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Assignment 8: Flush Left Diagramming: The Final Experiences

Assignment 8 Purpose 1. Gain possession of a tool for identifying sources of wordiness in sentences in one’s draft 2. Gain possession of a tool for improving one’s ability to understand difficult texts

Assignment 8 Objectives 1. Recite the grammatical definitions as they relate to relationships of parts of a sentence 2. Reinforce memorization of the first five principles of reader expectations 3. Explain the variables in sentence structure that readers will tolerate 4. Explain the three kinds of structure in a sentence 5. Demonstrate understanding of the rules of flush left diagramming 6. Practice flushing left a sentence and identifying sentence features in the light of reader expectations about sentence structure

Reading Assignments

• Chapter 6: Flush Left Diagramming: specific pages assigned below

• Appendix: Grammatical Terms Click on the “Intro to Assgt 8 #2” link in the Assignment 8 folder for a video describing the assignments for this section. Instructor Comments Perhaps the title of this section is a bit melodramatic – “The FINAL Experiences” … oooohh – but I want to underscore that if you are doing well in constructing a FLD correctly, then really you are getting an adult engagement with words and sentence. And this engagement is not, I believe, something that would be for the poet, but just adult engagement with words.

If Flush Left Diagramming were in the form of a video game, then you are about to go through a hidden door (which you see because of your success with Assignment 4). And now you are closer to entering the realm of the Master! And after that, you are a Creator of the Universe! But first you have to face and overcome the next four challenges! DIFFERENT TYPES OF FLUSH LEFT DIAGRAMS: Click on the “How Flush Left Diagrams Would Look When a Main Verb is Far from Its Subject” link in the Assignment 8 folder to see how a flush left diagram would look when a main Verb is far from its subject!!

When flushing left a sentence, sometimes you will need to add a subject that is not in the original sentence. To do that, you use brackets. Click on the

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“Examples of Needed Brackets for Flush Left Diagramming” link in the Assignment 8 folder to see examples of this.

I want you to pay special attention to the “two types of Subject/Verb Combos” that I explain on p. 93, under “Additional Concepts.” With regards to Identities, we can see that there are two kinds of subject-verb “combinations”: main subject-verbs and what I call “secondary subject-verbs.” ALL SV combos are called “main” SV combos, but only because sometimes an SV combo can be placed between another SV combo. Then you call that SV combo a “secondary SV combo.” I’m not saying that this condition violates reader expectations, but we writers just have to know it is there and then we can decide to keep it or not for the final draft. Click on the “Examples of Sentences with Secondary Subject” link in the Assignment 8 folder to see sentences with secondary SV combos. COMMENTS ABOUT THE READINGS: (I will present this writing in FLD form just as another experience of seeing how the writing observes PRE for location of subjects and verbs in light of the civilian preferences): Flush left Rules p. 94-97

A key breakthrough we should reflect on is  [notice the secondary SV combo (I’ll put in bold)]

that sentences have

a structure that is

separate from the words that are embedded

in that structure. I try

to visualize this with the 2nd wedge on the inside front cover of the textbook. This Flush Left activity can help

us literally see this structure, though we have

to know where our subjects and verbs are

before we flush

left the sentence. Later

you will see that when

you flush left sentences

that are not clear to you,

you understand the content of the passage and

you can see how that

writer is violating reader expectations! So

this activity can help you with rewriting and rereading.

WRITING ASSIGNMENTS

Flush Left Diagramming Assignment Type your responses to this assignment using a word processing program and save as a file. If you are using a word processing program other than Microsoft Word, then please save the file as Rich Text Format. Submit the file as an attachment. Read the pages assigned for each exercise and then complete the exercise.

1. Read pages 114 – 5 and refer to them as you complete this FLD activity. Also, click on the “FLD for ‘is’ Verbs” link in the Assignment 8 folder to watch a video on how to identify if the “be” verb is a main verb or a helping verb.

FLD TEST #1 (10 Points)

Complete the assignment using the “Identifying Forms of ‘is’ Correctly” link in the Assignment 8 folder that asks you determine if the ‘be’ verb is a helping verb or main verb.

2. Read pages 115 – 7 and refer to them as you complete this FLD activity. Also, you can click the “FLD for ‘that’” link in the Assignment 8 folder to access a video on how to identify if the word “that” is a subject or a conjunction.

FLD TEST #2 (10 Points) Using the “FLD Sentences that Have ‘That’ in Them” link in the Assignment 8 folder, complete the assignment that asks you to determine if ‘that’ is a subject or a conjunction

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3. Read p. 122 and refer to it (and other prior homework) as you complete this FLD activity.

Click the “FLD Secondary SV Combos” link in the Assignment 8 folder to watch a video that explains how to FLD sentences that have secondary SV combos. Click the “Revising Out Secondary SV Combos” link in the Assignment 8 folder to watch a video that explains how to revise out Secondary SV combos during revision.

FLD TEST #3 (10 Points)

Click the “Sentences that Have Secondary SV Combos” link in the Assignment 8 folder to complete the assignment dealing with secondary SV combos .

FLD TEST #4 (25 Points)

Click the “Test on Flush Left Diagramming” link in the Assignment 8 folder for a test of your FLD skills.

Analysis of a paragraph for PRE (Part 2) (50 points) Return to the “Paragraph Analysis for Assignment 7 (with a “Full Diagnostic”)” that you handed in with Assignment 7 and complete the rest of the activities (#5 to 8). This “deep massaging” into a paragraph and its words might seem to be over the top, but if you have taken these activities seriously and energetically, the dividends they pay will have no end.

FINALLY:

PREPARING FOR ASSIGNMENT 9: The Research Project (5 points)

Before you submit the FLD exercises, read “Questions for Chapter on Research Experience” in the Assignment 8 folder, and complete the Study Guide for Ch. 9 – The Research Project and submit. Then read Assgt. 9 for more instructions about the research project. This project will take a lot of time and has several moving parts to it, so refer often to Ch. 9 and print out as much of the Instructor’s Comments as you can.