Hi everyone– I hope you enjoyed your day off. I sure didn’t! I’m still feeling pretty sick! For Thursday, I’d like you to bring in your essay drafts ON PAPER (as planned for today.) I’d also like you to do the following:
- Print out, read and annotate the attached essay “S^&t” by my old student, Elijah Zeise. I do have permission to use this essay. It also won some big awards at the school I taught at previously. You’ll notice that it is less about a particular community than I have assigned you to write about. While you read, do the following:
- Underline (or write it out if you think he doesn’t have a distinct “thesis statement”) What Elijah’s main point, or “So What?” is. What does he want readers to know or to think about differently after reading this essay?
- For every paragraph, write a quick sentence or phrase in the margin about what you think that paragraph is trying to do-make it general enough that you could use Elijah’s “formula” with your own word, if you wanted. For example, in the first paragraph, he is using his word in a variety of different sentences to show the multiple ways it can be used. In the second paragraph he introduces himself and asks “what does this all mean?” Looking at the structure of a finished article like this is called “a reverse outline.”
