Wednesday, February 11 2009

Today’s Agenda

For today, you were to do the following:

Your homework for next time is to revise these two documents into the first two parts of your argument. Print off and bring three copies with you to class.

Let’s begin by getting out our three copies, and turning one over. On the back of this copy, I want you to write on the following topic for the next 10 minutes:

Beginning with your analysis of the “The Oblivious Empire,” I would like you to explain to me, in detail, how you went about condensing and summarizing your précis into a shorter document that successfully illustrates the major parts of this essay. Describe in detail how you re-worked the structure to make it not only shorter, but also logically coherent.

Next, I want you to describe the process of writing the evaluation portion of this document. How did you go about judging the significance, value, or worth of the individual parts of Hertsgaard’s  essay as they either support or contradict his thesis? Be specific and go into detail.

Group Work: For the next 5-7 minutes, I want you to get into groups of 4 and share the writing you just completed with one another. Take a few minutes to explain your answers to both of the above questions.

Class Discussion: What did we do? How did we do it? (5-7 mins)

Now that we have thought about what we did, we need to be showing one another how he actually did it.

Workshop:

In your groups, I want you to exchange drafts with one another. We will be performing focused proofreads on these documents for the next 20 or so minutes.

1)      Analysis:

a.       Content Check

i.      Has the author successfully analyzed the essay in the required space? Did he or she lay out the basic parts of the arguments (situation, issue, and thesis) in a way that makes sense? Is the writing balanced or unbalanced? That is, is the author skipping over important information?

b.      Mechanics check

i.      Let’s begin with a focus on paragraph structure. Are these paragraphs well-developed, i.e. 6-8 sentences long and focused on a general topic or idea. If so, great – but if not, then we need to let the person know that.

ii.      Citation check. Are quotes and paraphrases properly cited? Essentially, any information that appears to have come from, or have been gleaned from, a specific source (the essay) needs to be cited appropriately.

2)      Evaluation:

a.       Content check:

i.      Has the author clearly identified a thesis early in either his section or in the previous analysis section? Are they clearly explaining how the parts of the essay either relate or do not relate to the thesis? Has the author made an attempt to clearly explain the value of these parts within the essay as either supporting or confusing the author’s thesis?

b.      Mechanics Check:

i.     Again, let’s begin with a focus on paragraphs. Has the author written in well developed paragraphs, 6-8 sentences long, focused on one topic or idea? If so, the next step it to see if they have, again, cited correctly.

3)      Your homework for Friday is to re-draft these pages and e-mail the revision to me BEFORE class.  Your other homework for Friday is to come to class with your FOLDER: this folder will have printed off copies of everything in it that you have done for this class so far this semester.

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