Week 2/3 - Monday, 9/13/2010

Monday, 9/13/2010 - Class

• Review blog post/email sent this week

• Student emails (confirm) and discuss email policy (format and responsibility to check)

• Questions about Course policies?

• Questions about BA 1?

• Review Top Twenty

• Intro to Summary and Paraphrase

-          Why we’re learning this

-          Activity

• Assign BA 2:

Brief Assignment 2: Summary and Paraphrase

Reading 2: Textbook Ch. 1 Summary and Paraphrase p. 5-32; E-Handbook Ch. 1 & 2; 14 f(2) & (3); DiYanni, “Developing a College Vocabulary” (available from the E-Handbook website)

Objective: To demonstrate your ability to summarize and paraphrase portions of a text.

Purpose: Summarizing and paraphrasing are important skills for academic writers. For this assignment, you will write both a summary and a paraphrase of a text. Use the discussion about summaries in Ch. 1 of your textbook as well as the discussion of paraphrase in Ch. 1 and Chapter 14 of The St. Martin’s Handbook to assist you in doing so.

Description: Part One, Article Summary

The following three articles are located in Ch. 9 of your textbook. To complete your article summary, select one of the articles from the list below OR use a different article chosen by your classroom instructor. Your summary of an article should follow the summary writing guidelines discussed in Ch. 1.

Articles to summarize:

-        MacNeil, Robert. “Do you Speak American?”First-Year Writing: Writing in the Disciplines. Boston: Pearson Custom, 2010. 313-323.

-        Bryson, Bill. “Good English and Bad.” First-Year Writing: Writing in the Disciplines. Boston: Pearson Custom, 2010. 330-338.

-        Crystal, David. “Why a Global Language?” First-Year Writing: Writing in the Disciplines. Boston: Pearson Custom, 2010. 350-359.

Description, Part Two, Paraphrase Assignment

After you’ve completed your summary, you will paraphrase a brief but complex passage from the same text. For the "paraphrase" part of the assignment, you will only need to paraphrase a passage of your chosen article. As opposed to paraphrasing the whole article, please choose any passage (one large paragraph), identify the page number and paragraph number of the original passage (i.e. p. 474, paragraph 1) above your paraphrase, and write a short paraphrase for that passage only.

However, your assignment should provide a summary of the entire article for the summary part of the assignment. Please let me know if this makes sense. I am making this change to make for a bit less work this week, as you do have a lot of reading.

In summation, your summary should summarize the entire text. Your paraphrase should paraphrase only one passage within the original article (again, make sure you indicate which one you're paraphrasing at the top).
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Homework:

• BA 2 (due Friday by 11:59 p.m.)

Read and print Helicopter Parents-  http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37493795

• Read Chapter 2 in textbook (Critical Reading and Critique)

Follow up and To Do Before Class on 9/13/2010

Hello all,


Hope you had a fun and restful Labor Day weekend. Also, thank you for completing your Brief Assignment One -- all of those who turned in work will receive feedback and grades over the next week via Raider Writer.

Now, moving forward ... although we did not meet this week, we will need to complete some reading for the course for discussion next class (Monday, 9/13/2010).

To make this simple, I’m going to simply list below what you should have done from last week (what would have been due if we had had class this week on Monday, 9/6/2010) and then what you should have prepared for class discussion on Monday, 9/13/2010. You will need to have all of this completed by our next class meeting. Please bring all books and materials to class on Monday, 9/13/2010:

For Week 2 (if we had met for class on Monday, 9/6/2010; all of this should have done last week and of course, then, should be completed by class time Monday, 9/13/2010):

By now, you should have:

• Purchased your textbook (“First Year Writing”)

• Logged into Bedford Student Center and completed the pre-semester diagnostic

• Completed Brief Assignment number one and uploaded to Raider Writer

• Read the “Course Policies” in your “First Year Writing” textbook

• Read the Bedford “Top Twenty” on the E-Handbook Site

TO DO THIS WEEK - For Week 3 (complete/read by class time on Monday, 9/13/2010):


• Read in Textbook - Ch. 1 Summary and Paraphrase p. 5-32


• Read E-Handbook Ch. 1 & 2; 14 f(2) & (3) (ON BEDFORD E-HANDBOOK SITE)


• Read DiYanni “Developing a College Vocabulary” (available from the BEDFORD E-HANDBOOK website – INSTRUCTION/CODE FOR ACCESSING THIS INFORMATION IS ATTACHED HERE: HOW TO LOCATE READINGS FOR WEEK 2/3 in BEDFORD AND POSTED ON HTTP://TRAUTHWRITING.BLOGSPOT.COM

Again, in order to be prepared for our next class, you’ll need to complete the items above and bring all materials to class. If you have any questions, please email me or consult a classmate. Please make sure to read through ALL attached material before emailing to ask for codes, etc. I am also available for office hours this week on Thursday from 2:15 – 3:15 p.m. in ENGL 424.

Thanks, and see you all next week (Monday, 9/13/2010).

- E. Trauth

Week 1 - Monday, August 30, 2010

Class Activities:
- Welcome/Introduction to 1301 - Textbooks
- "Why Write?" Group Activity; "So what is ENGL 1301 about, anyway, and how does it differ from ENGL 1302?" "How does high school writing differ from college writing?" "Why do we need to know how to write in college?"
-  Go over syllabus/schedule/course policies/cultural extra credit
     - Save everything (USB drive or Dropbox)
     - You'll receive an email to your TTU address with instructions for resetting password and logging in; these activities must be done within 48 hours of the first class meeting.

- First Day Writing assignment
- Go over technologies (RaiderWriter, Bedford)

Bedford Student Center
- My contact - erin.trauth@ttu.edu
-  Discuss Critical thinking rubric
Homework:
- Get textbook
- Enroll in sites (RaiderWriter, Bedford)
- Brief Assignment # 1
(A) Take Pre-Semester Diagnostic on Bedford site

(B) Reading 1: Course Policies (in textbook) and E-handbook Top Twenty (in Bedford site)

(C) Complete Brief Assignment One: (note: Please make sure to answer all of these questions!)

Objective: To identify potential weaknesses in grammar and mechanics for further study this semester

Purpose: Often, students realize that they have trouble with grammar and mechanics, but find it hard to learn to avoid those errors because they aren’t even sure what they are. This assignment requires you to take the pre-semester diagnostic (available to you once you have purchased your e-handbook from Bedford St. Martins at their website) and then to write a brief reflection about your score. You will also answer some additional questions about your writing experience prior to enrolling in ENGL 1301.

Description:


1. Please begin by telling readers what your score was on the diagnostic.

2. Then, write a few sentences in which you tell us what problems you've had with grammar in the past and what questions about grammar you'd like answered. Also, please write a few sentences in which you tell readers whether or not the score was higher or lower than you expected. After reviewing your results, and based on your previous writing experiences, which particular grammar elements would you like to focus on this semester?

3. Conclude this first assignment by telling readers a little about the writing you did in high school. Roughly how many papers did you write? What kinds of papers were they? Research-based, argumentative, analytical? What do you think your strengths are as a writer? Your weaknesses?

4. Upload this to RaiderWriter under "Brief Assignment 1"

For next week:
- How to access week two and three readings:
Week 2 and 3 Readings on Bedford