Week 7: Monday, October 6th - Friday, October 10th
Goals for this Week
- Instructors
should read the posted “Working Bibliography” or first draft of Part 3 -
Annotated Bibliography - of Portfolio 2, including approximately a half
dozen sources. [Instructors: Read and provide immediate and substantial
whole-class feedback on this homework. Provide quick feedback to
individuals in Writing Studio. Award simply a check for completion (or
whatever mechanism you have for recording homework).]
- Continue
to discuss the evaluation of sources
- Continue
to discuss issues in the news (NYT) that represent “clashes of values and
beliefs”
- Using
the Position Analysis for a Single Source template developed last week,
continue to define distinct positions. Also work on the naming of shared
perspectives or approaches through the Composite Grid. Focus on the
contexts that contribute to the formation of positions and shared
perspectives.
- Discuss
their use of the Working Bibliography tool in the CO150 Room in the
Writing Studio to create the Annotated Bibliography
- Assign
the completion of the Annotated Bibliography
- Continue
to collect news clips of issues in the contact zones
Connection to Course Goals
Collecting
sources for the annotated bibliography will help students learn about the
recent conversation surrounding their issue. Students' previous experience with
research may have involved collecting and simply regurgitating information on a
topic. Here, we are asking them to think critically about a) their role as
researchers and b) the choices they make as writers, by evaluating their
sources for a specified purpose. We hope that this approach gives them a better
"real world" sense of how and why writers research and respond to
public issues.
Required Readings and
Assignments
- Continue
reading sources on your issue
- Continue
to work with the Position Analyses and Composite Grid
- Plan
for next week when you will complete your final annotated bibliography and
post it to the Working Bibliography (by the beginning of Week 8 or the
last class before the Reading Days and conferences)
Potential Activities for this Week
Remember to write a Lesson Objective, a Connection to
Course Objectives, an Introduction, Conclusion, and Transitions for each day of
class planning.
Assign
the completion of Part III - Annotated Bibliography in Alphabetical Order: Give
students a few minutes to review the assignment sheet and address any questions
or concerns they may have.
Integrate the
NYT: Discuss one or more issues
that students are seeing in their newspaper reading— focusing again on
the values, beliefs, affiliations, etc. that inform the varying perspectives.
Can they identify “camps” of belief or groupings that might be similar to the
shared perspectives or approaches that they’re naming in their position
analyses?
Return to the
concept of Positions and Shared Perspectives or Approaches: Since
the words “shared perspectives” and "approaches" are used
interchangeably in the lessons and the annotated bibliography assignment sheet,
students will probably raise questions about what this notion means. Use the
following explanation to distinguish the individual positions from the shared
perspective or approach (or one that you construct) to introduce students to
this new concept. We acknowledge that others may define "positions"
and “shared perspectives or approaches” differently outside this class, but for
the purposes of CO150, students will need to learn and use these concepts
The
following is just one example intended to illustrate the difference between positions
and shared perspectives or approaches. Feel free to substitute
"legalization of drugs" with your own model topic. You might also
find it useful to refer to Deborah Tannen's essay "The Argument
Culture" from the PHG when running this discussion.
For more assistance with planning this activity, see the "Introducing a
New Concept" section in the Planning Class Discussion guide located
on Writing@CSU.
Develop an interactive way of presenting the following
additional information on Positions and Shared Perspectives or Approaches
perhaps by applying it to the issue of marijuana legalization (see below).
In high school most of us learned to simplify shared
perspectives or approaches into two categories, "pro" and
"con," in order to examine a debate. However, approaches typically
run much deeper than "pro" and "con" since every person's
views are complicated by various social and cultural factors. Here's an
example: Let's say we reduced the issue of legalizing drugs (specifically
marijuana, perhaps) to "pro" and "con"--then it could be
said that both government officials and members of religious groups take the
same approach or share a perspective about legalizing drugs, since both groups
oppose making these substances legal. A closer examination of the arguments
made by members of each group indicates, however, that they do not share the
same views. Government representatives are likely to oppose legalization
because they claim that drugs are harmful to society as a whole. In contrast,
authors who oppose legalization because of their religious beliefs might do so
largely because it goes against the teaching of their faiths.
Let’s consider another group--parents. Some of these
individuals may oppose drug legalization because their children have become
victims of drug abuse. These positions would differ from those advanced by
members of the previous groups due to different experiences that have shaped
parents’ lives. However, depending on the specific argument they make, a parent
who writes a text protesting the legalization of drugs might share the approach
or perspective taken by a government official or member of a religious group.
Thus, although a parent will have his or her own position on this issue, he or
she would take the same perspective or approach as that taken by certain
government officials and members of particular religious groups.
Yet another group weighing in on the issue of legalization
is the civil libertarian voice. Civil libertarians believe that individuals
should be free to make decisions about drug use free of regulation by the
government. These authors argue that drug use is an individual choice and, even
if it harms the individual, is nonetheless something that the individual should
be free to do. This argument is similar in many ways to arguments about
mandatory use of seatbelts in cars and helmets on motorcycles and even to some
arguments that “risky” sports such as skiing should not be regulated by the
government.
Two additional groups interested in this issue adopt
economic approaches. One group argues that the amount of money the government
is spending in its attempt to combat drug use has largely been wasted. Since
drug use has declined only somewhat since the government began fighting the
drug war, the government should reconsider its tactics and, as it did when it
lifted the prohibition on alcohol, legalize drug use. The core of this argument
is that the money now spent on the drug war would be better spent on societal
needs. The other group taking an economic approach - albeit a very different
approach - includes companies that would view the legalization of drugs such as
marijuana as a threat to their viability. This group might include
representatives of alcohol and tobacco companies. It's fair to say that alcohol
and tobacco companies don't oppose drug use solely because drugs are harmful to
people (after all, the consumption of both results in many deaths per year).
It’s also fair to say that these authors would be unlikely to come out and say,
“Don’t legalize drugs because it will cost us money.” As a result, while representatives
of tobacco and alcohol companies might oppose legalization of drugs for
economic reasons, they would probably avoid couching their arguments in those
terms.
Given these examples, clearly it would be inaccurate to
clump these very different arguments into "pro" and "con".
If we did, much of the meaning or truth behind the issue would be lost. The
goal for a "good" writer of public discourse should always be to
produce texts that seek to fairly represent the issues (for the betterment of
society). Thus, it can be viewed as dishonest for writers to reduce the
complexity of an issue unnecessarily. In part, this is why you (student
writers) are being asked to think critically about these different positions
and approaches.
After
you've first skimmed, selected, and then more closely read your sources, look
for common threads that cut across sources as a way to group them into
different approaches. Here's what it might look like for the example above.
Topic:
Legalization of Drugs (or specifically apply to marijuana)
Shared
Perspective or Approach 1: Oppose legalization because it is harmful to
society as a whole
Shared
Perspective or Approach 2: Oppose legalization for moral reasons because
it is against religious teachings
Shared
Perspective or Approach 3: Advocate legalization for individual rights
reasons
Shared
Perspective or Approach 4: Advocate legalization for economic reasons
because the war against drugs has been ineffective
Shared
Perspective or Approach 5: Oppose legalization for economic reasons
Of course,
you could argue that the government is also economically motivated and that
representatives of alcohol and tobacco companies may legitimately believe that
drugs are harmful to society. If the support for these claims outweighs the
others, you'd need to group the positions of authors arguing about differently.
Keep in mind that grouping positions into approaches is far from an exact
science; you'll need to read various arguments before generalizing views into
approaches in order to represent each group fairly.
Mini-Debate
on marijuana legalization (or another issue): If you would like to
reinforce the concept that approaches to an issue run deeper than pro/con, try
using this activity or incorporate the ideas addressed above into this exercise.
The goal of this activity is to have students understand and practice the
process they’ll need to go through in analyzing their own issue. One of the
most effective ways to reach this goal is to have students generate a debate on
a familiar issue. If you’re having trouble coming up with an activity or want
ideas, see the sample activity in the appendix that asks students to analyze
the positions and values of different authors involved in the issue of the
legalization of marijuana. This debate activity can be done with any issue, but
the question of whether marijuana should be legalized has worked well in the
past because it lends itself to easily describable groups and some interesting
alliances that help distinguish between approaches. Whatever activity you plan,
be sure to emphasize these key concepts:
·
People take different positions because they
have different values and concerns.
·
There can be different positions within a
particular approach (i.e. parents and government representatives might both be
against legalization of drugs because it harms society, but parents are likely
to make different - most likely more personal - arguments than government
officials).
·
When we talk about approaches, we’re not
referring to pro, con, and something in between. It’s much more complicated than that.
·
In making an academic argument, you have to
consider and address the audience’s values and concerns (possibly their
opposing arguments) in order to be effective.
·
We research an issue to get a sense of what
approaches exist (e.g. legalizing marijuana lends itself to easily
distinguishable groups who would take different opinions).
·
For your own issue, you’ll need to find research
to show that each approach you identify is actually valid.
By way of transition into the students’
own sources, ask them to take out their Position Analysis template and review
the entries they’ve made so far. This is a reflective activity that is intended
to transfer the learning from the legalization of drugs/marijuana discussion to
their issues. Ask them to spend a few minutes adding analysis and
characterizing/naming the shared perspectives or approaches that they’re
beginning to see in the literature on their topic. They can pull out their
Composite Grids for this analysis. The transfer of the skills implied by
the marijuana debate and legalization analysis is essential. Students need the
transfer to be directly linked to their own analysis of the issue they’ve
selected for Portfolio 2.
Return
to evaluation of sources: The goal for this activity is to
reinforce student selection of effective sources for their issue analysis,
which was initially addressed last week. Remind students that they'll save time
researching and writing if they know how to determine which sources will be
most useful to them later on. Refer to pg. 588 - 589 in the PHG to guide this discussion and include
the following points:
What kinds of sources are appropriate for
Portfolio 2?
§
Informative sources (facts, dates, news reports,
etc..) will help you in the beginning stages to gain background knowledge on
your issue.
§
Opinionated sources, written by reputable
individuals and groups will be most useful in helping you meet your purpose for
writing the issue analysis. These will provide a range of different positions
and approaches to help you show that your issue is complicated.
§
"Objective" reports from news sources
will not "take a position" on an issue, but they can lead you to more
argumentative sources if you follow up with research on names mentioned in the
report.
How current should sources be for Portfolio
2?
§
This will depend on the issue you're researching
but it’s probably safe to say that some issues are newly emergent while others
have been with us for some time.
§
Discuss this question using some of your
students' issues as examples. Extremely current issues will have less written
about them, while old issues may be so overdone as to require great effort to
avoid complete predictability. Many issues that have been around for a while
will have “seminal” publications or judgments (perhaps from the Supreme Court)
associated with them. Point out to class that good students of any issue try to
make sure that they’ve identified and included essential documents among their
sources.
Which sources are reliable for Portfolio 2?
§
Many of the sources you'll need for Portfolio 2
will contain biases. One of the goals for this portfolio is to examine the ways
that beliefs and biases shape a writer's approach to writing about an issue.
Therefore, you'll want to collect opinion-based texts so that you can analyze
where these viewpoints come from and how they affect the conversation
surrounding your issue. However, you'll also want to use credible sources. This
is where some evaluation of the scholarship of the sources can come into play. Don't
be misled to think that "Robby Republican's" personal web site can
accurately represent the views of all Republicans. On the other hand, as long
as you understand the limitations of Robby’s web site you can use it to
represent a certain way of thinking or shared perspective (approach) to an
issue.
**Note
to instructors: One technique for making text evaluation concrete and
engaging is to bring in a range of sample texts (on a debatable issue that you
choose). Students would then practice evaluating texts for the purposes
outlined in the assignment. You might use editorials, political cartoons, chat
room scripts, personal web sites, government documents, scientific texts, and
research. Add 20 minutes to this activity if you decide to practice evaluating
sources in class. Try putting these sample texts on an overhead in an effort to
save paper.
Ask
students about their use of the Working Bibliography tool. How is it going? Do
they like using this tool? Point out that some re-formatting of entries may eventually
be necessary for the Works Cited page that they’ll include with the News and
Issue Analysis. Students should refer to the PHG pages 601-608 for help with
MLA conventions associated with the Works Cited page.
Conclusion: Write a conclusion
that connects shared perspectives/approaches, text evaluation, and the
Annotated Bibliography to the News and Issue Analysis they’ll be writing next
as the final product for Portfolio 2.
Assignment
Complete
your Annotated Bibliography using the Working Bibliography function of Writing
Studio and then transfer this information into standard annotated bibliography
form, reformatting to MLA standards as needed. Be prepared to turn in the
completed Annotated Bibliography in a folder containing your graded Topic
Proposal and Personal Position Analysis (as well as the individual Position
Analyses of a Single Source you’ve completed and progress you’ve made on the
Composite Grid) next time.
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