Final Essay | Argument Essay with Research

Week 14 Mon April 18: Assignment

• MW Section: your Essay Proposal, with due dates, has been emailed to you.
• Sat Section: your Essay Proposal, with due dates. Couple format oddities showed up in Google docs. It's best use the version I'm sending everyone. Here's your "Final Exit" Ethanasia blog.

Week 13 Mon April 11: Assignment for Both Sections (MW section due April 13; SAT section due April 16)

• Read Reid, Chapter 10 (Arguing) pp. 295-306 and 328-336. 
• Here's a 5 minute video on Topic Selection and research, with focus on thesis statement.
• In your journal, make an entry entitled Essay #4. This entry will have four items, which should be numbered as below. I suggest you read all four Items and do a little free writing before you start answering any of them. Then, at any point in completing this assignment, feel free to do some research on your topic. (We will soon be hold special intensive research sessions at the Oakton library to advance your research. But do at least an hour of research while completing this assignment (due Monday for the MW section).
•  Item #1 Topic. State why your topic is of urgent and personal interest to you.
• Have you narrowed it down? 330
• Item #2 Topic sentence. This is your thesis. Reid uses the word "claim". 
• Write one or more preliminary topic sentences. 
• Feel free to use two sentences if you wish: one that identifies your topic and states its importance and a second that makes your claim, or argument, about your topic. 
• Item #3 Types of claim and types of appeal 298-306.  Identify the claims and appeals you will probably use in your essay.
• Item #4 Look at "Assignment for Arguing" 328 and identify your audience and possible genres for your paper.
• Do this work now and you will have a good grip on your paper. Put it off and you lose a week. I will be checking all journals in class. Good luck!

People: congratulations on the Fix the Budget project. Question for class: How many of you would like to spend LIMITED time in and out of class - perhaps 30 minutes a week total - completing this project by getting a better sense of each other's blogs and by following the current budget crisis debate?

On Thesis Statements

A good one takes a position, justifies further discussion, expresses one main idea, and is specific.

- Rindee Paul, writing tutor Undergraduate Writing Lab Academic  Success Center Alliant International University.

General Rule: Almost all pieces of good argumentative writing, no matter how complicated, answer a single question. This question is raised and answered in a thesis statement.

Thesis statements can be strong or weak. Strong ones are precise: they are a roadmap to the paper to come. Weak ones are are vague: they are a path or two paths leading nowhere.

A strong thesis statement has three parts: topic, claim or assertion, and reason(s) to be supported by evidence.

1. The topic is well defined, with 
2. A clear claim or argument about supported by
3. reasons to be backed in the paper by evidence. 

A strong thesis statement gives the reader a clear idea of what to expect from the paper. It makes a promise that the writer will keep:

The high cost of medicine in the United States puts undue economic strain on the elderly, forcing may to go with out their prescriptions or to seek medicines from questionable sources abroad.

Here note the clear and constant focus on the “economic strain” of the elderly: on their suffering and the risks they take in buying low cost medicine. It’s clear that the paper will evaluate two claims: that seniors must go without their prescriptions or seek lower cost drugs from risky sources.

In a weak thesis statement, the topic is poorly defined (usually in general terms), the claim about it is contentious, and the reason in support of the claim is already familiar to most readers:

Senior citizens are suffering today because the companies that make their prescription drugs are charging outrageously high prices.

This thesis shows strong anger but lacks focus. It mentions the suffering of senior citizens but shifts focus to the drug companies with an angry assertion completely unsupported by reasoning or the promise of evidence.

Where will the writer of this paper take us? Your guess is as good as mine!

Fix the Budget: TEMPLATE for All Item Posts on Your Blog

Greetings Budget Balancers!

Back from the drawing board with a simplified single-post template for ALL your research on a given Budget Item(s). Here are its benefits. 

INSTRUCTIONS 

1. You want your blog to look like this one. Check it out.
2. Keeping this window open, OPEN a new window and a LAUNCH a second copy of your blog.
3. In your second copy, CREATE a new post to which you will transfer all the data between the ++++++ lines below. 
4. SCROLL down and COPY the content between the ++++++ lines and PASTE it into your new post. This is your new template (with examples).
   
5. Now you can start TRANSFERRING information from your current blog to your single-post template.
6. CLEAN UP your formatting and DELETE examples and instructions.
7. SAVE and POST your new template, DELETE your old blog entry/entries and you are DONE! 
   
8. Due date for the transfer: March 21 after spring break. (Both sections)
9. Hope this helps. Let me know of any bugs in all this info.
10. Enjoy the Break! 

P.S. - If you need them - TIPS on handling bullets:

1. TAB advances a bullet to the right
2. Moving a bullet to the left is tricky. Best way I know is first to unhighlight the bullet number in your blog editing toolbar, and then create a new bullet
3. To delete bullets and move text up, use Backspace.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

[Name of your blog] (your name - nothing else - make changes in Settings)

[Post Title] Area 1 - Domestic and Foreign: Cut Foreign Aid In Half [font: large]

[copy and paste the appropriate Budget Item language from Fix the Budget puzzle - font size: small] 

Example: 

CUT FOREIGN AID IN HALF                                                              $30 BILLION

At a time when the United States is facing large deficits, some budget analysts argue that the country should significantly reduce the money it spends helping other countries. Others say that foreign aid already represents a smaller share of the budget here than in other rich countries and that it expands American influence.

[Reasons in favor of cuts - font size: large + underline] 


[Give reason #1 - font size: normal + bold]

• [Author]. [Title of article - hyperlinked]. [source]. [date].
• Quote:
• [brief author bio - found at end of article or in Wikipedia]
• [your comment/opinion on the article: why is it important?]

Example: 

Reasons why foreign aid should be cut

• Foreign Aid corrupts the countries that receive the aid
• Bandow, Doug. "Foreign Aid, Or Foreign Hindrance." Forbes. 2/22/11.
• Key Quote: “Systematic foreign aid creates opportunities for corruption, cultures of dependency, and disincentives to development. The aid faucet misaligns incentives between donors and recipients, making it extremely difficult to turn off the flow.”
• “Douglas (Doug) Bandow (born ca. 1954) is a former columnist with Copley News Service and a senior fellow at the Cato Institute. He served as a Special Assistant to President Ronald Reagan and as a Senior Policy Analyst in the 1980 Reagan for President campaign.” (Wikipedia)
• Comments:
• Agree: Countries like Egypt, El Salvador, and Ethiopia are examples of corruption caused by foreign aid.
• Disagree: Foreign aid will not balance the budget, and cutting it will create tensions with the countries that are dependent on the aid.

[Reasons against cuts - font size: normal + underline]

[Give reason #1 - font size: normal + bold] 

• [Author] [Title of article - hyperlinked] [source] [date]
• Quote:
• [brief author bio - found at end of article or in Wikipedia]
• [your comment/opinion on the article: why is it important?

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

"FIX THE BUDGET" Launching Pad for Essay #3 (Problem Solving)

For all material pertaining to this essay please visit Fixthebudget102.

OPPORTUNITIES FOR OAKTON STUDENTS

One may be right for YOU! More to come as time permits.

• $250 Simon Essay Contest prize for best essay on how Oakton has changed/improved your life. Extra credit for anyone who writes this essay
• 
  

PEER REVIEW SHEET

Peer Review Sheet

On Egypt and one or two other things . . .

This link expands on my recent comments in class about the situation in Egypt. I offer it to you as an example of how your blog can convey all kinds of information from diverse sources and organize this information into a clear and powerful argument. (My argument is of course debatable but I think I have made it strongly and compellingly.)

It took me only an hour to find the first half dozen sources given at this post. But took about 15 hours to find all the other sources and to organize them into an opinion piece (or "op ed" piece) that describes what I see as one of the dominant historical trends of our time.  I have revised the language of this post at least 20 times. Every time I read the darn thing, I always find little errors and also ways to clarify and strengthen it. 

Only a very few of us are born chess or violin or baseball players. And sorry folks, but only a few of us are born writers. I have met a couple of them in my life and believe me what they can do on a first draft amazes me. So but the rest of us, myself included, have to work at it. That said, practice does make perfect, and when you really get into it, practice does becomes a pleasure in itself. How so?

Well you begin to feel that you are in touch with something special in yourself, an important part of yourself to which writing - and writing alone - gives you access.  That's how poets and novelists feel. And that's how, if we are lucky and hardworking, all of us will feel at some point this semester.  

But then comes something much bigger and more enduring: the reward - the thrill - of seeing something in print - something YOU wrote - that goes way, way, way beyond any ability you thought you had to think deeply and profoundly. But there it sits, deep and profound, waiting for ready for others to read it. And it sits there simply because you worked hard to get your thoughts and ideas down on paper (or at your blog) clearly and compellingly. 

Anyone who wants to do so is welcome to use my blog format for their papers as opposed to the standard hardcopy paper format. In fact I encourage it. I think that for the purposes of English 102 the blog format is a better way to convey information. So feel free to use it. And now I am running late for my 2:00 pm class. 

Rhetorical Situation in a Nutshell

First, the memorize this acronym and get it down cold:

1. Writers
2. Often
3. Purposefully
4. Avoid
5. Great           (Gooey
6. Conflicts      (Chocolate

Now to the nitty gritty, with examples for each of the six components

1. WRITER: your connection to your topic.
• I write about Bulgaria because I am Bulgarian or my best friend is Bulgarian. 
• I write about nursing because I will be a nurse or a doctor.
2. OCCASION: what motivates or inspires you write to about this topic now. 
• I write about Egypt because I am Egyptian or because Egypt is has just had a revolution.
3. PURPOSE: the effect and/or benefits you want your paper to have on your audience. 
• EFFECTS: I want to entertain/surprise/alert/arouse/amuse/inform/persuade my audience with [information/writing] that increases their [understanding/apprecation] of [narrowed topic].
• BENEFITS: I want to benefit my audience by giving them information about [narrowed topic] that will help them make better choices in the area of [general topic]
4. AUDIENCE: the specific, targeted group - perhaps yourself - who will benefit from your paper.
• OTHERS: 
• YOURSELF:
5. GENRE: the kind, type or format of writing that will deliver maximum benefits to your audience.
• Remember your essay will always be one of the four types for this course: Expository ("Tell Me"), Explaining, Problem-Solving, Arguing 
• Decide whether your essay will take the form of an online blog (with in text links to research) or a hardcopy research paper (with in text links to a Works Cited List).
• Be creative: ask how you can best get your message through to your target audience? 
• Be imaginative: ask if your audience might prefer one of any number of formats: brochure, how-to manual, encyclopedia entry,  newspaper opinion piece, magazine article, a poem or even a cartoon with research appendices attached.
6. CONTEXT: background information to help your audience see clearly and at once exactly how your topic relates to them. Although context is number six on this list, it always belongs in the introduction to your paper. Think first about your audience: what they probably know or don't know about your topic. Then give them information that will connect and get them involved in your topic. Examples:
• Context for an Explaining paper on how to prepare for a career in nursing:
• Facts: Nurses are in demand (give stats), qualifications of a good nurse, types of nurse   
• Personal: I am in my second year of training to be a nurse
• PERSONAL: inform your audience of YOUR connection to your topic
• GENERAL: use a good dictionary or encyclopedia to get context information. Begin with Wikipedia. Then go to Columbia Encyclopedia, a magnificent one-volume reference work. And guess what: it's  online at the Oakton Library Database. In Find It, go to Facts and Encyclopedias >  - All Subjects Credo ReferenceSearch > Encyclopedias (right hand column) > The Columbia Encyclopedia (under Encyclopedia/General) and then
1. Enter your search in "Search for" at the top and not "Heading contains" a little farther down.
2. Avoid misspellings, which give this message: "No hits for [misspelled topic]  in The Columbia Encyclopedia"

Some Good Mainstream Media Sources . . .

Want to know what is going on in the world? Here are sources that I follow. The focus of most is on business and economics. Use them to search for any topic relating to the world today.Anyone have any sources to add to this list?

• New York Times The best newspaper in America. Covers everything.
• Financial Times From London. I prefer it to the New York Times because it is clearer and more direct.
• Bloomberg Businessweek The best American newsweekly even though its focus is business. Here is a terrific story about global youth unemployment of the kind that sparked the revolution in Tunesia and Egypt. 
• Slate I don't follow this but young people do and it is very sharp.
• The Economist The world's best weekly, from England. Covers everything, despite its title.
• Real Clear Markets aggregates 20 new opinion pieces every day about finance, all culled from all over the Internet. Very intelligent choices.
• Weathering the Storm  My own site. Useful links on a) income disparity (rich/poor) and b) how (and whether) the world is recovering from global finance meltdown of 2007-2008
• Middle East Report The deepest coverage of the Middle East that I know of. Al Jazeera coverage of Egypt is fascinating.
• Drudge Report The most popular news aggregator. It's kind of right wing, yet I often find important stories here that are not covered in centrist (Chicago Tribune) or Leftish (New York Times) publications.
• Newser Another news aggregator. This one has a clever format: a grid of little photos for each story. Junk stories mix with serious stories.
• Scientific American For anything scientific! 
• Columbia Encyclopedia is  online at the Oakton Library Database. In Find It, go to Facts and Encyclopedias >  - All Subjects Credo ReferenceSearch > Encyclopedias (right hand column) > The Columbia Encyclopedia (under Encyclopedia/General) and then
  1. Enter your search in "Search for" at the top and not "Heading contains" a little farther down.
  2. Avoid misspellings, which give this message: "No hits for [misspelled topic]  in The Columbia Encyclopedia"
   

Explaining Essay Assignment Sheet/Proposal and Revised Due Dates

Was it like this near you? I took this shot Wednesday at noon as the sun came out. Snow was still blowing off the roofs. OK, back to work. Here for both sections are materials and schedules for essay #2, Explaining. We will complete this work by the end of week 5. One change is unrelated to the big storm: in class I will show everyone how to create their a blog for the course. Fear now, blogs are easy to make and the benefits are real.

• EXPLAINING ESSAY PROPOSAL. THIS is your assignment sheet. You can download and begin work on it now. Because you will have ample time to complete your proposal, I suggest that you start freewriting NOW on portions of the body of your paper. Feel free to submit your writing to me along with your proposal for my review and suggestions.
• Section 003 - MW - proposal emailed to me by Sun Feb 6. Approved by me by Thu Feb 10.
• Section OW1 - SAT - emailed to me by Wed Feb 9. Approved by me by Sun Feb 13.

• Essay deadlines, first and final drafts:
• Section 003 - MW - First draft due: Mon Feb 16. Final Draft due: Wed Feb 23.
• Section OW1 - SAT - Final draft due Sat Feb 19: hard copy handed in at start of class. 

• Only for Section OW1 - SAT: our revised course schedule. 

Any questions? Ask them in comments below. Here's a snow ridge, looks like perfect sand dune - right in my own back yard. Peaceful.

Where Mr. Sewall Got His Yelling Trick . . .

From a choir conductor in a New York City public school. See how these kids sing and move.  And what they sing is Classical: the Hungarian composer Franz Liszt. This guy from New York is good. See how he strikes his first crystal clear chord on the piano, then turns to the choir for their first phrase -  "So sentimental," which he has gone over with them a hundred times, you may be sure  . . .

All this is to show the importance of practice (in music or sport) and revision (in writing.)  Practice that leads to improvement requires focus and effort.  Practice that leads to great improvement, especially in groups, usually has substantial elements of satisfaction and fun. These kids are all singing from the gut: just look at their body language. That's why we start Egl102 the way we do: writing from the gut. Finding our voices. Once you have found your voice, you are in touch with parts of yourself - interests, concerns, ideas - that you will learn about, develop and express in your Explaining, Problem Solving and Arguing essays.

Getting Organized

Hello everyone - Here are five preliminary tasks to be completed during our first week.  

1. Bring to class first day and EVERY day:

• Textbook (Stephen Reid, Prentice Hall Guide for College Writers, short 9th Edition). If you have a copy of the long 9th edition, you may use it. I dislike book publishers as much as you do. However, using the somewhat out of date 8th edition will put you at a disadvantage. Check out the text rental program at the Oakton Bookstore.
• Your JOURNAL: a 75-page notebook, which I will review periodically during the semester and at the end.
• Relevant Course Documents (#3 below).

This filebox stands for these tasks. When completed, they will extend your mind. So complete them now NOW and see the good things that happen later.

2. Course documents. Print out copies and bring them to every class. We will be referring to them often. These documents are housed at DocStoc, a user-friendly document storage site. To house them on your computer, create an"Egl 102" folder. Then, at DocStoc, click "Download", open the document when it's on your computer and save it to your Egl 102 folder.

• Mr. Sewall's Editing Marks Refer to it when reviewing my comments to your papers.
• Mr. Sewall's Parts of Speech  I expect you to know the eight parts of speech, which this sheet simplifies nicely.
• Waste Words. Take a good look at this document NOW! You will soon become an enemy, like me, of waste words: their implacable foe!
Fill out this Questionnaire for the first day of class, hand it in to me (even if you have done it before) 
• How to Write a Professional Email Use this format in your emails to me - I use it in mine to you.
• ENGLISH 102 COURSE SYLLABUS Read it carefully and read it now!
• Top 10 most annoying writing mistakes (to be posted later)
  
• Top 10 ways to improve your writing 
• Before and After Practice turning shabby writing into smooth writing.
• Mr Sewall's "OAKTON: Write for Real" student writing blog
• Essay #1 Assignment Sheet (Expository)
• Week 2 Topic Selection Sheet (in class exercise for all three essays) 
• EXPLAINING ESSAY PROPOSAL. THIS is your assignment sheet. You can download and begin work on it now:
• Section 003 - MW - proposal emailed to me by Sun Feb 6. Approved by me by Thu Feb 10.
• Section OW1 - SAT - emailed to me by Mon Feb 7. Approved by me by Sun Feb 13.
• Essay deadlines, first and final drafts:
  
• Section 003 - MW - First draft due: Mon Feb 14. Final Draft due: Mon Feb 21.

Section OW1 - SAT - First draft due: Sat Feb 19. Final Draft due: Sat Feb 19.

• Essay #3 Assignment Sheet (Problem Solving)
• Essay #4 Assignment Sheet (Argument)

3. Preformat all of the four essays that you'll write this semester using these two documents: Essay Preformat Instructions and  Preformatted Essay #1 Expository.  Download both docs from DocStoc and keep them open so you can make changes in your "Template" by following the "Instructions.

My PREFERRED email address is this gmail one, so please be sure to email me there - I don't check the Oakton email as often.

4. Get your Oakton library card. Bring to the library an Illinois driver's license or valid state ID and your concise student schedule for this semester. Time permitting, practice accessing Oakton's incredible research databases from home, especially Ebsco and Lexis/Nexis.  Don't hesitate to call a reference librarian at Oakton or at any public library for help in using these databases.

5. In your Internet Browser, create an English 102 Folder for links to sites you'll be using during the course. These include academic sites:

• Purdue Online Writing Lab (OWL), a fine online grammar and composition site
• Sample OWL exercise for practicing verb tense consistency.
• Here is a useful map of the OWL site.
• EasyBib, which pretty much creates your own bibliography for you in the MLA format we use. 
• KnightCite Citation Service looks good - 

Your EGL102  folder will also include - in its own subfolder created by you - all of the useful sites you visit for your research papers. The sites will start piling up in number, so create three subfolders now for out three research papers. Trust me, it's no fun racking your brain to find a missing site when you're deep into the writing process!

Thanks for completing these tasks on time!