Thursday, March 30: Peer Critiques

Hello all!

First off, here's today's lesson: Lesson 10. You have submitted your first draft (yay!), and we're moving on to revision. (If you have not yet submitted your draft, you need to get it in as soon as possible. The rest of our assignments are based on revising that draft, so not having it in will immediately put you behind).

This week, we focused on peer critiques (which will be due on Tuesday). You will anonymously critique two drafts submitted by your classmates through RaiderWriter.

Peer Critiques (as listed on RaiderWriter):

• For each critique, you will introduce the draft, summarize its main points, assess and respond to the author's presentation, and offer conclusions about the effectiveness of the analysis. Remember to speak as specifically as possible about the draft, quoting from it when necessary. Each critique will be 400 - 500 words in length.
• Text for Analysis/Thesis: Identify the writer's thesis and then evaluate it for effectiveness. 
• Determine whether the writer has selected a particular text to analyze and whether or not the thesis indicates that the writer will complete a rhetorical analysis of the text. 
• Discuss whether the thesis is specific enough and of appropriate scope for this analysis. For example, a thesis that states that an author uses ethos, pathos, and logos in their text is NOT specific enough for a rhetorical analysis. 
• Explain why or why not, and provide suggestions for the writer to help improve the thesis, if necessary.
• Quality and Specificity of Analysis: Evaluate the writer’s analysis. 
• Does the writer select specific quotations from the text to discuss? What are these quotations, and what does the writer have to say about them? 
• Does the writer seem to effectively analyze, or does the draft read more as a summary or paraphrasing of parts of the text being analyzed, or does the writer end up arguing about the content, rather than the structure and presentation of the text?
• Overall Essay Structure: Comment on the overall structure of the essay. For example, explain in detail whether or not the paragraphs are presented in a logical and persuasive way. 
• Does the writer provide a clear introduction, body and conclusion? 
• Does each paragraph begin with a clear topic sentence and transition into the next paragraph? Provide examples that are particularly effective or areas that need more improvement.

Technical Difficulties:

• Keep in mind that you do have two critiques due.
• Each critique is 400-500 words
• Within RaiderWriter, you'll open up "1.1a," and you must hit "Submit Now" or else it won't appear.
• RaiderWriter only saves that draft for you for 48 hours. If you open one and leave it for too long, you'll get a new paper next time. Try to finish your critique in one go.
• Know that, if you're giving a good peer review, you may not even get through their whole paper before hitting the word limit.

Homework:

• Reading:
• First-Year Writing: Ch 6 pp. 118-124
• St. Martin's Handbook: Chapter 4 pp. 64-93
• Peer Critiques

That should be all for now!

Thursday, March 23: Rhetorical Analysis (Draft 1.1)

Hello all,

First off, here's a link to today's lesson: Lesson 9.

I hope that the workshopping we did in class today gave you some good ideas/directions for any major changes you'll make to your draft before it's due on Tuesday. Keep in mind, this paper should be fully formed when you turn it in--you are not just submitting a fleshed-out outline or a really "rough" draft. You should have a thorough introduction, body paragraphs with sufficient analysis, a conclusion, and a works cited page at the end of your document.

Also, please note that when you submit the draft on RaiderWriter, you should: copy and paste the text into the text box AND attach the actual Microsoft Word document. If you have any technical difficulties, remember to email me a copy of the draft before the due date so I at least have it on file.

DRAFT 1.1--From RAIDERWRITER:

• After selecting your text and critically reading it, you will determine the writer’s purpose and intended audience for the text.
• Once you have determined these elements, you will begin to analyze the text so as to determine the specific strategies (rhetorical choices) the writer uses to achieve his or her purpose and to meet the needs of the audience. 
• For example, you might choose to look at such elements as the types of evidence a writer puts forward and how he or she does so. Ask yourself if the writer uses evidence from sources, or if he or she tells stories from personal experience. 
• Examine the sentence structures and word choice. How do these contribute to the author’s purpose? 
• Evaluate the overall tone of the text, and determine how it does or does not contribute to the way in which it communicates to its audience. 
• After you determine what these strategies or rhetorical choices are, consider how well these strategies (rhetorical choices) actually work. 
• As a result of this assignment, you should be able to take these skills and transfer them to any reading you are asked to do in college, and you should see an improvement in your ability to read and comprehend any text.

Although this is an initial draft, it should be carefully edited and written in a professional tone. Please use MLA format for both your in-text citations and your works cited in this draft.
Your draft should be 1200 words in length.  

Homework

• Reading: 
• St. Martin's Handbook: Chapter 4a, 4c-e, "Rereading Your Draft," "Getting the Most from Peer Reviewers' Comments," "Learning from Instructor Comments," "Revising with Peer and Instructor Comments"; Chapters 27, 28, 30, "Writing to the World," "Language that Builds Common Ground," "Word Choice" (pp. 27-28, 30, 64-66, 76-79, 354-359, 360-366, 374-385) 
• First-Year Writing: Chapter 6 (pp. 121-125)
• Draft 1.1 due Tuesday
• (Optional) Open Tutoring Session on Monday (3/27) from 5-7pm. ENGL/PHIL 352 or 353.

Thursday, March 9: Revision

Hello all!

First off, here's today's lesson: Lesson 8.

For today's class, we discussed where you are in the writing process for your draft 1.1, and we also discussed how revision is *not* the same thing as editing/proofreading.

Remember, in revision, you should start out by giving yourself some distance from your first draft, and then you focus on rereading for conveyed meaning, recalling your own purpose in writing your draft, reconsidering your rhetorical stance, considering your audience, and evaluating your organization. These are big picture issues that you want to get squared away before you work on smaller details through editing (you don't want to do all that work editing only to find you need to change directions on a big idea of your paper, right?). Again, these steps in the writing process basically ensure that you are conveying exactly what you mean to convey about a topic--that you are expressing your argument effectively.

I encourage you to keep looking at the differences in the sample drafts from draft 1.1 to 1.2 in the back of your book (pgs. 471, 478). Look for the author's identification of audience/purpose and rhetorical choices, organization of ideas, adherence to the assignment, etc. (other big picture ideas).

Homework:

• Reading: St. Martin's, Ch. 2 (pgs. 23-39)
• Bring a HARD COPY of your working rhetorical analysis to class after spring break (Draft 1.1 assignment is on RaiderWriter under the syllabus--take a look at it and make sure that you adhere to the assignment). The due date for your rhetorical analysis is coming up (March 28th), so you need to begin drafting! 
• You have already done a good chunk of the work here--you have gathered information, identified audience/purpose, structured a thesis statement, and you have even started a bit of analysis here and there. I am asking you to take your first swing at putting this into paper format. 
• BA6

Brief Assignment #6:

Description: To complete this assignment, you will read the initial draft provided on RaiderWriter and then write an initial paragraph in which you discuss the problems that you see in the current draft. 

Next, read the revised draft and write another paragraph in which you discuss:
1) Whether the problems that you saw in the first draft were addressed.
2) Whether the revisions fixed other issues that you hadn’t noticed in the draft.
3) Why the revisions are or are not an improvement over the first draft.

If you believe other revisions should be made to the draft, conclude your assignment with an explanation of what those are and how the revisions should be made.

Your discussion should be 500 - 650 words in length.

Let me know if you have any further questions. Have a great spring break!

Thursday, March 2: Integrating and Evaluating Quotations

Hello all!

It was good to see all your smiling faces in person today. Here's the link to today's lesson: Lesson 7.

This week is about finding some support for your paper and thinking about how to integrate that support into your writing. Although you have picked out rhetorical choices and examples of them(BA3), here you are looking to begin analyzing (i.e. how does the author effectively reach his/her audience through his/her use of these rhetorical choices?).

Remember, your thesis is saying that the writer is making rhetorical choices in order to make an argument. Therefore, your included quotations should be based on showing *HOW* these rhetorical choices are working on a specific audience, so avoid picking a quote just because it "sounds good" or "it shows the author's message/main idea really well."  Instead, look to find quotations that truly represent the rhetorical choice you're going to analyze. Then, show how these rhetorical choices are working to leverage the audience toward the author's purpose.

You can always look at the student samples in the back of the FYW textbook if you need some guidance.

Your homework this week is BA5:

*This post has been updated with new information*

Description:  Begin by writing your working thesis (the one from Brief Assignment 4 or a revision of it) at the top of your assignment.
Then, consider which rhetorical choices you’ve identified in this text represent some of the most significant choices made by the author.
Select a minimum of five examples from the article that exemplify the two or three choices you plan to analyze in your upcoming draft. Write a brief assessment (minimum of 100 words) of why each example would be useful to you in composing your draft. Your assessment of each example should include your answers to the following questions:

• Are you quoting the author directly, or referring to a source that the author quoted in the text?
• Where will this example fit in your draft’s organization? Consider whether it will be part of an early or late body paragraph? Part of the introduction? Part of the conclusion? Why?
• How does it demonstrate the points you are trying to make about the author's writing?

Your analysis, not counting the quotations, should be 500-650 words.

NOTE: You may find that in identifying and evaluating your quotations, you will modify and improve your working thesis statement.  In other words, you may find quotes for rhetorical devices that are stronger than the devices you previously chose to use.

That should be all for now! Have a good week!