Friday, Nov 1st: Library or academic reading activity
- Monday, Nov 5th: Proposals due
- Wednesday, Nov 7th: Conferences
- Thursday, Nov 8th: Conferences
- Friday, Nov 9th: Conferences
- Monday, Nov 12th: MLA/APA citation
- Wednesday, Nov 14th: Creating a multimedia presentation
- Friday, Nov 16th: Complete academic research paper due in class for peer review
- Monday, Nov 18th: Optional class. Complete drafts of final paper due to me by Tuesday, Nov 19th at midnight
- Monday, Nov 26th Review: creating a multimedia presentation
- Wednesday, Nov 28th: Presentations #1-10
- Friday, Nov 30th: Presentations #11-20
- Monday Dec 3rd – Friday Dec 7th: Office hours availability to discuss revisions. Final papers are due Friday Dec 7th at 11:00am.
Homework
I’d like you to close read the article you have chosen to revise. Why are you revising this one? What ideas do you have? Turn our brief discussions in class today into something more concrete and directive. This exercise is meant to be inventive and generative–so spend about 10 minutes just free-writing, spitballing, letting as many ideas and thoughts pour out of your head as possible. Don’t worry about grammar, about style, about “making sense.” Just go.
When you are done, go out and find two things that you can add to this article. Answer the following questions for each new source:
- When was it published?
- What was its purpose(s)?
- Can you break the article into sections?
- What was its evidence?
- What methods did it use to get its evidence?
- What conclusions did it draw, what recommendations did it make?
You’ll submit this to Canvas–“Tues, Oct 23: Article Revision Self Assessment and Research.”
Sign up for a conference time.
If none of these times work for you, let me know and we can work something out.
