Hello,
Below are Packets 6 and 7 for next week. Remember that there is a Q & C due for Packet 6.
PACKET 6:
This is actually a video to view...it is approximately 17 minutes long.
http://www.ted.com/talks/deborah_scranton_on_her_war_tapes.html
PACKET 7:
"Why Marriages Fail" by Anne Roiphe
http://www.hearttoheart.com.cn/english/jiazuo/20050808005404.html
Thursday, October 27, 2011
Monday, October 17, 2011
Monday, October 17th, 730 pm
Hello,
Below you will find information you will need to print out for our class lecture and discussion on Wednesday.
Please come to class with a copy of it in hand. See you then!
How to Critically Read an Essay
Educated adults exist in a delusional state, thinking we can read.
In a most basic sense, we can.
However, odds are, some of us cannot read, at least not as well as we would like.
Too many college students are capable of only some types of reading and that becomes painfully clear when they read a difficult text and must respond critically about it.
Intelligence and a keen memory are excellent traits and most students have learned to read in a certain way that is only useful for extracting information. Thus, students are often fairly well skilled in providing summary.
However, the act of reading to extract information and to read critically are vastly different!
The current educational system in American primary schools (and many colleges) heavily emphasizes the first type of reading and de-emphasizes the latter.
In many ways, THIS MAKES SENSE.
Reading to extract information allows a student to absorb the raw materials of factual information as quickly as possible. It is a type of reading we all must engage in frequently. However, each type of reading calls for different mental habits. If we do not learn to adjust from one type of reading to another when necessary, we cripple our intellectual abilities to read critically.
DIFFERENCES BETWEEN READING TO EXTRACT INFORMATION AND READING CRITICALLY.
1. They have different goals. When students read to extract information, usually they seek facts and presume the source is accurate. No argument is required. On the other hand, when students read critically, they try to determine the quality of the argument. The reader must be open-minded and skeptical all at once, constantly adjusting the degree of personal belief in relation to the quality of the essay’s argument.
2. They require different types of discipline. If students read to learn raw data, the most efficient way to learn is repetition. If students read critically, the most effective technique may be to break the essay up into logical subdivisions and analyze each section’s argument, to restate the argument in other words, and then to expand upon or question the findings.
3. They require different mental activity. If a student reads to gain information, a certain degree of absorption, memorization and passivity is necessary. If a student is engaged in reading critically, that student must be active!!! He or she must be prepared to pre-read the essay, then read it closely for content, and re-read it if it isn’t clear how the author is reaching the conclusion in the argument.
4. They create different results. Passive reading to absorb information can create a student who (if not precisely well read) has read a great many books. It creates what many call “book-smarts.” However, critical reading involves original, innovative thinking.
5. They differ in the degree of understanding they require. Reading for information is more basic, and reading critically is the more advanced of the two because only critical reading equates with full understanding.
ULTIMATELY, WHAT WE WANT IS THE CONSCIOUS CONTROL OF OUR READING SKILLS, SO WE CAN MOVE BACK AND FORTH AMIDST THE VARIOUS TYPES OF READING.
FIVE GENERAL STAGES OF READING
1. Pre-Reading—examining the text and preparing to read it effectively (5 minutes)
2. Interpretive Reading—understanding what the author argues, what the author concludes, and exactly how he or she reached that conclusion.
3. Critical Reading—questioning, examining and expanding upon what the author says with your own arguments. Skeptical reading does not mean doubting everything your read.
4. Synoptic Reading—putting the author’s argument in a larger context by considering a synopsis of that reading or argument in conjunction with synopses of other readings or arguments.
5. Post-Reading—ensuring that you won’t forget your new insights.
Below you will find information you will need to print out for our class lecture and discussion on Wednesday.
Please come to class with a copy of it in hand. See you then!
How to Critically Read an Essay
Educated adults exist in a delusional state, thinking we can read.
In a most basic sense, we can.
However, odds are, some of us cannot read, at least not as well as we would like.
Too many college students are capable of only some types of reading and that becomes painfully clear when they read a difficult text and must respond critically about it.
Intelligence and a keen memory are excellent traits and most students have learned to read in a certain way that is only useful for extracting information. Thus, students are often fairly well skilled in providing summary.
However, the act of reading to extract information and to read critically are vastly different!
The current educational system in American primary schools (and many colleges) heavily emphasizes the first type of reading and de-emphasizes the latter.
In many ways, THIS MAKES SENSE.
Reading to extract information allows a student to absorb the raw materials of factual information as quickly as possible. It is a type of reading we all must engage in frequently. However, each type of reading calls for different mental habits. If we do not learn to adjust from one type of reading to another when necessary, we cripple our intellectual abilities to read critically.
DIFFERENCES BETWEEN READING TO EXTRACT INFORMATION AND READING CRITICALLY.
1. They have different goals. When students read to extract information, usually they seek facts and presume the source is accurate. No argument is required. On the other hand, when students read critically, they try to determine the quality of the argument. The reader must be open-minded and skeptical all at once, constantly adjusting the degree of personal belief in relation to the quality of the essay’s argument.
2. They require different types of discipline. If students read to learn raw data, the most efficient way to learn is repetition. If students read critically, the most effective technique may be to break the essay up into logical subdivisions and analyze each section’s argument, to restate the argument in other words, and then to expand upon or question the findings.
3. They require different mental activity. If a student reads to gain information, a certain degree of absorption, memorization and passivity is necessary. If a student is engaged in reading critically, that student must be active!!! He or she must be prepared to pre-read the essay, then read it closely for content, and re-read it if it isn’t clear how the author is reaching the conclusion in the argument.
4. They create different results. Passive reading to absorb information can create a student who (if not precisely well read) has read a great many books. It creates what many call “book-smarts.” However, critical reading involves original, innovative thinking.
5. They differ in the degree of understanding they require. Reading for information is more basic, and reading critically is the more advanced of the two because only critical reading equates with full understanding.
ULTIMATELY, WHAT WE WANT IS THE CONSCIOUS CONTROL OF OUR READING SKILLS, SO WE CAN MOVE BACK AND FORTH AMIDST THE VARIOUS TYPES OF READING.
FIVE GENERAL STAGES OF READING
1. Pre-Reading—examining the text and preparing to read it effectively (5 minutes)
2. Interpretive Reading—understanding what the author argues, what the author concludes, and exactly how he or she reached that conclusion.
3. Critical Reading—questioning, examining and expanding upon what the author says with your own arguments. Skeptical reading does not mean doubting everything your read.
4. Synoptic Reading—putting the author’s argument in a larger context by considering a synopsis of that reading or argument in conjunction with synopses of other readings or arguments.
5. Post-Reading—ensuring that you won’t forget your new insights.
Friday, October 14, 2011
Friday, October 14th, 1130 am
Hello,
I do hope all of you managed to get the message about class being cancelled today BEFORE you went to class. I did post it on the blog, but not until I actually found out about the fire, which was after 10 pm. I also sent an email to all of your SacState email addresses. A few things to tell you:
1. We will move Group 3 Exercise to Monday.
2. Below is the reading for Packet #5, due to be completed by Friday.
3. Be sure to bring Made for You and Me to class on Monday.
PACKET #5:
THE WIG
By Brady Udall
(First Prize: Story’s Short Short Competition)
My eight-year-old son found a wig in the garbage Dumpster this morning. I walked into the kitchen, highly irritated that I couldn’t make a respectable knot in my green paisley tie, and there he was at the table, eating cereal and reading the funnies, the wig pulled tightly over his head like a football helmet. The wig was a dirty bush of curly blond hair, the kind you might see on a prostitute or someone who is trying to imitate Marilyn Monroe.
I asked where he got the wig and he told me, his mouth full of cereal. When I advised him that we don’t wear things we find in the garbage, he simply continued eating and reading as if he didn’t hear me.
I wanted him to take that wig off but I couldn’t ask him to do it. I forgot all about my tie and going to work. I looked out the window where mist fell slowly on the street. I paced into the living room and back, trying not to look at my son. He ignored me. I could hear him munching cereal and rustling paper.
There was a picture, or a memory, real or imagined, that I couldn’t get out of my mind: Last fall, before the accident, my wife was sitting in the chair where now my son always sits. She was reading the paper to see how the Blackhawks did the night before, and her sleep-mussed hair was only slightly longer and darker than the hair of my son’s wig.
I wondered if my son had a similar picture in his head, or if he had a picture at all. I watched him and he finally looked up at me but his face was blank. He went back to his reading. I walked around the table, picked him up, and held him against my chest. I pressed my nose into that wig and it smelled not like the clean shampoo scent I might have been hoping for, but like old lettuce. I suppose it didn’t matter at that point. My son put his smooth arms around my neck and for maybe a few seconds we were together again, the three of us.
I do hope all of you managed to get the message about class being cancelled today BEFORE you went to class. I did post it on the blog, but not until I actually found out about the fire, which was after 10 pm. I also sent an email to all of your SacState email addresses. A few things to tell you:
1. We will move Group 3 Exercise to Monday.
2. Below is the reading for Packet #5, due to be completed by Friday.
3. Be sure to bring Made for You and Me to class on Monday.
PACKET #5:
THE WIG
By Brady Udall
(First Prize: Story’s Short Short Competition)
My eight-year-old son found a wig in the garbage Dumpster this morning. I walked into the kitchen, highly irritated that I couldn’t make a respectable knot in my green paisley tie, and there he was at the table, eating cereal and reading the funnies, the wig pulled tightly over his head like a football helmet. The wig was a dirty bush of curly blond hair, the kind you might see on a prostitute or someone who is trying to imitate Marilyn Monroe.
I asked where he got the wig and he told me, his mouth full of cereal. When I advised him that we don’t wear things we find in the garbage, he simply continued eating and reading as if he didn’t hear me.
I wanted him to take that wig off but I couldn’t ask him to do it. I forgot all about my tie and going to work. I looked out the window where mist fell slowly on the street. I paced into the living room and back, trying not to look at my son. He ignored me. I could hear him munching cereal and rustling paper.
There was a picture, or a memory, real or imagined, that I couldn’t get out of my mind: Last fall, before the accident, my wife was sitting in the chair where now my son always sits. She was reading the paper to see how the Blackhawks did the night before, and her sleep-mussed hair was only slightly longer and darker than the hair of my son’s wig.
I wondered if my son had a similar picture in his head, or if he had a picture at all. I watched him and he finally looked up at me but his face was blank. He went back to his reading. I walked around the table, picked him up, and held him against my chest. I pressed my nose into that wig and it smelled not like the clean shampoo scent I might have been hoping for, but like old lettuce. I suppose it didn’t matter at that point. My son put his smooth arms around my neck and for maybe a few seconds we were together again, the three of us.
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Please read IMMEDIATELY!!!!
HELLO!
I just now found out that Mariposa Hall is closed for clean up due to a fire today on campus.
Which means...My section 1 class will not be meeting tomorrow morning.
This is going to throw off my other two classes as well, since they are all on the same class schedule.
So,
I am going to go ahead and cancel all three sections of 1A for tomorrow, Friday, October the 14th.
Sections 1, 4, and 84.
I will keep you posted about how we will move the Group Two exercise to next week.
I just now found out that Mariposa Hall is closed for clean up due to a fire today on campus.
Which means...My section 1 class will not be meeting tomorrow morning.
This is going to throw off my other two classes as well, since they are all on the same class schedule.
So,
I am going to go ahead and cancel all three sections of 1A for tomorrow, Friday, October the 14th.
Sections 1, 4, and 84.
I will keep you posted about how we will move the Group Two exercise to next week.
Sunday, October 9, 2011
Sunday evening, October 9th, 745 pm
Hello,
just a quick reminder for those planning to revise out of class essay #1.
For section 84, revisions are due by tomorrow, Monday the 10th.
For sections 1 and 4, revisions are due by Wednesday, the 12th.
See you tomorrow...with your Rules of Thumb Handbook in hand! :-)
just a quick reminder for those planning to revise out of class essay #1.
For section 84, revisions are due by tomorrow, Monday the 10th.
For sections 1 and 4, revisions are due by Wednesday, the 12th.
See you tomorrow...with your Rules of Thumb Handbook in hand! :-)
Friday, October 7, 2011
Friday evening, October 7, 2011--8 pm
Hello everyone,
Just a quick reminder...to be sure to bring your Rules of Thumb Handbook to class on Monday.
The quiz is open book. You will have the full 50 minutes to complete the quiz.
Become familiar with the documentation pages in your Handbook.
Enjoy your weekend.
Just a quick reminder...to be sure to bring your Rules of Thumb Handbook to class on Monday.
The quiz is open book. You will have the full 50 minutes to complete the quiz.
Become familiar with the documentation pages in your Handbook.
Enjoy your weekend.
Thursday, October 6, 2011
Thursday, October 6, 2011, almost noon
Hello,
As you know, we did not have an opportunity to focus on Packet 4 yesterday, so be sure to bring it along with you on Friday to class. We will also be completing Group Work #2 on Friday.
Happy rainy day to all of you.
See you tomorrow.
As you know, we did not have an opportunity to focus on Packet 4 yesterday, so be sure to bring it along with you on Friday to class. We will also be completing Group Work #2 on Friday.
Happy rainy day to all of you.
See you tomorrow.
Sunday, October 2, 2011
Sunday, October 2, 2011--330 pm
Greetings,
I received an e-mail from a student asking if the quiz scheduled on the course outline for Monday is still going to occur.
Yes.
Of course.
As you know, and as I mentioned on the course outline and in class, I cannot remind you all the time to read the syllabus.
If you follow the syllabus, you should do absolutely fine in the course. As you will in any course. :-)
Hope you are having a great weekend...I am thoroughly enjoying my birthday!
See you tomorrow.
And as always, when you have something due to be read, you bring that source to class.
I received an e-mail from a student asking if the quiz scheduled on the course outline for Monday is still going to occur.
Yes.
Of course.
As you know, and as I mentioned on the course outline and in class, I cannot remind you all the time to read the syllabus.
If you follow the syllabus, you should do absolutely fine in the course. As you will in any course. :-)
Hope you are having a great weekend...I am thoroughly enjoying my birthday!
See you tomorrow.
And as always, when you have something due to be read, you bring that source to class.
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