Schedule Updates

Schedule for the rest of the term:

Wednesday, May 28:  Group work and presentations
Friday, May 30:  Presentations (Annotations due by email to Kristin sometime on Friday)

Monday, June 2:  Discuss Gopnik
Wednesday, June 4:  Bring in 2 copies of your Gopnik summary (2-2.5 pages)  Peer Review
Friday, June 6:  Thesis workshop (bring in a thesis statement if you have one!  I will give extra credit for sharing)

Monday, June 9:  NO CLASS--Finish Common Assignment.  **Due to Kristin by email by midnight  (Essays submitted after midnight will not receive credit)
Wednesday, June 11:  Bring 3 copies of your finished Common Assignment for peer review
Friday, June 13:  TBA

Wednesday, June 18:  Common Assignment due by email (5 pm) or in person to Kristin (office hours coming soon)

Common Assignment Prompt

For your third and final formal writing assignment in ENGL 101, you are asked to consider Adam Gopnik’s "The Caging of America," an article in the January 30, 2012 New Yorker. Using your own reading and understanding of the Gopnik article, along with your own research and the research of your peers, you will write a 5-6 page critique of Gopnik’s argument. This paper should:

1. Provide a thorough and accurate summary of the Gopnik article (including a clear statement of Gopnik's thesis.)

2. Contain an arguable thesis and build an argument to support that thesis.

3. Utilize (through the strategies of paraphrase, summary, and quotation) 3-4 credible, college-level sources, including the Gopnik article.

4. Document all sources fully and correctly both in text and on a works cited page. Use signal phrases and embedding strategies to indicate use of and evaluations of research.

5. Demonstrate academic conventions using Standard English, an awareness of an academic or professional audience, and a logical organizational plan.

The thesis of your essay should either address the way in which your research supports Gopnik's argument or the way in which your research suggests deficiencies. Is there something that Gopnik has not taken into account? Is there research that would further support what Gopnik is trying to argue? Is there research that Gopnik has misunderstood or misrepresented? Use your research and your own reading to test the argument Gopnik makes.

We will workshop working thesis statements for these papers on Friday, June 6.  You will begin this process by writing your summary of Gopnik. This should be no longer than about 2-2 1/2 pages. Bring completed summaries with you to class on Wednesday, June 4 for a peer review activity.  This will help you better understand and process the Gopnik article. In the meantime, it will give you time to think about how you want to engage Gopnik in conversation. Write your thesis AFTER you have written the summary.

First drafts will be due by email to Kristin NO LATER than midnight on Monday, June 9.  Please bring 3 copies of the essay with you to class on  June 11 for peer review. 

Final drafts can be turned in by 5 pm on Wednesday, June 18 in person (I will post office hours for that day) or by email. I will not take any final drafts after 5pm on Wednesday, June 18. 

For Monday: Gopnik

I am looking forward to reading your film reviews!  That's my homework for the weekend.

For You:

For Monday's class, please read "The Caging of America" by Adam Gopnik.  At least once (preferably a couple of times) and prepare very careful and exhaustive notes.  You may use the technique of a double-entry journal (explanation found here) or Cornell notes (explanation here).  Our entire class on Monday will be focused on this reading.  If you have not done it, you may as well not come to class. But don't you dare not come to class.  If you miss class on Monday, you will miss assignment of a group for the annotated bibliography and presentations.  You will be very, very confused and behind.  

This Gopnik reading is at the center of everything we will be doing for the rest of the term. 

Schedule for this Week and Next. Paper Comments

Paper comments are done and on their way back to you via email.  If you have not received yours yet, be patient, they will come sometime after class today.

This week's schedule:  

Monday--Watch Frontline Program.  Discuss uses of ethos/pathos/logos.  Begin talking about revision.

Wednesday--Finish revision.  Work on revision plans for the film review.

Friday--Quiz--Review modifiers and parallelism (read RFW 35-40).  Quiz on revision/modifiers and parallelism.  Introduction of Gopnik.  Introduction of dialectical notes.  Film review due to Kristin via email by midnight Friday night. 

Next week's schedule:

Monday- Introduction to research group project and Common Assignment.  Topics/logisitics/group assignments for annotations and annotated bibliographies.  Research strategies.  Read RFW 420-437; 437-447 and handout on annotations by class time.  ALSO, be sure that you have read Gopnik and started taking dialectical notes.    

Wednesday--meet in library for research/group work.

Friday--meet in library for research/group work.

Looking ahead:  

Rewrites of your essay one (Stelloh) will be due on Wednesday, May 28th.  (After Memorial Day).

Reminders for Friday

1.  There will be a quiz.  Agreement (see the reading assignment for April 24) and rhetoric. 

2.  Peer review letters are due.  Remember that you will be doing TWO and that you need TWO copies of each letter (one for writer one.  one for writer two.  two for me)  Those of you who were prepared with a paper and with 3 copies today will be rewarded richly.

3.  For those of you who did not turn in a draft today, do so ASAP.  Before the weekend for sure.  And contact me if there is a problem. 

4.  Revised schedule on Friday or Monday.  We'll have a good, solid revision week next week. 

RE: EMAILS (Important!)

Hey guys.  A quick update.  I haven't forgotten about you.  However, I think that I have left CHL summaries in a locked office.  I'm going to try to go track them down now, but there is a chance that I won't actually be able to access them until tomorrow.  This doesn't help you guys.  SO--

Whether I can get them out to you today or not, let's extend the due date for the second essay (the film review) to Wednesday.  Don't look at this as a reprieve.  If you are smart, you will go ahead and finish it up for tomorrow and then revisit it before turning it in on Wednesday.

If I am able to get them today, I'll still send them out.  But the Wednesday due date stands.

Hope that's clear.  Sorry for the mistake--it is totally mine.  I know that I owe the rubric for the assignment too--