Category: Reading

Posted in English 1103, Reading, Teaching, Writing

ENG 1103: Delivering Your Presentations, Observing Your Peers, and Reflecting

Posted on by janemlucas

This morning, in the first half of class, you and your classmates will deliver your group presentations. Keep in mind that when you are not presenting, you will still play a vital role in class as an audience member. Pay close attention to the other three presentations. Jot occasional notes in your journal, but don’t keep your head down for a substantial length of time. Making eye contact with the speakers and nodding your head are gestures that will convey your appreciation for your classmates’ efforts.

In the second half of class, we will look back at the four articles that served as your subjects, and you will compose reflections. Directions for your reflections are included below.

Directions

Compose a short piece of writing (two paragraphs, minimum) that reflects on your individual preparation and delivery of your portion of the presentation and your group’s presentation overall. Elements to address include the following:

  • The roles of your reading and writing: How did the processes of rereading the text and writing and rewriting your remarks contribute to the effectiveness of your delivery?
  • The introduction of your group members and opening remarks
  • The examination of points in the article
  • The conclusion
  • Poise, eye contact, and avoidance of filler words
  • The group’s cohesiveness

After you have reflected on your group’s presentation, compose an additional paragraph that addresses a presentation by one of the other groups. Choose the one that stands out the most to you. What element or elements of that presentation made it particularly effective and why?

Next Up

Wordplay Day! To prepare for class, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website, or the Merriam-Webster Scrabble Word Finder page, and review the blog posts devoted to Scrabble tips.

Posted in English 1103, Reading, Teaching, Writing

ENG 1103: Continuing to Prepare . . .

Posted on by janemlucas

As you continue to prepare for your presentation, be mindful of the valuable roles that reading and writing play in the process. Although the final product is your group’s three-to-four-minute oral presentation, your work began with reading and writing: reading the article that serves as your subject, and writing the plan that you composed in class yesterday.

Have you thoroughly reread the article that serves as your subject? If not, turn back to the text itself at least two more times before Wednesday. Chances are, on a second or third reading, you will notice details you didn’t notice before, ones that you may want to add to your presentation.

In addition to recording key words on your notecard, write out your portion of the presentation in your journal. Though you will not be permitted to have your journal in hand during your presentation, the act of writing down your remarks and rewriting them will help you commit them to memory.

As you practice delivering your presentation, be sure to limit the time that you look down at your notecard and your copy of the reading. Your ability to limit those glances will be greater if you spend ample time rereading the text and writing and reviewing your remarks in your journal.

Robert Klara’s “Scrabble”

Yesterday, while you were planning your presentations, I distributed copies of Robert Klara’s article “Scrabble.” If you plan to focus on Scrabble for your final essay and annotated bibliography, Klara’s article will serve as your starting point.

Unlike the articles you read for your presentations, Klara’s does not report on research, though he does quote journalist Stefan Fatsis, author of Word Freak: Heartbreak, Triumph, Genius, and Obsession in the World of Competitive Scrabble Players. Klara’s article also provides historical context.

If you choose Scrabble as the subject for your final essay and annotated bibliography, include among your sources at least one newspaper or magazine article that reports on Scrabble research, or include the original research itself, published as a peer-reviewed article, such as “The World of Competitive Scrabble: Novice and Expert Differences in Visuospatial and Verbal Abilities,” by Diane F. Halpern and Jonathan Wai, available through the HPU Libraries.

Next Up

In class tomorrow, you will deliver your group presentations. Afterward, in the second half of class, you will compose a short essay that reflects on both your own presentation and one by another group.

Posted in English 1103, Reading, Teaching

ENG 1103: Planning Your Group Presentations

Posted on by janemlucas

This morning in class, after your Scrabble debriefing, I will distribute your group presentation assignment, and you will have the remainder of the class period to devote to planning the short presentation that you will deliver in class on Wednesday. An additional copy of the assignment is included below.

As an exercise in collaboration and oral communication, you and three or four of your classmates will plan, rehearse, and deliver a concise presentation focusing on a reading that addresses one of the practices implemented in the course. If you were absent when copies of the articles were distributed (see the titles in the group assignments below), download and print copies from the Blackboard readings folder.

Presentation Assignment Directions

  1. Plan a presentation of three or four minutes, total, that addresses the most significant points covered in your group’s designated reading. (The lists of group assignments and designated readings are included below.)
  2. Include in your presentation the following elements: (1) an introduction that mentions each group member’s first and last name (each group member may introduce himself or herself, or the group may assign one member the responsibility of introducing everyone), the title and author, or authors, of the reading, and a brief overview of the text, (2) A close examination of two or more points in the reading, and (3)) A conclusion that provides closure without restating the introduction and that invites questions. One strategy to consider for your conclusion is to address the relevance of the practice (the subject of your reading) to your work in English 1103, your work in other courses, and/or your life outside of the classroom.
  3. Do not create a digital component, such as a PowerPoint or Google Slides show. You will not be permitted to use any digital devices during your presentation. Instead, you will rely only on a single three-by-five-inch index card with your notes and your paper copy of the reading.
  4. Aim for cohesion. Turning briefly to the previous speaker and addressing him or her by first name, repeating a word or idea of his or hers, and connecting it to your own remarks are ways to unify your presentation. If your presentation seems to be a series of individual talks rather than a single group presentation, it lacks cohesion.
  5. Every group member is not required to speak for the same length of time, but every member is required to deliver a portion of the presentation.

Directions for Rehearsing

  1. In preparation for rehearsing, write your notes on a single three-by-five-inch index card (one card per group member). If your initial notes are written in complete sentences, rewrite them to include only words and short phrases for your key points. If your notes are too detailed, you will risk relying too heavily on them and making minimal eye contact with the audience. Plan to make as much eye contact as possible, and be sure to make eye contact with people throughout the room rather than fixing your eyes on one or two people.
  2. Practice good posture. As you deliver your presentation, your ears should be directly above your shoulders. If you tend to shift your weight from one foot to the other, stand with your feet perpendicular to each other. If you do so, you will not be able to shift your weight from one foot to the other.
  3. Avoid filler words, such as uh, um, like, and you know. If you tend to use filler words, practice pausing at the points where you are likely to use them.
  4. Take turns delivering your portions of the presentation, and offer feedback to your group members. Offer both suggestions for improvement and words of encouragement.

Group Assignments

  • “Blogs vs. Term Papers”: Avery Clark, Madison Davis, Sofia Marin, Travis Pecararo
  • “Skim Reading is the New Normal”: Zach Dick, Nicole Marin, Tommy McHugh, Elise Claire Palmisano, Davis Smith
  • “Why Writing By Hand is Better for Memory and Learning”: Nick Beeker, Jermaine Cain, Izzie McLawhorn, Sierra Welch
  • “A Break from Your Smartphone Can Reboot Your Mood . . .”: Aidan Berlin, Marcus Gerhardt, Ethan Paterson, Dylan Virga

Grade Criteria

  • An A presentation includes all elements outlined in the directions for planning and rehearsing and demonstrates the group members’ poise and ability to avoid filler words.
  • A B presentation includes all elements outlined in the directions for planning and rehearsing but may be marred by group members’ lack of poise and/or inability to avoid filler words.
  • A C presentation includes most but not all elements outlined in the directions for planning and rehearsing and may also be marred by group members’ lack of poise and/or inability to avoid filler words.
  • A D presentation includes only some elements outlined in the directions for planning and rehearsing and may also be marred by group members’ lack of poise and/or inability to avoid filler words.
  • An F presentation includes few if any elements outlined in the directions for planning and rehearsing and may also be marred by group members’ lack of poise and/or inability to avoid filler words.

Next Up

In class on Wednesday, you will deliver your group presentations. Afterward, in the second half of class, you will compose a short essay that reflects on both your own presentation and one by another group, one that was notable for its strengths.

Posted in English 1103, Reading, Teaching, Writing

ENG 1103: Looking Ahead . . .

Posted on by janemlucas

Group Presentations

On Monday, after your Scrabble debriefing, you will receive the assignment for the short group presentation you and three or four of your classmates will deliver on Wednesday, March 11. You will have the majority of Monday’s class period to devote to planning, and you will have the first ten minutes of Wednesday’s class for final preparations.

The subject of your presentation will be an article focusing on one of these aspects of English 1103:

  • Blogging
  • Limiting screen time
  • Reading printed texts (rather than reading online articles and ebooks)
  • Writing longhand

Although you and your group members will focus on only one of the four articles, all of you will read and annotate the other three in preparation for your classmates’ presentations.

If you decide to devote your final essay and annotated bibliography to one of the aspects of the course covered in the group presentations, the article focusing on that subject will serve as the starting point for your project.

Final Essay and Annotated Bibliography

Which aspect of the course or which of the writers we have studied are you interested in examining further? Your answer to that question will determine the subject of your final essay and annotated bibliography.

In preparation for beginning your research next week, review the list below and freewrite in your journal on the subjects that appeal to you most.

  • Donald Barthelme
  • Blogging
  • Tom Junod
  • Helen Keller
  • Limiting screen time
  • Martin Luther King, Jr.
  • Harper Lee
  • Michael Lewis
  • Reading printed texts (rather than reading online articles and ebooks)
  • Scrabble
  • David Sedaris
  • Writing longhand

If you choose to research one of the writers we have studied, keep in mind that your project will be an exploration of the author’s words, not his or her life. Your aim is not to write a biography, but instead a study of the writer’s craft.

Bonus Assignment

Directions

  1. Go to the class blog page, and click on the link for the blog of the classmate whose name precedes yours. If you are first on the list, go to the blog of the student whose name is last.
  2. If your designated classmate’s blog is not linked to the page, or his or her analysis is not published, choose another classmate’s blog. 
  3. Read the classmate’s analysis.
  4. Compose a one- or two-paragraph response (75 words, minimum) that includes both the classmate’s name and the title of his or her analysis. In your comment, address one or more of these elements: the title, the thesis, evidence to support the thesis and/other claims, organization, the conclusion, the image documenting part of the writing process away from the screen, the embedded link to a relevant website. Note that you will mention the classmate by name, but you will not refer to him or her in third person. In other words, you will not write, John’s examples of “The School”‘s incongruities effectively demonstrate Donald Barthelme’s postmodernist approach to storytelling. Instead, you will write, John, your examples of “The School”‘s incongruities effectively demonstrate Donald Barthelme’s postmodernist approach to storytelling.
  5. Recommended (not required): Draft your comment longhand in your journal.
  6. Type your response as a comment. You should see a leave comment/reply option at the top or bottom of the post. If you do not see that option, click the title of the blog post, and scroll down. You should then see leave comment/reply.
  7. Before you click leave comment/reply, copy your comment (on a PC, copy with control + c; on a Mac, copy with command + c).
  8. After you submit your comment on your classmate’s blog post, return to this post, and paste your comment as a reply (on a PC, paste with control + v; on a Mac, paste with command + v). This step is critical because your classmate may not approve your comment, which means it will not be visible on his or her blog post. To receive credit for the assignment, you must post your duplicate comment as a reply to this blog post, “ENG 1103: Looking Ahead.“ To submit your comment, click the title of the post, then scroll down to the bottom. There you will see the image of an airmail envelope with a box for your comment. Type your comment in the box and click Comment. Post your comment by the 5 p.m. on Thursday, March 12.

I will make your comments visible after the deadline.

Next Up

On Monday, you will begin planning your group presentations. For more details, see the first paragraph of this post. I will provide additional instructions in class.

Posted in English 1103, Reading, Teaching, Writing

ENG 1103: Sample Analyses Follow-Up

Posted on by janemlucas

At the beginning of yesterday’s class, we examined “Wait Means Never,” the sample student analysis of Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” and “Princessof the Rock,” the analysis of the prologue to Tara Westover’s memoir, Educated. Today’s post presents more detailed notes on the essays’ content and form. As you continue to revise, return to these notes for reminders of dos and don’ts for your own analysis.

“Wait Means Never” Content

  • Rather than beginning with a summary of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” the writer comments on the letter by observing its relevance. Instead the writer should state what the letter is, an epistolary essay King wrote in 1962 while he was jailed in Alabama for leading nonviolent protests.
  • The writer ends the first paragraph with a thesis, but the statement is primarily description. Essentially, the writer states that King uses stylistic devices to deliver his message to a wider audience, but a thesis or main claim in a textual analysis should offer an assertion about how the writer’s use of those devices achieve a particular effect. The recommended revision that we examined in class–the one on the handout that I distributed–is included below, under the Revision heading.
  • The writer observes that King repeats “the word ‘wait’ throughout the letter” (par. 2), but King does not introduce that word until his eleventh paragraph. The writer could revise his thesis to focus specifically on King’s eleventh paragraph because that portion of the letter is the source of his claims and textual support.
  • In the body paragraphs, the writer effectively details King’s diction and sentence structure, but a couple of inaccuaracies undercut the prose. Neither “from bad to worse” (par. 3) nor “at the end of the letter” (par. 5) is accurate.
  • After ending the final body paragraph with ”’wait'” (par. 5), the writer turns to a conclusion that reads more like the ending of a history report than a textual analysis. Simply revising the opening of the last paragraph to begin, “[t]he words of Dr. Martin Luther King . . .” would maintain the focus of the analysis, the words themselves. The writer could still address the letter’s role in history by noting how the words have endured as a rallying cry for peaceful nonviolent protest. Consider how else the writer might give the analysis closure.

“Wait Means Never” Form

  • The document lacks a running header.
  • Because the writer is referring to wait and never as words in his title, both should be italicized.
  • In the first line, the writer defines King’s letter as a “speech of literature” (par. 1). Although King was an orator, his “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” is not one of his speeches. As the title indicates, it’s a letter. Labeling the letter “literature” is unnecessary because the analysis that unfolds will reveal the literary quality of the prose. If the writer wants to address the letter’s status as a work of literature, in the conclusion, he might note that many students first encounter King’s letter in the pages of their high school and college anthologies.
  • In the first sentence of the introductory paragraph and the second sentence of the second paragraph, the writer uses coordinating conjunctions that indicate contrast, but the clauses those words connect are not in contrast. See “yet remains” (par. 1) and “but irked” (par. 2). In both cases, “and” would be the accurate conjunction. That said, “yet remains” introduces an assessment of the letter–in particular, its relevance–which shouldn’t be part of the summary at the beginning of the analysis.
  • The writer refers to King’s voice as “the narrator’s” (par. 2), but a narrator is a person who tells a story, usually a work of fiction or a narrative poem. King should be referred to as the writer or the author.
  • The clauses “it can easily be acknowledged” (par. 2) and “it can be identified” (par. 5) are passive constructions that de-emphasize the subject. The sentences that contain those clauses should be revised to show the action that King performs as a writer. The second-paragraph sentence might be rewritten as this: King’s repetition of wait emphasizes how frequently he has heard the word and how its “piercing familiarity” (par. 11) has increased his frustration. The two sentences convey the same idea, but the revision is eleven words shorter.

Introductory Paragraph

The paragraphs below are the first paragraph of “Wait Means Never” and my revised version.

Original Introductory Paragraph

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” is a speech of literature that was composed many years ago yet remains relevant. King’s words give insight into the life of an African American during the 1960s and symbolize the significance of taking action and standing up for what is right, justice for African Americans. In this particular letter, King speaks about how it’s easy for people who have never felt pain of being oppressed, discriminated against, and segregated to say the word “wait.” The letter goes further into detail about what “wait” truly means for an African American and specifically tackles the perspective of an American father who also has to explain to his children why the world is the way it is, yet that father does not quite know himself why people act in such a harsh manner. In this letter, Martin Luther King Jr. utilizes repetition, detail, vivid imagery, and sentence structure to deliver a message to not just one person, or even a hundred people, but the entire country that justice for African Americans cannot be a patient matter.

Revision

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail” responds to the eight white clergymen who drafted an open letter addressing King’s involvement in the civil rights movement, urging him to seek justice in the courts rather than in the streets. In his answer to the clergymen, King asserts that a Christianity that permits racial oppression and prejudice is immoral and stands in direct opposition to the teachings of the gospel. Though King’s letter draws on his 1956 sermon “Paul’s Letter to American Christians,” the hallmark of his epistolary essay is not the rhythmic cadences of his baritone voice, but instead its artful composition. With the repetition of the word wait and a series of dependent clauses, King encapsulates his testimony and delays the end of the letter’s longest sentence, creating a holding pattern that forces readers to experience their own wait.

“Princess of the Rock” Content

  • The writer refers to the “unique setting” (par. 1) of Tara Westover’s childhood, but doesn’t specify the location of the mountains that are home to Buck’s Peak, which features the image of the Indian Princess, Westover’s friend and protector. Identifying Buck’s Peak as part of the Bear River Range in southeast Idaho would give readers a better sense of the setting.
  • What appears to be the essay’s thesis–the sentence that begins, “Her description of the rural farm . . .”–is itself description rather than analysis. Shifting the focus from the fact that Westover depicts herself as a child to what Westover achieves through the adult retrospective narrator’s presentation of her younger self would move the essay in the direction of critical study.
  • The writer states that Westover uses “lighthearted words” (par. 2), but the line that she quotes as evidence to support her claim is not lighthearted.
  • Only near the end of the essay–in the fifth of its six paragraphs–does the writer identify the excerpt she is analyzing as the prologue of the memoir. Identifying the text as the prologue in the introduction and addressing its function in the thesis is another change that would move the essay in the direction of critical study. (What background or context does the prologue provide? What does it foreshadow?)

“Princess of the Rock” Form

  • The memoir’s title, Educated, is incorrectly enclosed in quotation marks (par. 1).
  • Commas incorrectly follow closing quotation marks (par. 1).
  • The phrase “rural farm setting” (par. 2) is redundant.
  • The passive construction “[t]he lighthearted words used” (par.2 ) should be recast in active voice: Westover uses lighthearted words . . .
  • The first quotation from Educated (par. 2) should not include the author’s last name, and the Roman numerals should be lower-case.
  • The word “princesses” (par. 3) should be possessive rather than plural (princess’s).
  • The word “has” (par. 3) should be replaced with an action verb–such as demands or forces to enliven the sentence and give readers a better sense of Westover’s father. The writer should also note that the father’s name in the memoir is Gene, a pseudonym for Val.
  • The second quotation from Educated (par. 3) lacks both a signal phrase and a parenthetical citation.
  • The third paragraph ends with an instance of faulty predication.
  • The writer refers to “Tara’s family” (par. 4) and “Tara wish[ing]” (par. 6) when she should refer to Westover’s and Westover.

Conclusions

Effective strategies for concluding analyses include (1) offering an insight about the text or an additional quotation from it, (2) revisiting the thesis without stating it verbatim, and (3) pointing to the broader implications of the analysis. In “The Strange Fruit of Sosnowiec,” I employ two of the three, specifically one and three. Look back at the final paragraph and note how each sentence offers insights about Maus or points to its broader implications.

As I have noted before, you should avoid the phrase in conclusion or any variation on it at the beginning of the final paragraph of your essay. While that transitional phrase can be useful in a speech (because the audience cannot see that the end is near), there is no reason to write those words when readers can see for themselves that only one paragraph remains. For more, see Harvard University Writing Center’s notes on conclusions.

Relevant Embedded Links

The relevant embedded link that you include in the blog post for your analysis should be a primary or secondary source, not a background one, such as Wikipedia, Encyclopedia Britannica, or a social cataloguing website, such as Goodreads. Appropriate websites to link include the authors’ own sites, sites where the full-text of the essay or chapter is available (without a paywall), and authors’ pages on publications that employ them, such as Michael Lewis’s page on the ESPN site. The list below includes a link to one appropriate site for each of the seven subjects. If you are unsure whether a site is appropriate to link to your analysis, ask me or simply use the relevant link below.

Note that for search purposes, the sites above are listed as complete URLs, not as embedded links. In your blog post, the site address should be embedded in a word or phrase, just as the links are embedded in the earlier sections of this post (and in my other posts).

Next Up

On Wednesday, you will compose a short reflective essay focusing on the process of planning, drafting, and revising your analysis. If you are still in the process of completing your essay on Wednesday (since you have until Friday morning’s hard deadline to post it), your reflection will address your work in progress.

Before class, review the sections of the textbook, Writing Analytically, that have guided you in the writing of your analysis:

  • “Focus on Individual Words and Sentences” (48-49).
  • “How Long?: Paragraphs, Readers, and Writers” (308). 
  • “‘Interesting,’ ‘Revealing,’ ‘Strange’” (24). 
  • “Seems to Be About X, But Could Also Be (Or is ‘Really’) About Y’” (104-7). 
  • “What a Good Analytical Thesis Is and Does” (241-42).
  • “Words Matter” (49-50).

After you have reviewed those sections of Writing Analytically, choose a phrase, clause, or sentence relevant to your writing process and draft in your journal a short passage that connects that quotation to your writing. That passage will serve as part of your reflection. Detailed instructions for composing your reflection and including your chosen quotation will be included on the assignment handout that I distribute on Wednesday. Remember to bring your textbook to class.

Posted in English 1103, Reading, Teaching, Writing

ENG 1103: Sample Analyses

Posted on by janemlucas

For today’s class, you read and annotated “Wait Means Never,” an analysis of Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” written for English 1103 in a previous semester.

Today in class, you and two or three of your classmates will collaborate on an assessment of “Wait Means Never” that addresses both the content and the form of the analysis. You will also examine a second student analysis–one that I will distribute in class–which focuses on a passage in Tara Westover’s memoir Educated (2018).

As you assess the student analyses, pay close attention to both the assignment guidelines and the grade criteria. Ask yourselves whether each essay includes all of the following elements:

  • A title that offers a window into your analysis
  • An introduction that presents a summary of the text
  • A thesis statement, or main claim, that presents your take on the text based on your close study of it
  • Textual evidence that supports your claims
  • A minimum of two relevant quotations from the text, introduced with signal phrases and followed by parenthetical citations
  • A conclusion that revisits the thesis without restating it verbatim
  • A work cited entry 
  • A minimum of 600 words

Keep in mind that A and B essays must include all of the elements listed above.

In addition to reading and annotating “Wait Means Never” for today, you examined the page of Art Spiegelman‘s graphic memoir Maus posted in the readings folder on Blackboard, and noted in your journal what elements of the page you might address if you were writing an analysis of it. Time permitting, after we discuss your assessments of “Wait Means Never” and “Princess of the Rock,” we will examine my analysis, “The Strange Fruit of Sosnowiec.”

Spiegelman, Art. Maus I. Pantheon, 1986. p. 83.

Next Up

In class on Wednesday, you will compose a short reflective essay focusing on the process of planning, drafting, and revising your analysis. If you are still in the process of completing your essay on Wednesday (since you have until Friday morning’s hard deadline to post it), your reflection will address your work in progress.

Before class, review the sections of the textbook, Writing Analytically, that have guided you in the writing of your analysis:

  • “Focus on Individual Words and Sentences” (48-49).
  • “How Long?: Paragraphs, Readers, and Writers” (308). 
  • “‘Interesting,’ ‘Revealing,’ ‘Strange’” (24). 
  • “Seems to Be About X, But Could Also Be (Or is ‘Really’) About Y’” (104-7). 
  • “What a Good Analytical Thesis Is and Does” (242-42).
  • “Words Matter” (49-50).

After you have reviewed those sections of Writing Analytically, choose a phrase, clause, or sentence relevant to your writing process and draft in your journal a short passage that connects that quotation to your writing. That passage will serve as part of your reflection. Detailed instructions for composing your reflection and including your chosen quotation will be included on the assignment handout that I distribute on Wednesday. Remember to bring your textbook to class.

Posted in English 1103, Reading, Teaching

ENG 1103: “The Falling Man” Revisited . . .

Posted on by janemlucas
Photo Credit: Richard Drew https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a48031/the-falling-man-tom-junod/

Yesterday in class, before you began typing your revisions, I checked your journal exercises that addressed both the opening of “The Falling Man” and the textbook’s authors’ suggestions for paragraph writing. My version of that exercise follows.

The authors of Writing Analytically recommend that “[i]f you find a paragraph growing longer than half a page–particularly if it is your opening or second paragraph–find a place to make a paragraph break” (Rosenwasser and Stephen 308). Junod does not follow that advice in the opening of “The Falling Man.” He opts instead to begin his article with a paragraph of more than four hundred words.

If Junod had chosen to divide the first paragraph, where might he have divided it?

Junod might have started a second paragraph with the words “[i]n all the other pictures,” because there he shifts the focus from the Falling Man to the photographs of other people who jumped from the Twin Towers. An opportunity for a third paragraph comes with the words “[t]he man in the picture, by contrast,” where Junod turns his attention back to the Falling Man. And he might have begun a fourth paragraph with “[s]ome people who look at the picture,” because there he shifts to viewers’ perceptions of the Falling Man.

Generally, one hundred to one hundred and fifty words is a suitable paragraph length. As a rule, you should begin a new paragraph when you present a new idea or point. If you have an extended idea that spans multiple paragraphs, each new point within that idea should have its own paragraph. But the first paragraph of “The Falling Man” defies convention. For Junod, choosing not to divide the first paragraph creates an unbroken movement that parallels the unbroken downward flight of his subject, the Falling Man. Outside of the photograph, “he drops and keeps dropping until he disappears” (par. 1). With “disappears,” the last word of the paragraph,” the Falling Man disappears from the page, and Tom Junod turns to the photographer, whom we learn later in the essay is Richard Drew.

Works Cited

Junod, Tom. “The Falling Man.” Esquire, vol. 140, no. 3, Sept. 2003, pp. 176+. ProQuest, https://libproxy.highpoint.edu/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/ magazines/falling-man/docview/210268344/se-2.

Rosenwasser, David and Jill Stephen. “The Idea of the Paragraph.” Writing Analytically, 9th edition. Wadsworth/Cengage, 2024. pp. 307-313. 

“Anyone Who Had a Heart . . .”

Any of you who had hearts–paper ones with lace doilies, distributed last Friday–could have earned bonus assignment credit for composing a Valentine and posting an image of it on your blog. Kudos to Nick Beeker, Madsion Davis, Sophia Marin, Dylan Virga, and Sierra Welch for taking the initiative to create Valentine’s Day greetings for loved ones.

Nick Beeker, who titled his post “Valentines Day,” wrote, “This word filled heart was sent to my childhood best friend Cameron. As he is going off to boot camp for the Marines. I am very proud of him!”

Madison Davis, who titled her post “Happy Valentine’s Day <3,” wrote, “I made this valentine for my mom because she has been my valentine every year until this year, so now that we have moved on from the tradition of her getting me a valentine, I wanted to make her one to let her know that I am still thinking of her, even when I have my own valentine. Happy Valentine’s Day mom!”

Sophia Marin titled her post “A Valentines to My Best Friend.”

Dylan Virga, who titled his post “Happy Valentine’s Day,” wrote, “My friend is Brazilian, and back in the 2014 World Cup, Brazil lost to Germany 7-1 which is one of the worst blowouts in sports history. So I like to tease her about it every now and again.”

Sierra Welch titled her post “Valentine <3.”

Bonus Assignment Opportunity

Directions

  1. Determine which of the five Valentine’s posts is the strongest in terms of composition. Since each post features both an image of the hand-crafted card and its written text, think of the composition not solely as the words composed but instead as a combination of the words and image. You may also consider the writer’s commentary, where present, and the title of the blog post itself.
  2. Compose a comment of one complete sentence or more that includes (1) the first and last name of the writer, and (2) a brief explanation of the Valentine’s effectiveness.
  3. Post your comment as a reply to this blog entry no later than 9 a.m. tomorrow, Friday, February 20. (To post your comment, click on the post’s title, and scroll down to the bottom of the page. You will then see the image of an airmail envelope with a leave comment option.) 

I will approve your comments (make them visible) before Friday’s class.

Next Up

Wordplay Day! To prepare for class, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website, or the Merriam-Webster Scrabble Word Finder page, and review the blog posts devoted to Scrabble.

Posted in English 1103, Reading, Teaching, Writing

ENG 1103: Revising Your Analysis

Posted on by janemlucas

After I check your journal exercises on the opening of Tom Junod’s “The Falling Man,” I will return your drafts with my notes, and you will have the remainder of the class period to begin revising your analyses on your laptops. Because next week is spring break, you will have two additional weeks to continue your revision work before you submit the assignment to Blackboard and publish it as a WordPress blog entry. The due date is Wednesday, March 4 (before class). The hard deadline is Friday, March 6 (before class). Directions for submitting your analysis are included on your assignment sheet and on the Blackboard submission site.

Analysis Draft Notes

I have attached to your analysis draft a handout of notes for you to review–along with my handwritten annotations–before you begin your revision work. An additional copy of those notes is included in yesterday’s blog post.

The Writing Center

As you continue to revise your analysis, consider visiting the Writing Center. If you do so, you will earn five bonus points for the assignment.

To schedule an appointment, register online here, email the Writing Center’s director, Professor Justin Cook, at jcook3@highpoint.edu, or scan the QR code below. To earn bonus points for your analysis, consult with a Writing Center tutor no later than Thursday, March 5.

Writing Center Consultations for Literacy Narratives

  • Section 8: 2 of 17 students, 11.7%

If you are one of the students who did not take advantage of the Writing Center when you were composing your literacy narrative, do not miss the opportunity to receive that guidance–and those bonus points–for your analysis, and later for your final essay and annotated bibliography.

Model Analysis

After spring break, we will examine the student sample analysis “Wait Means Never” and “The Strange Fruit of Sosnowiec,” my model analysis of a page of Art Spiegelman’s graphic memoir Maus. Before class on Monday, March 2, read and annotate “Wait Means Never,” which you will receive a copy of today, and read the page of Maus that is posted in the readings folder on Blackboard. As you read the page, make note in your journal of the elements of the page you would address if you were writing an analysis of it.

Next Up

Wordplay Day! To prepare for class, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website and review the blog posts devoted to Scrabble.

Posted in English 1103, Reading, Writing

ENG 1103: Looking Ahead to Your Analysis Revision

Posted on by janemlucas
Rosenwasser, David, and Jill Stephen. “Focus on Individual Words and Senetnces.” Writing Analytically, 9th edition. Wadsworth/Cengage, 2024. pp. 48-49. 

In Writing Analytically, David Rosenwasser and Jill Stephen recommend “focus[ing] on individual sentences and short passages and build[ing] up a knowledge base from there” (48). The paragraphs that follow demonstrate how developing your understanding of a text through your close examination of individual words enables you to develop an analysis of it.

Suppose you are writing about Michael Lewis’s “Back Story” and are examining the words “[f]our Mississippi”(21). You might be drawn to the fact that Lewis withholds those words for several pages, rather than presenting them shortly after the previous counts in the Redskins’ play—one, two, and three Mississippi–which he documents in the opening paragraph of the chapter. You might ask yourself why he withholds “[f]our Mississippi”(21), and answer with these words:

Doing that allows him to develop the backstory.

Although the statement above answers your question, it does so in very general terms. To develop the idea, state specifically what that is, which is delaying the resumption of the chapter’s opening scene:

Delaying the resumption of the chapter’s opening scene for several pages allows Lewis to develop the backstory.

Noting that backstory is the title of the chapter and stating what the backstory is develops the sentence more:

Delaying the resumption of the chapter’s opening scene for several pages allows Lewis to develop the backstory of the title: how Lawrence Taylor redefined the running back position and fundamentally changed the game of football.

The sentence above fleshes out the idea of the original nine-word sentence and nearly quadruples its length.

As you revise your analysis, follow the same steps to develop your ideas.

Tomorrow, when I return your drafts with my annotations, you will also receive a handout with general notes. An additional copy of those notes is included below.

Analysis Draft Notes

  • The opening paragraph of your essay should be a summary that leads to your thesis statement. Remember that summaries are objective by nature. If you comment in any way on the quality of your subject (the text you are writing about), you turn from summary to commentary or analysis. That should not occur until you present your thesis statement, which will follow the summary.
  • Summaries are written in the third person. No singular or plural first- or second-person pronouns should appear in your summary. In other words, you should not use the words “I,” “me,” “you,” “we,” or “us.” MLA style requires the use of the present tense in writing about literature and other pieces of writing that are sources of study.
  • On first reference, refer to the author by first and last name. On subsequent references, refer to the author by last name, not first.
  • Text is a blanket term for all your readings. When you are referring to a particular reading, do not use a blanket term. Instead, identify by type: essay, chapter, chapter excerpt, or magazine article excerpt.
  • MLA style requires the use of the present tense in writing about literature and other works that are sources of study. Write Sedaris meditates on, not Sedaris meditated on. For more on writing in the present tense, see MLA’s notes on writing in the present tense.
  • Do not foreground the words page and paragraph in your sentences. In other words, do not write, on page twenty-two. . . . Page and paragraph numbers are for parenthetical citations.
  • Once you begin your analysis, you may use first person, but MLA’s editors and your textbook’s authors recommend that you use first-person sparingly, if you use it at all. If you find it difficult to write in third person, compose your analysis in its entirety in first person, then afterward try recasting it in third person. For more on the person question (to write I or not), see Writing Analytically (415-16) and MLA’s notes on using I.
  • In your drafts, some of you presented ideas that you heard in class as if they were your own, which is a form of plagiarism. If you mention an idea that I presented in class, you should introduce the idea with a signal phrase, such as this: As Professor Jane Lucas has observed, the narrator Edgar’s apparent detachment may stem from his grief. The signal phrase is in past tense because it refers to a statement from a previous class, but Edgar’s verb is present tense (stem, not stemmed) because of the present-tense MLA rule. Again, see
  • If you paraphrase a statement of mine from class, include the following work-cited entry at the end of your revision. You will need to consult your class notes to identify the correct date.

Lucas, Jane. English 1103: Academic Research and Writing. 4 February 2026, High Point University.

  • If you quote or paraphrase an idea from our class notes, the same rule applies. The work cited entry for a blog post appears below.

Lucas, Jane. “ENG 1103: ‘The School’ Follow-Up.” Jane Lucas, 5 Feb. 2026, https://janelucas.com/2026/02/05/eng-1103-the-school-follow-up-3/.

  • Do not use the phrase in conclusion or any variation on it at the beginning of the final paragraph of your essay. While that transitional phrase can be useful in a speech (because the audience cannot see that the end is near), there is no reason to write those words when readers can see for themselves that only one paragraph remains. For more, see Harvard University Writing Center’s notes on conclusions.

Next Up

At the beginning of class on Wednesday, I will return your handwritten analyses drafts with my notes, and I will conduct a check of your journal exercise on the first paragraph of Tom Junod’s “The Falling Man.” Afterward, you will have the remainder of the class period to begin revising on your laptops and tablets. The due date for posting your revised analysis to Blackboard and to your WordPress blog is Wednesday, March 4 (before class). The hard deadline is Friday, March 6 (before class).

Posted in English 1103, Reading, Teaching, Writing

ENG 1103: Preparing for Your Midterm Reflection

Posted on by janemlucas

Monday in class, you will plan and compose a midterm reflective essay that documents your work in the first half of the semester, focusing on two or three assignments or aspects of the course that have contributed to your development as a writer and a student. Since you have already written a reflection devoted solely to your literacy narrative, your midterm reflection should focus primarily on other assignments or aspects of the course. One of the requirements of the assignment is incorporating a relevant quotation from one of the texts we have studied or from Writing Analytically. Before Monday’s class, determine what phrase, clause, or sentence you will quote, and draft a sentence in your journal that introduces the quotation with a signal phrase and follows it with a parenthetical citation.

One option for integrating a quotation into your essay is to include a line from one of your readings and explain what that passage has taught you about writing.

Examples

  • In the opening line of “Back Story,” Michael Lewis demonstrates that repetition can be an asset. With the words “[f]rom the snap of the ball to the snap of the first bone” (15), he repeats “snap” as a frame for the seconds leading up to Jo Theismannn’s career-ending injury. The first “snap,” the hike of the football, begins the sequence. The second “snap,” the fracture of Theismann’s tibia and fibula, ends it.
  • The opening line of “Back Story,” demonstrates that repetition can be an asset. The two prepositional phrases “[f]rom the snap of the ball to the snap of the first bone” (Lewis 15), repeat “snap” as a frame for the seconds leading up to Jo Theismannn’s career-ending injury. The first “snap,” the hike of the football, begins the sequence. The second “snap,” the fracture of Theismann’s tibia and fibula, ends it.

The two examples above are very similar. The first one names the author, so only the page number appears in the parenthetical citation. The second does not name the author, so his last name precedes the page number in the parenthetical citation. Notice how omitting the author’s name from the passage shifts the emphasis from the writer’s actions (“he repeats ‘snap’”) to the words themselves (“prepositional phrases . . . repeat ‘snap’”).

Another option for integrating a quotation into your essay is to include a line from Writing Analytically that presents a concept that figures in your own reading or writing process.

Examples

  • The observation that “understandings are rarely simple and overt” (Rosenwasser and Stephen 104) led me to reexamine “The School” and reenvision it. No longer was it primarily a chronicle of deaths, but instead it was a narrative about the nature of storytelling itself.
  • David Rosenwasser and Jill Stephens’ observation that “understandings are rarely simple and overt” (104) led me to reexamine “The School” and reenvision it. No longer was it primarily a chronicle of deaths, but instead it was a narrative about the nature of storytelling itself.

Works Cited

Lewis, Michael. “Back Story.” The Blind Side. 2006. Norton, 2009. pp. 15-23.

Rosenwasser, David, and Jill Stephen. “Seems to Be About X, But Could Also Be (Or is ‘Really’) About Y.’” Writing Analytically, 9th edition. Wadsworth/Cengage, 2024. pp. 104-7. 

Happy Valentine’s Day Eve!

Today in class, you will receive a red paper heart on a lace doily for an informal writing exercise: composing a valentine for someone.

Next Up

In class on Monday, you will compose your midterm reflection. To prepare, choose a phrase, clause, or sentence from one of the course readings–one that is relevant to your work in the course–and draft in your journal a short passage that connects those words to your writing. That passage will serve as part of your reflection. 

Postscript

Bonus Assignment: Publish your completed Valentine as a post on your blog before 9 a.m. on Monday, February 16, and you will earn a bonus assignment credit in the short assignments/participation category. You are welcome to include a photo caption or a brief explanation of the Valentine, but that is not required. The photograph alone will suffice. Once you have published your post, email me so I can visit your site and credit you with the assignment.