Sequential Smarts
Monday, February 28, 2005
Cross-questioning
You've completed half your work for the oral debate project already, but don't rest on those cushy laurels: the other half of your debate grade (about 2.5% of your final course grade) will be decided on Wednesday during the question and answer session.
The committee (Kelly, Nikki, Pasha) will announce the meeting's agenda at the beginning of class on Wednesday, but for at least 25 minutes the floor will be open for discussion between groups. Your group should not only prepare to answer whatever questions others direct towards you, but you should prepare at least one question for each of the other four groups. To get an A for this half of the project, you should not only prepare (as in brainstorm and write down) responses to questions you are likely going to be asked, but you should also write down two to three questions for each of the other groups so you don't end up preparing a question that another group - or the committee itself - asks.
These questions shouldn't be wimpy or superficial: presume that material issues (financing, protection from the weather, etc.) can be easily corrected. Instead, examine each group's main argument (The committee should choose our design because X) for its warrant (e.g. The committee should choose the design that brings the most money into Madison), and ask questions that make that group defend its warrant.
If you want to venture into more difficult (and interesting) territory, try to hunt down two or three groundings for each group's argument and poke holes in those. One warning: make sure that your own argument doesn't share that grounding before engaging in systematic etiolation thereof.
Today's presentations
- Avant-garde: Brie, Reza, Ronak [ powerpoint | html ]
- Film: Adam D., Katie, Nicole, Tenzin [ powerpoint | html ]
- Library: Chetan, Megan, Yessenia [ powerpoint | html ]
- Music: Ashley, Leslie, Mark [ powerpoint | html ]
- Sex ed.: Adam H., Dan, Laura [ powerpoint | html ] (Recommended font: BernhardFashionBT.)
Sunday, February 27, 2005
Papers, grades
I will email back the first batch of essays (the first third to arrive) in just a few minutes. If you are interested in seeing your grade, please email me back with your answers to these questions:
- What are you most pleased with in this essay? What writing tactic was most successful for you?
- What concrete, specific tool or skill have you learned about or honed in composing, reviewing, and drafting this essay?
- What do you want to do better on your next essay? OR, if you had to write a fourth draft of this essay, what would you change?
Friday, February 25, 2005
CLUE and you
CLUE (http://clue.library.wisc.edu) is composed of three short introductory excursions into using the libraries here in Madison. It is a warmup for our March 4th library session, and will help shoehorn you into the research work you will be doing for your third essay and for the higher-level work you do on campus for the next three years.
The library system on this campus is absolutely incredible. The Badger Herald reported last semester that the UW-Madison library system has "the eleventh largest collection in North America," with its anchor library--Memorial, the largest single library in Wisconsin--receiving "over 1 million visits per year." As the library system itself reports, in addition to Memorial there are "more than 40 General Library System, professional and special-purpose libraries " holding
- Some 7.2 million books
- 58,000 journal titles
- 6.7 million items recorded on microfilm
And if that's not enough for you, you should know that our library system spends over $4 million every year updating enormous databases of electronic material.
That is a buttload of information. CLUE is here to help you begin to sort out how to find information--books and articles that meet your research needs--inside the enormous UW-Madison library system.
CLUE is organized as a series of three half-hour computerized learning modules. The first module addresses how to begin doing research at the University; the second looks at MadCat, the catalog to those 7.2 million books; the third module explains how to find magazine, journal and newspaper articles from among the tens of thousands available physically and electronically through the system's subscription to about a hundred journal databases.
For class on Wednesday, I would like you to have completed all three of these learning modules. Take the short quiz at the end of each section, and print out the results.
Getting your presentations to class on Monday
In order to give me ample time to load your presentations onto the presentation laptop, please email me your Powerpoint document by noon on Monday. If you want to bring it to where the class is meeting - Helen C. White 6191 - on a CD or USB flash drive please let me know! (No floppies - there's a good chance the laptop won't have a 3.5" drive.)
Your committee
- Nikki: Representative from the State Street Merchants Association.
- Pasha: Owner of the University Book Store
- Kelly: Representative from the University
Monday, February 21, 2005
Thinking is good for you
Although I'm sorry that we weren't able to go into the museum today, I'm not sorry that you all had to trek over there: now you know where it is and can - I hope - go back later this week (Tuesday through Friday 9 to 5; Saturday and Sunday 11 to 5).
I am really pleading with you to do the LVM Project - if at all possible at the museum itself or in front of a real-life artwork - so you can savor the experience of thinking completely and utterly for yourself. We're only reading the short excerpts from Carroll's book for this unit, and having a clear sense of your own about why art is worth its cost will only help you develop original and interesting arguments for the rest of the semester.
Oral Debate Groups: A Clarification
Not counting the committee itself, there are six possible groups listed; of them, probably only four or five will actually be part of the project: I'm waiting to see what groups you're interested in. However, two groups will appear regardless of interest: the historians and (to be glib) the sexologists. It is In Your Best Interest to list one of these two groups on your preferences, as otherwise people will be put into these groups willy-nilly if not enough of you express interest of your own accords.
Also, I should point out that the group orientations are meant to be fairly general: the School of Music doesn't have to advocate classical music in the evenings, as is written, but could suggest indy rock concerts or a flexible bill of musical entertainment. Groups will have complete control over their designs so long as they meet the goals that are listed on the sheet.
Patty Bouvier: Blushing bride
It's very convenient of the world to provide an excellent example of the questions we'll start struggling with this week.
L. Brent Bozell III, president of the Parents Television Council, had this to say about The Simpsons' take on gay marriage:
Do children need to have gay marriage thrust in their faces as an issue? Why can't we just entertain them? (Source: NYTimes.com.)This is a very good question: what is the public role of art/entertainment? Should it avoid social and political issues?
Saturday, February 19, 2005
...and one last thing
While I will read your final essays closely, I will steer clear of over-commenting them: since there's no fourth draft, all I need to tell you is what you need to know in order to improve your writing for your second essay.
Thus, if you want comments on a specific section of your essay or a specific feature of your writing, let me know that in the email you send me to which you attach your essay, or even in front of the essay itself - "What can I do to write more concisely?" you might ask; or, "How effectively did I support my claim about comics giving children paper cuts?"
What "1000 words" means
The 1000 words requirement does not mean that a 999-word essay will fail, nor does it mean that I will automatically drop your grade if you turn in 1050 words. Although I was very interested in your using the 1500 words of the first draft to explore your options - and hence was slightly irked at all the 1200-word essays I recieved - I am more interested, in this final draft, in having you hone down your essay so that it expresses its most sophisticated claim as clearly and concretely as possible in limited space.
There are two basic reasons for this:
- A lot of the academic writing you face for the next two to four semesters will be short response papers, short analysis papers, or essay exams (also, of course, short).
- In the professional world, much of the important writing you do will be in the form of short, readable reports and memos.
If your final draft is noticeably longer than 1000 words (say 1050, not counting bibliography, etc.), I will be especially harsh in looking for redundancies, digressions, and other features of your writing that ought to have been trimmed to make your argument clearer. If your draft is significantly shorter than 1000 words, I will be looking particularly for arguments that needed sophistication or complication. This doesn't mean that a 1200-word essay couldn't possibly earn an A; it just means that you have a slightly better shot at one if your essay is slim & trim.
Thursday, February 17, 2005
There are still some conference slots open!
Not sure how to incorporate your peers' comments? Want to talk through some revisions you've made since your second draft - or a list of revisions you plan to make? There are still three slots open tomorrow: 10 am, 10:40, and 1:00 pm. Check the complete conference schedule for details.
Oh, and remember: conferences are in the OPEN BOOK CAFE.
Monday, February 14, 2005
An Attempt at Clarification; or, You Should See What Comes Out of My Mouth in Seminar
I'd been so proud of not spewing so much gibberish this semester as my wonderful students last semester stoically endured; today was definitely a low-water mark in my War Against Incomprehensibility.
Let me attempt to clear up any confusion about the peer review process in this nifty question and answer format!!
What, precisely, do I have to do for Wednesday?1. Read andUhhh, can you give me an example?
2. Comment in the margins of the text for which you are the Primary Reviewer;
3. Answer questions 3 through 11 on the Peer Review Worksheet;
4. Email the commented-up essay and the half-filled Worksheet to the essay's Secondary Reviewer.
5. When you receive the commented-up essay and half-filled Worksheet for the essay for which you are the Secondary Reviewer, read that essay,
6. Add comments in the margins if you would like, and
7. Answer questions 12 and 13 on the Peer Review Worksheet. Then for class on Wednesday, please
8. Print out one copy of the fully-commented essay and the Peer Review Worksheet for the essay for which you were Secondary Reviewer.Sure! Let's use Group Beta. Ronak is the Primary Reviewer for Kelly's essay. He reads it over and adds several comments in the margin (approximately one paragraph-level comment per page) via the Insert Comment feature in Word. Then he fills out the top half of the Peer Review Worksheet and emails both the Worksheet and commented-up essay to Laura. Laura adds a couple of comments, has fun filling out the two Secondary Reviewer questions on the Peer Review Worksheet, and prints out both the fully-commented essay and Worksheet to bring to class.Aren't we supposed to skip one of the questions on the worksheet?Primary Reviewers should skip 4c since we haven't really discussed ol' Jurgen's Claim Types yet.I have Word open but I can't see the Insert Comment button!I'm sorry, but can you phrase that in the form of a question? This is a question-and-answer session, after all.You're such an ass.No no, I'm a pedantic ass.Whatever. How do I insert comments, ass?View menu, Toolbars, Reviewing. The Post-It Note-looking button adds a new comment to text you've highlighted. If you're more of an old school menus-only kind of dude, you can also select the text you want to comment, go to the Insert menu and choose Comment.What's going to happen on Wednesday?We'll spend about three minutes quizzing our cumulative knowledge of subject-verb agreement and commas and then proceed to a brief ten-minute survey of those sexy colons and semicolons. After this point, you'll break into your peer review groups and spend about ten minutes chatting over each peer's essay, talking specifically about its strengths, and - more importantly - tools the author can use to patch up weak spots.
Sunday, February 13, 2005
HebdomaNotes
There has been little discussion at all among your blogs - a phemenon the more perplexing when we consider how many interesting-but-racy arguments you guys have published! Perhaps you're thinking "There's nothing controversial and interesting to say in response to your dumbass topics, Mike!" Ah, but Adam H., Megan, and Tenzin (two pick three strong responses out of many) beg to differ! Among this week's on-another-topic hebdomadals, Laura's defense of mediocrity stands out as exactly the kind of thing reasonable people can fight about.
I remind you of the option to write responses to your peers' utterances as I warn you of a shift upwards in my standards: beginning this coming Friday, I will be looking for thoroughly debatable arguments and strong implementations of support (logic, anecdote, and generally non-artistic evidence incorporated satisfyingly in response to your claims). This is not to discourage you from defending the excellence of hot ham and cheese sandwiches; however, you should make sure that you're defending them against something (cafeteria food in general, perhaps).
Thursday, February 10, 2005
Maybe my comments should be harsher
You know, when I asked you to write at least 1500 words for this draft I didn't really mean "Well, y'know, 1200 would be fine." 1500 isn't a polite offer: we're not haggling over the price of halibut in a Parisian street market. I'm asking you to brainstorm and interrogate your ideas, and to do it at some length, without repeating yourself uselessly and without loading your essay up with fluff or with long and unrelated quotations. By giving yourself that many fertile, interrogated ideas you will have a much wider field to draw from for your second draft, making thereby a much better essay.
Your second draft must be at least 1250 words long. If it's 1249 or fewer (not including your name, works cited, or footnotes) I'm going to toss it back to you like a too-small halibut back into the water.
At least my comments aren't this harsh
Give a terrible writing assignment (List and describe the impact which the LASER had in your or your friends lives), get terrible answers.
But seriously, I feel my marginal notes on your essays and hebdomadals creeping into the Maybe-Too-Mean zone, and I'm trying to work on that - these first drafts have really been well above my expectations, and I really appreciate the work you've been putting into this class when you are juggling so many.
Tuesday, February 08, 2005
125 reasons to write a smashing first essay
English 100 students are invited to submit their papers for the Lewis Prize (deadline for submission: March 15th):
- The Lewis Prizes (approx. $125) are awarded annually for the best two essays written by freshmen in an English Department course.
- Expository papers of any length and on any subject are eligible (works of fiction and poetry are not eligible for Lewis and Vilas prizes).
- Papers may be submitted in either revised or unrevised form. In any case, the judges would strongly prefer a cleanly typed copy, free of instructor's comments.
- Papers may be submitted by instructors or by the students themselves. No student may submit more than one paper.
- Each submission should indicate the student's name, year in school, title of the paper, instructor's name, and course for which the paper was written.
- Papers may be submitted at any time before March 15, 2005 to the Undergraduate Majors Office, 7195 Helen C. White. The prizes will be awarded at the English Majors Banquet which will be held this year on Sunday April 24, 2005.
Monday, February 07, 2005
Paper 1 Conference Schedule
Updated 2/17!
Here is the up-to-date schedule for conferences. If you'd like to change your conference date/time or if you'd like to schedule a second conference, just shoot me an email! Remember, as long as you're here, what to bring with you:
- A hard copy of your essay (reviewed, along with my comments if I've made them yet)
- Ideas of how to answer my usual questions: What part or quality of this draft are you most concerned about? Do you have specific plans for substantial revision? What writerly weaknesses do you want to work on through this essay?
- Two or three substantive questions to ask me - while I will be happy to address formatting and citation issues, I'm really a lot more interested in questions of style, organization, and argument (not necessarily in that order)
3:30 pm - Tenzin 3:50 - Mark 4:10 - Tuesday 2/8 9:30 am - Ronak 9:50 - 10:10 - Friday 2/11 10:00 am - 10:20 - Pasha 10:40 - Chetan 11:00 - Adam D. 11:20 - Yessenia 11:40 - Dan 1:00 pm - Megan 1:20 - Laura 1:40 - Kelly 2:00 - 2:25 - Adam H. 2:45 - Nikki | 3:30 pm - Brie 3:50 - Katie 4:10 - Ashley Tuesday 2/15 9:30 am - 9:50 - Nicole 10:10 - 2:00 pm - Reza Friday 2/18 10:00 am - Megan 10:20 - 10:40 - 11:00 - Chetan 11:20 - Leslie 11:40 - Yessenia 1:00 pm - 1:20 - Laura 1:40 - 2:00 - Ronak 2:20 - Tenzin 2:40 - Mark |
From Ideas to Details: Remarks on redrafting
Ideas drafts are specifically intended to eschew concrete evidence for the articulation of broad concepts: it's not quite time, as you write the first draft, to get sunk in the dull details of an argument.
The second draft, then, is the time to start popping details into your essay: evidence (anecdotal, statistical, scientific, rhetorical, etc.) that supports your claim that obscene material inspires violence, that there is no harm in depictions of nudity, that news programs couldn't be bloodier if Quentin Tarantino was a CNN producer.
As you begin your quest for those perfect jewels of proof, I would like to make a few calm recommendations:
- Personal experience counts! There may not ultimately be a lot of classes where your instructor asks you to plumb your life and experience for examples illustrating your argument, but this is one of them: as long as you recognize that your anecdotes don't reflect universal truth, they can be helpful tools by means of which to illustrate (and spice up) a complicated point.
- Remember to question the authority of your source (ethos and all that). Wertham's argument was answered and problematized by Nyberg's, so if you're going to rely on his evidence you need to somehow cope with the fact that Nyberg found his findings unsatisfactory.
- At the end of the day, all your subclaims need to be nailed down with evidence or argument. You don't want a bold claim ("Comics do not cause juvenile deliquency") just sitting in the middle of a paragraph unsupported by any evidence: that just looks silly.
- If at all possible, avoid the following words: aspect, facet, negative, and positive. Why? These are the top four offenders of the frequency of appearance : specificity of meaning ratio: you're a lot better off writing "There are three principle ways obscene material influences readers' behavior" than "Obscenity has a number of negative aspects."
Saturday, February 05, 2005
Citing Wertham, Nyberg, and McCloud
Here is the publication information for the three articles we read in class this unit:
Author: Scott McCloud
Chapter: "Setting the Record Straight"
Book: Understanding Comics
Publisher: HarperPerennial
Location: New York City
Date: 1994
Author: Amy Kiste Nyberg
Essay: "Poisoning Children's Culture: Comics and Their Critics"
Book: Scorned Literature: Essays on the History and Criticism of Popular Mass-produced Fiction in America
Editors: Lydia Cushman Schurman and Deidre Johnson
Publisher: Greenwood Press
Location: Westport, Connecticut
Date: 2002
Author: Fredric Wertham
Chapter: "Design for Delinquency"
Book: Seduction of the Innocent
Publisher: Rinehart
Location: New York City
Date: 1954
Friday, February 04, 2005
Grammar goodness!
Okay, subject-verb agreement isn't the most exciting way to begin our discussion on grammar, and I imagine the quiz on Wednesday won't be a huge challenge for you. Here's the thing, though: easy doesn't mean pointless.
Here's the math of how quiz grading will work out this semester: there will be twelve quizzes, divided into two groups of six.
- If you get perfect scores on five out of the first six quizzes, you get one freebie hebdomadal: you can just skip writing one hebdomadal sometime this semester (as you can imagine, this can be quite useful later in the semester when you have a million exams to study for and half a million essays to write).
- For each perfect score you get on quizzes in the second set you get 0.5 points just added to your score: an 89.1 at the end of the semester becomes an 89.6, etc. This might seem weenie, but can make a cumulative difference to your grade, especially if you also opt to make one of the optional presentations on Jimmy Corrigan.
Thursday, February 03, 2005
Everything you Need to Know About Writing Successfully, by Stephen King
Yes, that Stephen King.
Of course, his advice is explicitly for fiction writers looking to publish; that said, points 3, 5, 7, 9, and 12 are - on their own - virtually a summary of English 100.
Wednesday, February 02, 2005
Why it's a good thing you're not grading me on clarity
Yessenia just politely pointed out to me that Friday's hebdomadal topic is worded confusingly. While I take some pleasure in the heb topics being confusing (which gives you more leverage, I feel, to interpret and answer them how you want), I will of course try to clear this one up.
You should answer EITHER
1. How the superhero comic you read for Monday is or is not what you expected a comic book to be like (etc.). I'm really asking you to explore comic book stereotypes and whether or not they're true, but I'm also fishing for your insights into the medium: what's cool / unique about comics? What's stupid about them?OR, if that topic is boring, there's an ALTERNATIVE topic:
2. Use the superhero comic you bought to argue for or against McCloud’s claims in “Setting the Record Straight.” (This involves analyzing McCloud's argument and finding ways to incorporate further or contradictory evidence.)This is an important hebdomadal; it's a kind of springboard into our discussion of many of the topics central to this course. The more time you put into thinking through the unique artistic and narrative advantages of sequential art - and their unique disadvantages - the more raw intellectual material you will have to work with all semester.
Tuesday, February 01, 2005
Stuff I don't teach: Essay exams
TAs are constantly bombarded with various services and outlets on campus asking us to forward messages to our students. Lucky for you, we're sane people and don't want to become spamholes. However, the advantage of blogs is that I can post particularly useful offers without rudely filling your inbox to the brim with useless crap. Here follows a recent to-be-forwarded email from the Writing Center regarding one of their most popular classes (formatting intact):
Does the thought of writing an essay exam put you in a whole-body sweat? Check out this Writing Center class about writing essay exams. It might be the best hour you'll spend (and be the calming balm you need).
Writing Essay Exams
Not sure what professors are looking for on an in-class or take-home essay exam? This class will answer your questions and prepare you for writing college-level essays on examinations. We'll talk about studying for exams, managing your time during an exam, planning your answers, starting your essays effectively, and writing well-developed and coherent essays.
Dates and times offered:
Wednesday, Feb. 9 from 4:00 to 5:00 pm
Thursday, Feb. 17 from 4:00 to 5:00 pm
Tuesday, Feb. 22 from 4:00 to 5:00 pm
Wednesday, Feb. 23, from 4:00 to 5:00 pm
Wednesday, March 2 from 4:00 to 5:00 pm
Monday, April 25 from 7:00 to 8:00 pm
Thursday, April 28 from 4:00 to 5:00 pm
Tuesday, May 3 from 4:00 to 5:00 pm
Note: Registration is not required for this class. Classes meet in Room 6191, Helen C. White Hall.
And if you're looking for someone to help critique your papers or writing projects, the Writing Center offers individual conferences with experienced writing instructors. Call 263-1992 to make an appointment!
The UW-Madison Writing Center
