First of the Detailed Weekly Schedule Posts . . .

***Most readings come from They Say, I Say unless otherwise indicated

*** Page numbers indicated in parentheses and are taken from the second edition of the book

 Week 6:

 Focus: The Critical Review, Reflection and Workshopping

 **We will begin workshopping the rhetorical analysis at the end of the week.

 **We’re also beginning our study of the Critical Review.

 **As per the announcement, you might decide to write your first reflection on your rhetorical analysis (you have to write two of these over the course of the semester; you choose which papers)

 Read:

 The prompt for the Critical Review, of course.

 Begin reading Part 1 of They Say, I Say (as you begin revising, you may find these sections helpful). When you write your reflection, you will need to highlight readings/handouts/lectures that you read/used/found helpful as you draft and revise your papers – I don’t “check” your reading, but I do ask you to reflect thoroughly on the materials you read in preparation for a paper (see prompt for Reflections).

 Part 1:

Section 1: “They Say: Starting with What Others Are Saying” (19)

Section 2: “Her Point Is: The Art of Summarizing” (30)

 What’s due next week:

1. Reflection #1 (again, IF you choose to write a reflection on Paper 1; you may elect to write your first reflective piece on Paper 2): 9/30
2. Workshop Responses, Round 1: Sun, 10/06

An Appropriate Argument at the Drafting Stage . . .

From an anonymous commenter on the article "10 Tips on How to Write Less Badly". 

The article's written to academics and contains a few tips that don't apply to students, but several of them are really work thinking about as you draft. Really.

"Getting a first draft down on paper is akin to plopping wet clay on the wheel for the first time. It is simply the beginning of writing. Editing (or re-writing) IS writing, just as carving and re-shaping the frumpy pot on the wheel is still "making a pot." When I hear students or colleagues say, "I've written it, now all I have to do it edit it," I cringe. The truest, deepest writing is in the rewriting.

Thought for the day and such.

Blog Post #2

Kailyn Servis
Professor Bolaski
English 100
11 September 2013

Rhetorical Analysis

In the article "Drugs for Drowning" published September 3, 2013 on health.usnews.com, David L. Katz presents his speculations on taking drugs for a source of weight loss. Katz discusses how taking weight loss drugs, such as Qsymia and Contrave, in his opinion, are not the best solutions to losing weight. One of his stronger remarks in the article is, "imagine while waiting for drugs to fix drowning, we didn't bother learning how to swim." As Katz is targeting an audience of anyone who is looking for an easy weight loss solution, he’s trying to make a point that reaching for the medicine cabinet may not to be the best solution.

Blog Post #2, "Walter Willett's Food Fight"

In Neil Swidey’s article, “Walter Willett’s Food Fight” published by The Boston Globe on July 28, 2013, he asserts that there are numerous contradicting ideas on what is healthy fare. Swidey utilizes strong imagery while appealing to logic in his report on why it can be so confusing for Americans to choose what the right choice at the dinner table is. There are many discrepancies between the theories of nutrition specialists and the author addresses quite a few of them, favoring Willett with his choice of diction and more appealing imagery while offering a more drab and dry approach to the FDA and CDC. “If scientists from Harvard and the CDC can’t decide on something as basic as whether being overweight will kill you sooner or later, who are we supposed to believe?” inquires Swidey. It is apparent through his written strategies that he is inclined towards Willett’s assertions  and appeals to the reader to consider the Harvard nutrition guru’s concept of healthy eating.

Blog Post 2

Meghan Stanton
Professor Amy Bolaski
English 100: 1459
September 11, 2013

In the article "Stinging Fingerprints" the author Angela Conner discusses the difference between S&M, and abuse. The story began describing the experience that was taken place by her character (not named). This character thought she knew what S&M was, and how people did it, but she never quite grasped it until she experienced it first hand. The experience was none like she ever had before. Her closest friend asked her a very important question, "how is it not abuse?" And her answer was something most people who are passionate about this topic would agree with, she said "because it felt good." Experiencing something as drastic as getting slapped in the face would seem almost obsurd to most people. How could someone actually enjoy feeling pain? The idea of being able to take that pain is what gets people aroused, and that's why they enjoy it.

Blog Post 2

Nicole Jones

Professor Bolaski

English 100

11 September 2013

               On August 28^th 2013 William Saletan’s article Better Safe Than Syria, succors Slate.com readers as Saletan examines the United States previous lack of force in Kuwait, Kosovo, and Libya. Saletan advises Americans through cause and effect, emotional appeal, euphemism, and syllogism that fighting from a distance with desultory intentions will free Americans from bearing the death of their soldiers only at the cost of hundreds of thousands of Syrian lives who will incur Assad’s wrath. It is no doubt that the American resolve to defend Syrian civilians is dissolving at the thought of war and causalities, that is why Saletan informs readers to act fast and hard or do nothing at all.  

BLOG POST #2
Uriane Robinson
Professor Bolaski, Amy
English 100
2013 September 11

     On the 26th of August 2013, Peter Gray a Professor of Psychology, identifies and presents

numerous feasible aspects relating to the relationship between children, schools, and the “ basic blue-

print” of the “top- down, teach- and- test method” in his article “School Is A Prison.” In this article he

acknowledges the appeal of logical and extensive research that shows the readers that school is seen

as a chore. The concept of need to and not of want to; the burned out notion. Gray indicated, as many

can also attest to, that schools create this unpleasantness that doesn’t make the learning process any

easier. Being able to apply self-motivation, and seek everyday questions will help them to become

portrayed as independent. “Acquiring personal responsibility and the capacity for self-control, that is

able to serve them well in all aspects of their lives.”

Blog Post #2

Matthew Tampon

English 100

9/11/2013

 

Rhetorical Analysis

 

The author, Peter Gray, uses ethical appeal, repetition, symbolism, and numerous statistics to convey the flaws and misguidance of America’s education system in his article “School Is A Prison”. This article from salon.com, was addressed to parents and scholars alike, in regards to America’s future generation. The author discusses how new scientific research on how children learn naturally, suggests that “children learn most deeply and fully, and with greatest enthusiasm, in conditions that are almost opposite to those of school.” Instead of school systems actually helping students with learning, they are restricting their freedom and creativity. By putting children in these conditions, many of them can suffer from psychological damage. The inadequate methods of the education system are causing children to lose creativity, critical thought process, and the ability to learn on their own.

Jake Haman Blog #2

Jake Haman

Amy Bolaski

English 100

September 8, 2013

RHETORICAL ANALYSIS

In the article “The Case for Doing Nothing in Syria” the author Matthew Yeglasias bases his case around a phrase he hears when he was in a meeting in Washington. This phrase was that Obama had “no good options” in Syria. He posts this article on Wednesday 28 2013, in Slate, which is an argument-driven online magazine; it covers politics, arts and culture, sports, and news. The author uses the logical appeal throughout his article on the phrase “no good options.” He immediately attempts to get his audience on his side by letting them know he was in a meeting with “a whole bunch of important people” in Washington when he hears this phrase. Matthew Yeglasias does a good job using inartistic proof throughout his article by using facts, data and statistics. These include; the President’s National Security Strategy, Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, and a chart showing how military intervention on the side of rebel groups has increased the number of civilian deaths. The author’s goal in this article is to reach the American populace, to use common sense by the facts and data he has laid out. If there are “no good options” in Syria, then leave it alone and move onto another problem where there are good options.

Ian Hadder

Amy Bolaski

English 100

9/10/2013

Old Habits Die Hard

            The only constant in life is change. This is because evolution is a necessity for anything  to thrive. Not just on the biological level, this idea is applicable to everything, not excluding social institutions such as the education system. Using writing strategies such as allusion, diction, logos, punctuation and counter examples as vessels, Peter Gray points out irrefutable flaws in America's current educational system. Gray show cases the uncomfortable realization of how America's education system's history and established core principles are just short of the least effective environment to promote learning. 

Blog Post 2

Lynnel Navarro

Professor Amy Bolaski

English 100

11 Sept 2013

America's "Culture of Violence"

                                                                Rhetorical Analysis

In Justin Peter's published article on "Don't trust the research saying video games cause real-world 

aggression", he creates a argumentative and persuasive article referring to the NRA's Wayne Lapierre

 comparing movies and video games to aggression in society and association with the school shootings.

 Having armed security in schools comes out a little over the top and expensive, as stated in the article. The 

author makes a strong point on how he feels about the influence from movies and video games. The author

 receives facts to support his opinion from research supporting the theory that violent videos games prompt

 real-life violence from a Psychology lab at IOWA state University. He used multiple researchers to argue

 the facts of the link to video games and real world aggression. Wayne Lapierre of the NRA( The National

 Rifle Association) argues at first with support of the link from the incident that occurred Dec 14, 2012, when

 a young man named Adam Laza fatally shot twenty children and 6 adults in a mass murder and says its 

because Adam was very fond of violent video games prior to the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary

 school. I feel the author supports gun control but associating real-world violence with video games is

 ignoring the fact that there is violence and aggression with or without video games.

Blog Post #2: Rhetorical Intro

After having a child with a life-threatening disease, it is only natural to think of the unknown while pregnant with a second child, hesitating to love it in fear of losing it too. Heather Kirin Lanier reveals her personal account of being a mother of a child diagnosed with Wolf-Hirschhorn syndrome and pregnant with her second in her article, “Waiting to love my child,” published by Salon.com on May 7, 2013. In her writing, she comes to the realization that she is afraid to let herself love this baby, as her close friend had said, because of the painful experience she had with her first daughter. Through the use of appeal to pathos, characterization, consonance and symbolism, Lanier unfolds her troubled quest in loving her, as she describes, “unknown” second child.

Blog Post #2

Ben Ossenfort

Professor Amy Bolaski

English 100

6 September 2013

Rhetorical Analysis

            In Peter Gray’s article School Is a Prison, he points out the flaws in the current education system and explains why an unconventional approach to education is more beneficial to both children and society.  This article was presented to readers of Salon.com on August 26, 2013. Targeted to parents and educators, Gray, a research professor of psychology at Boston University, uses examples and data collected via research to make his compelling case that self-directed students contribute most to society.

            The author admits that parents send their kids to school with the best intentions, “believing that’s what they need to become productive and happy adults.” However, even parents who believe the above, question the performance and quality of the school system, according to Professor Gray. Instead of using more money, better teachers, and more rigorous tests as part of the solution, Gray suggests that the nature of educational institutions is failing children and society. In his article, he states that school is a place where children are forced to go and where freedom is heavily restricted to them. Appealing to reasonable logic, Gray uses studies to suggest that children learn best in environments opposite to what can be found in schools.

Blog post 2

Who knew one tweet could strike up such a huge outrage! In the article " Dr. Phil lets talk about sex" written by Tracy Clark on Wednesday, August 21st, 2013. Published on salon.com. What was intended to be turned into a discussion turned into this author giving her personal view point on this trying o persuade the audience to reading more into more than what the question was about. The author is showing her true ethics in this article by saying if Dr. Phil would have said "woman" instead of girl it would of been a completely different story. The audience is missing the main point of this tweet, it was a true question is it okay!

Blog Post #2

Rachele Jacobs

Amy Bolaski

English 100

10 September 2013

In the article, “Dr. Phil:  Let’s Talk About Drunk Sex” published August 21, 2013.  The author Tracy Clark-Flory, sways her audience with her choice of diction, her strong emotional appeal, the usage of her sarcastic tone- intertwined with questions that she asks the audience, along with the use of quotations from other sources to help support her stance.  The ultimate question in this article is, “If a girl is drunk, is it OK to have sex with her?” (Dr. Phil:  Let’s Talk About Drunk Sex)  The author creates the argument that posting such a tweet about underage drunk sex was totally irrational and inconsiderate on Dr. Phil’s part.  The authors targeted audience would be the general population- most likely including those that have strong opinions or concerns about teenagers, rape, drinking, and let alone ‘drunk sex’.  Her purpose is to persuade the audience into believing that Dr. Phil did not choose “…the right medium” (Dr. Phil:  Let’s Talk About Drunk Sex) in discussing matters about the controversial issue on underage drunk sex, whether it be right or wrong, moral or 'legal'.

Blog Post #2

Sung Mi Pyun
Professor Bolaski 
English 100
September 10, 2013


On August 26, 2013, an article titled “On August 26, 2013, the article which was published on Salon.com, “School is a prison—and damaging out kids,” Peter Gray criticizes that school harms kids by forcing them to learn for long periods. He adds that “most students—whether A students, C students, or failing ones—have lost their zest for learning by the time they reach middle school or high school.” His tone is straight forward and his article is logic and reasonable with logical researches. In his research, students take compulsory education and school divides them by students’ grades. By doing so, students do not know what to do for their future and lost interests in education. The main audience the author wants to grasp is the schools and parents who force kids to learn unconditionally without teaching them the joy of education.