Week 6: Monday, 9/28 – Friday, 10/2

(No classes Monday; Tuesday is a Monday schedule)

Unit 2: Inquiry-Based Research (Annotated Bibliography)

By end-of-day Tuesday, 9/29

WRITING:

  • Unit 1 Assignment: Discourse Communities Due 

Micro-Activity #8: Reflection on Unit 1, Investigating a Discourse Community

  • Write a  post that is  a short reflection about your speech or letter.
    • What are your thoughts on writing in the genre you chose? Did you find it easier to express your thoughts via this genre vs. traditional academic writing (such as an essay). Why or why not? Also, reflect on how the model (either the speech or letter) helped you create your piece.
    • Find a section of the Unit 1assignment that you struggled to write. Quote it and explain what you were struggling with and steps you took to overcome the difficulty you were facing.
    •  Imagine you had 24 additional hours to work on the speech or letter, what would you do to further develop it? Why?
    • Submit Unit 1–At the end of today’s post, link out to a google document of your essay. Make sure that it is a hyperlink and that anyone with the link has permission  to edit your document.
  • Before publishing your post, make sure you do the following:
    • Title it “Micro-Activity #8: Reflection on Unit 1, Investigating a Discourse Community”
    • Pick the category “Week 6 Work”
    • Set the visibility of this post to “private,” Go to the top left corner of the post page, click on the word “edit” next to “Visibility: Public” and choose private.
By end-of-day Wednesday, 9/30

READING:

WRITING:

Quick Comment

  • Go to my Discussion Question on Unit 2: Annotated Bibliography and comment on it. For example, have you ever written an annotated bibliography before? Have you done research for another class? What is some advice you might give to peers who have never done this kind of work? In addition, you may use this opportunity to ask practical questions about the assignment itself (re: deadlines, formatting, etc.). (approx. 100-150 words)

Micro-Activity #9: Analyzing the Declaration of Independence

  • Write a post in which you respond to the following (approx 350 words):
    • The Declaration of Independence is made up of several sections. Read through and pay attention to the document’s organization. Write a few sentences summing up the purpose of each section and the reason (or reasons) it was written (e.g. is it a call to action? an explanation? a proposal of a solution? something else?).
    • What about this document is or is not persuasive in your view?
    • Take a look at Randy Barnett’s article in The Washington Post. In it, he interprets several of the claims made in the Declaration, and he explains what these claims are saying in modern terms. Pick one or two of the claims that you feel relate to concerns, issues, or problems in American society today, and explain your choice (or choices).
  • Before publishing your post, make sure you do the following:
    • Title it “Micro-Activity #9: Analyzing the Declaration of Independence”
    • Pick the category “Week 6 Work”