Lessons like this make me wish I were a more linear thinker. But, I'm not.
To prepare for reading, I printed the essay for students and drew boxes around 42 words that I thought might be problematic and might impede comprehension. I asked students to write definitions for those words in the margins of the essay. There was some protest as students wanted to type them or write them on a separate sheet of paper. I insisted for this time that they stick to the margin plan so that the definitions would be readily accessible to aid comprehension. I believe that the vocab list is more functional when it is directly connected to the reading. Also, I believe that there are times in this age of technology when we bypass a valuable step of the learning process and that is the one that involves the brain to hand aspect. Handwriting. I'll not digress about that at this time. But I do have a rationale for making them try it this way. If they try it, and don't like it ....next time maybe they do it their way and we see if it works better. What I want to avoid is the copy and paste situation.
After students read the essay, they are to make a list of the author's assertions. The piece is an essay about essays and I want kids to read it closely to glean from it the author's claims. This is tricky as it becomes difficult to discern what the author's ideas are and what he has simply synthesized from others. The piece is an analysis of the discourse that already exists about the nature of an essay, its history, where we've perverted it in public education and the paradoxical nature of the form. The piece was written by Michael Depp and first appeared in an issue of Poets and Writers. Depp's piece illustrates form reflecting meaning as he describes the essay as a meandering, an exploration, am exercise of sense making which is exactly what he does in his piece. In retrospect, I asked students to write the author's assertions in complete sentences....it may have been better to ask for big ideas. Although there is some value in looking at how much of the actual piece is what the author believes and not what he is simply presenting from other writers.
The piece is also an excellent example of synthesis. Depp incorporates the thinking of 8 different author's in his dialectic and illustrates a number of ways in which students might smoothly blend quoted material into their own essays. He also illustrates this idea that the College Board and Higher Academia is so fond of which is to have the sources in discourse with one another. So, students will be tracing the synthesis path and noting the blending techniques for future emulation.
So, maybe we get out the highlighters and we highlight the ideas of others and then we highlight what seems to be the author's own ideas or at least conclusions he has reached as a result of his exploration.
The next step will be the "Pithy Quotations" activity which requires students to choose one quotation that they feel is at the very heart of the entire piece. . They write it out big and present an argument for their quotation of choice. What is it about this quotation that makes you think it is the very heart of the piece. Then we hang them all over the room and they serve as reminders for real essay writing, not fake 5 paragraph, I-know-exactly-what -this-is going to say before I even write anything down kind of essay. Which is fake.
After that, I introduce the rhetorical precis which is pages of explanation. But the rationale behind writing them is about analysis. It is a highly structured form that requires close reading and precise composition. And that's just good stuff. So, that's where I am.
Excuse me, I need to go spend the next 4 hours at the duplo.
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