Holiday Reminders

We are not meeting this Wednesday, November 26th. We are meeting again on Monday, December 1st, though, and I have moved the due date of the rough draft to Wednesday, December 3rd--please see the assignment sheet for more details. There is no reading/writing assignment due on Monday. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me.

I hope you all have a good Thanksgiving break!

Homework for Monday, November 24th

When reading the essay, "A Letter from a Birmingham Jail," please respond to the following questions in a blog post. This is in lieu of the reading response that was originally assigned, and your responses will be the basis for our discussion in class on Monday.

• What is the primary claim that Martin Luther King, Jr. is trying to make?
• What is the situation for writing this letter, and how do you believe it affects his writing?
• Who is MLK's direct audience?
• In what ways does MLK try to appeal to this specific audience? (Please provide examples)
• How/Where does MLK utilize the rhetorical appeals? (Provide an example of each)
• Please pay close attention to MLK's conclusion and be prepared to discuss the way he closes this letter.

Your responses should be posted to your blogs prior to class on Monday in order to receive full credit for the assignment. If you have any questions, please feel free to email me.

Homework for Monday, November 24th

Please read the essay, "Letter from a Birmingham Jail," by Martin Luther King Jr. for class on Monday. This essay can be found on page 736 in the Current Issues textbook. In lieu of a reading response, I will post questions to this newsfeed that I would like you to respond to on your blogs prior to our meeting on Monday. We will dissect this essay, along with a student example, in preparation for the final paper. The assignment sheet for the final paper is available for download/viewing in the Content section of D2L, along with the notes on basic research paper construction. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me.

Here is a link to the Malcolm Gladwell essay,"Offensive Play," for those of you who are interested in seeing how to utilize anecdote in a synthesis paper.

Homework for Wednesday,, November 19th

Please read the two short essays about loan forgiveness in Chapter 14 (page 465) of the Current Issues textbook before class. We will discuss the writers' messages and how they put these pieces together. If you have any questions, please send me an email.

Homework for Monday, November 17th

Please remember that the final draft of your Compare/Contrast essay is due tonight (11/12) by 11:59pm CST as a dropbox submission. If you are unable to get it submitted by that time, email me a copy as soon as you are able.

The homework for Monday is to read Chapter 17 of the Current Issues book. There are two short essays about the death penalty in this chapter that we will discuss in class. I am not requiring that you write a response to these essays, but I highly recommend taking notes in preparation for the class discussion. I will post some questions here to direct your reading of these essays over the weekend. In the meantime, if you have any questions, please feel free to contact me.

***Reminder about Class on Monday, November 10th***

Please remember that we do not have class on Monday, November 10th. You can take this time to work on revising your Compare and Contrast essays. I have emailed you all the feedback for your Compare/Contrast essay, so please check your University accounts for the file.

Also, please open the file as soon as possible to ensure that it works on your computer and that you are able to hear the feedback. I recommend using QuickTime Player, as it has proved to be most compatible. If you have any questions about the feedback or issues with the file, please contact me as soon as possible, so that I can get back to you right away. If you did not receive an email with an audio file, then I did not receive a rough draft from you.

Finally, I have extended the due date for the final draft of the Compare/Contrast paper to 11:59pm CST on Wednesday (November 12th), so that you have a little extra time to work on analyzing the sources, based on the workshop and (audio) conference feedback.

Weekend Reminders

Please remember that we are not meeting on Monday, November 10th. Over the weekend, I will be providing you with audio feedback in response to the drafts you posted to the discussion board today. The file will be sent to you via email. If you have any questions about that feedback, you will need to contact me as soon as possible to ensure that I am able to respond to you prior to the due date. The final draft of the Compare/Contrast paper is due by the beginning of class on Wednesday, November 12th as a dropbox submission. For more details on the assignment, please reference the assignment sheet and workshop questions for consideration in the Content section of D2L, or feel free to contact me.

Homework for Wednesday, November 5th

Please be sure to post a copy of your rough draft to the discussion board titled Compare/Contrast Workshop 11/5 prior to the start of class on Wednesday. For those of you who posted to the dropbox, you will need to repost the draft to the discussion board (I mistakenly created it for the rough drafts, when it was intended for the final drafts). Please select your Group within the discussion forum, then click on the Start a New Thread button. You will have an option to Add Attachments. Once you click on that link, you will be able to upload your draft. Please be sure that the file is in a compatible format (.doc, .docx, or .pdf). If you have any questions, please email me as soon as possible.