Tag: week ahead

David's Posts

Week ahead: 5

5 2/10

Inductive & Deductive Writing

We’ll revise a 5 paragraph deductive essay into an inductive essay with an ABT thesis statement

You don’t need to do much of anything in advance to prep for class this week. If you can, just before class glance over the essay below.

[Edited to add:

A number of years ago, I assigned students in a class three hard-boiled detective short stories and assigned them to write a comparative essay in response. I no longer remember the exact prompt I gave those students, but they needed to compare the stories. The three stories are all set in Los Angeles: The Big Sleep is one of the originators of the genre, with a white male hardboiled detective in the 1930s; in “Murder is My Business” the protagonist is a lesbian detective in LA of the 1980s; and in Devil in a Blue Dress the protagonist detective is a black man in LA of the 1950s.

Below is a real essay a student wrote in response, which has some good observation in it but the five paragraph structure of the essay seriously undermines the author’s ability to make any kind of argument.]

Detective-comparisons-essay

In class, we’re going to revise this essay from a standard 5 paragraph essay into an inductive essay with an ABT thesis. Since we only have 50 minutes, it would be helpful if you have at least skimmed over the essay in advance.

by David
David's Posts

Weeks ahead: 4

 

1/24
3 1/27 No class: Return to campus.
4 2/3

Goal setting & Rhetorical situation

We won’t meet during week 3 because, at least according to current projections, you’ll all be moving back to campus and getting resettled for the start of face-to-face classes again. So I will see y’all in person on 2/3 in Callaway S104.

In the meantime, publish your “What’s in your bag?” photos to your sites — again, feel free to create a fictional self with this photo or to decide how you want to represent yourself and run with it. You can present yourself very professionally or you can show what’s in the bag for your Dungeons and Dragons character if that seems more interesting.

When we meet again, I’d like to discuss Randy Olson’s ABT structure with you. The Lunsford reading might be a review of concepts you’ve covered in other writing classes, but it’s short and it’s useful to review a bit. We will spend a few minutes on it, but mostly we’ll just be applying those terms this semester so I want to make sure we’re all on the same page with what they mean.

We’ll spend the bulk of our class session discussing your goals for this class, so please think about what those are and come prepared to discuss them.

by David
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