Discussion Forum+ Writing Summaries
vng225
module2.docxFor Your Success & Readings
Be sure to read the required and recommended resources noted in this module. These resources will prime you for success in this course. The Discussion Board forum is especially important because you will practice locating sources in the CSU-Global library .
In preparation for the week, by Sunday, print off the Module 2 Preparations . This listing serves as a checklist for your day-to-day objectives and duties for the week.
ENG101 Module 2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vd1tM9cLJ2g
Required
· Sections of Rhetoric and Composition: A Guide for the College Writer :
· 4. Writing Applications
· 4.2 Description
· 4.4 Narration
· 4.4 Exposition
· 5. Advanced Topics
· 5.1 Writing in the Humanities
· 5.2 Writing in the Sciences
· 5.3 Writing in Business
· Chapter 1, Sections c-d in A Writer's Reference with Writing in the Disciplines
· Douglass, F. (1881, November). My escape from slavery. The Century Illustrated Magazine, 23. Retrieved from http://timtrask.com/amliti/escape.pdf
Recommended
· In-text citations. (2014). University of Purdue Online Writing Lab. Retrieved from https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/02/
· Vassallo, P. (2003). Executive summaries: Where less really is more . ETC: A Review of General Semantics, 60(1), 83.
References
Baurlein, M. (2011, January 5). A survival skill. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2010/07/12/when-did-cheating-become-an-epidemic/cheating-as-a-survival-skill
Education-Portal. (2011, June 29). 75 to 98 percent of college students have cheated. Retrieved from http://education-portal.com/articles/75_to_98_Percent_of_College_Students_Have_Cheated.html
Greenburg, D. (2008, August 25). The write stuff?: Why Biden's plagiarism shouldn't be forgotten. Slate. Retrieved from http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/history_lesson/2008/08/the_write_stuff.html
Maddox, M. (2017). The writer's 5 Ws. Retrieved from https://www.dailywritingtips.com/the-writers-5-ws/
1. Styles of Writing
As you start working on ways to further refine your own writing prowess, it is important to read and understand the writing styles of others. While this isn't a literature course per se, it is important for you to have a basic grasp of literary terms. All that said, since you might be new to learning and dissecting literature, it is important to understand literary elements/devices. You are encouraged to read the content as outlined in the course and take a look at the supplementary material provided below so that you can keep these elements in mind while reading the assigned essays.
Expressive language consists of similes, metaphors, and personification, and there are a number of different reasons and ways an author might employ these devices in academic writing. Can you think of a few reasons why? Review the Glossary of Literary Terms and the video (below) summarizing these elements.
Check out the Lynda.com video Creating a Vision to learn more about this topic.
Review and work through these sections if you would like to develop your writing process even more thoroughly. Module 1 moved you onto to the first step in the writing process of starting the reading of sources and planning our writing project. Module 2 now intensifies your reading and research efforts. To help guide the reading, a writer needs to sharpen his or her ideas about the topic while in the process of researching and reading sources. Understanding what form or type of essay was going to be deployed in the assignment helps sharpen your perspective when searching for research material. To sharpen your search even further, a writer needs to have a solid working thesis in front of her. A writer who has a solid working thesis should basically know exactly what research he is looking for.
Before we work with these issues, let us first consider developing the most effective attitude about writing. That attitude is best described as writing in plain English. In today's technological age, with the smaller space for the word and the more hurried pace of the message, writing in plain English has to be our primary goal. Writing in plain English is our best chance for your communication survival and success in the future.
1.1. Writing in Plain English
Writing is Plain English is not a recognized term by many, but the movement is gaining traction. One might ask, how do I write an expository essay or narrative essay in plain English? No matter what your purpose or intended audience, never forget to pitch the writing in plain English.
The most direct way to write in plain English is to avoid using jargon. In academic writing, every discipline has developed a language all its own. At times, the discourse of academic writing can be so familiar to those professionals working within that discipline that only they clearly understand what is being said in the discourse of academic thought. As an emerging academic, merely visiting and reading that discipline while researching your paper might at times seem confusing. As you become more savvy with your writing, you will become armed with a clear purpose as you come to understand your essay type and as you formulate a solid working thesis. In other words, you already know exactly what you are looking for during your research. However, as you become armed with academic tools, a writer should not get lost as he or she learns to write in a more academic manner.
At the same time, do not pick up the use of employing bad jargon habits along the way. Avoid writing the jargon of the locals in that discipline, even if you are a part of that discipline. Instead, only write in plain English. It may prove difficult at times not to use some concepts and phrases from your discipline. That said, some of the writing you encounter in your research may seem so intelligent or above your head that you may feel intimidated -- perhaps even impressed by the elevated language. Don't be. Please understand that a writer should write to express an idea, not to impress her audience with specialized jargon. Jargon is often the refuge of those who really do not have anything substantive to argue.
Using Plain English
This website will introduce you to the plain English movement that is trying to work against jargon writing. Not only will writing in plain English help you in your academics, it will also help you in your work and home life as well. Writing to express, instead of writing to impress, should always be our goal.
Writing to express, instead of writing to impress, should always be our goal
Visit Using Plain English for helpful examples.
Plain Writing Exercises
The following document provides clarity to the plain English movement, noting exercises to help you to implement concepts tied to the PLAIN principles movement , to help you improve your plain English writing skills. You might have many poor plain English writing habits. You might not even know you are practicing these errors in English. Working through these exercises will particularly help you recognize these less-than-stellar habits and work to eliminate them.
1.2. Expository
At the start of our academic careers, we spend an inordinate amount of time writing expository essays. However, as we reach into higher and higher levels of our education, the form of writing should be replaced increasingly by argumentative essays.
Our progress with academic writing follows what we know about the development of critical thinking using Bloom's taxonomy. Bloom's taxonomy begins with the knowledge domain, which means the mind at this level is chiefly concerned about learning facts. Expository essays thrive on the ability to weigh and convey facts. Knowledge is the chief domain of the undergraduate in the introductory and general education courses. As the undergraduate moves closer towards graduation, the writing in these courses should be arguing a debatable thesis.
The point of this lesson is that knowing the "ins" and "outs" of the various writing modes will make you a more successful writer. So when you start annotating a source, you know more clearly the type(s) of sources you will need to prove your thesis for the particular type of essay you are writing. For example, expository essays work better with fact-based and data-specific evidence or support. When annotating your sources for your expository thesis, you want your annotations to suggest how best to support your claims. Therefore, it is imperative to establish a solid working thesis as soon as possible.
Check Your Understanding
Which of the following is a true statement about expository writing?
References
Baurlein, M. (2011, January 5). A survival skill. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2010/07/12/when-did-cheating-become-an-epidemic/cheating-as-a-survival-skill
Education-Portal. (2011, June 29). 75 to 98 percent of college students have cheated. Retrieved from http://education-portal.com/articles/75_to_98_Percent_of_College_Students_Have_Cheated.html
Greenburg, D. (2008, August 25). The write stuff?: Why Biden's plagiarism shouldn't be forgotten. Slate. Retrieved from http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/history_lesson/2008/08/the_write_stuff.html
Maddox, M. (2017). The writer's 5 Ws. Retrieved from https://www.dailywritingtips.com/the-writers-5-ws/
Online Education Database (OEDb). (2010, December 19). 8 Astonishing stats on academic cheating. Retrieved from http://oedb.org/library/features/8-astonishing-stats-on-academic-cheating
1.3. Persuasive
The longer you are in college, the more you will increasingly find yourself writing persuasive essays. The more experienced writer learns to argue his thesis, no matter what the issue, or topic. Noting and establishing a position is the mode of writing for the most experienced student.
Review the following Ten Timeless Persuasive Writing Techniques for helpful persuasive tools.
2. Summarizing a Text
Learning to convey other people's ideas with integrity is a unique skill. A writer must turn the words into his or her own, yet still be completely accurate in relation to the original idea. The most difficult part of summarizing and paraphrasing is that you actually have to understand and digest the material before you can perform either one of these skills. When we summarize, we accurately condense another person's work. This means boiling it down to a brief retelling in your own words. Practical applications for summary are numerous, but most notably it seems as though professionals who can distill their ideas succinctly in white papers and executive summaries are the types of employees who get ahead in the workplace, as management can readily understand their ideas. Talk about managing up!
Items for you to consider when summarizing include the following:
· Develop a conscious sense of propriety about how you use information.
· Know and study your material before writing about it.
· Be accurate in relation to the original passage.
· Do not let your own personal biases color the accuracy of the information you are summarizing and paraphrasing.
· Do not summarize immediately. Wait a while and try to write without looking at the passage. Then check it for accuracy.
· When summarizing and paraphrasing, remember: you are a translator, an explainer or teacher of information.
· If you can summarize the material correctly, you will have internalized and comprehended the information. You will have achieved a new level of cognition (which is always a good thing).
· Make it clear to the reader with signal phrases where your information is coming from. You can do this, for example, by saying "Jones notes…"
As you read and summarize Frederick Douglass' work, think about the main points Douglass portrays in his writing. Often times, it is good to take a break from a work before starting a summary. When you start to summarize, go ahead and do so, but try not to look at the original work when you first attempt to summarize another person's words.
