Assignment Learning Goals

For each student:

• To demonstrate close reading of a text.
• To demonstrate context-aware critical thinking: the ability to identify significant patterns of meaning in texts.
• To demonstrate the ability to make a clear, well-defined, significant claim about the meaning of a text, and to support that claim with well-considered argument and effective evidence.
• To write a well-focused, well-organized short analysis paper.

Instructions

1. In the course of reading and discussing material in this class, select an aspect of a particular text that you consider to be meaningful. You may use your own reading notes, your own Web Board postings, the Web Board posting of others, or class discussions as resources when making this selection.

2. Develop a clear, supportable, and significant claim about that textual aspect. Your claim should involve science, knowledge, narrative strategies, or a related topic.

3. Prepare a 3-4 page essay that,

A. States your claim clearly and illustrates why it is significant.

B. Supports your claim by providing careful analysis and offering plenty of textual details in the course of that analysis.

Criteria for Evaluation

These essays will be judged by our criteria for good academic writing:

FOCUS (The essay must state a claim and stick to it throughout)

CLARITY (The essay must be clearly written throughout)

ACCURACY (The essay must cite the text appropriately and accurately)

COMPLETENESS (The essay must be at least 2 full pages in length, and must meet the basic criteria stated above)

QUALITY OF ANALYSIS (The essay must use textual evidence well to analyze a pattern of meaning in the text and must show a pattern of development (presenting several related points rather than simply restating one point))

QUALITY OF SYNTHESIS (The essay must be well-organized and show effective synthesis of your ideas and the textual evidence selected to support those ideas).