pb3a

Motivation and Connection: Teaching Reading

(and Writing) in the Composition Classroom

The Benefit of Explicitly Teaching Reading-Writing Connections:

• ·      I chose to write about this specific section of the journal article because I believe that this is the most important part.  This answers the “why” part of the article – why should one teach the connections between reading and writing?  Knowing what reading-writing connections actually is and how to implement this concept is integral in understanding the argument, but knowing why it should be done is the foundation of the article’s purpose.  Why should one teach about reading-writing connections?  Because there is a benefit of “explicitly teaching reading-writing connections. 

Teaching Model Texts Effectively: An Example

• ·      I plan on incorporating the “how” portion of the article by also writing about this section.  Once the reader of the genres I am going to write know why connecting reading and writing is taught – there is a benefit – I am going to explain to them how teachers should effectively convey this plan to their students.  Thus, the audience will know what is happening, why it is going on, and how it should take place.

Younger audience: A comic book

• ·      This comic book I am going to create will be geared towards an audience of students, particular within an academic setting.  The author, me, will pretend to be a teacher creating this comic book towards a group of students. Although the journal article by Bunn “[Teaches] reading in terms of its connections to writing [to] motivate students to read” (512), I will be trying to motivate the reader – students – to have a reason to do their reading.  I’ll introduce why it is important – because there is a benefit of explicitly learning about reading writing connections.  I will also write about how the teacher (me) will effectively teach the connections between reading and writing in a way that will get the students excited to learn.
• ·      To grab the readers’ attentions, I will try to make this genre funny.  I will use characters of the same age group (high school) or from media they are accustomed to so that the characters will be relatable to the students.  In terms of content, I am not entirely sure how, but I will try to make what the audience will be learning from the comic book seem “cool” so that they will be inclined to keep reading the possibly learn more.

Older Audience:  A cover letter applying to become a UCSB Writing 2 teacher.

• ·      The content of this piece will contrast greatly to the comic book.  Along with the general content usually associated with a cover letter – introducing myself and my purpose for applying – I will talk in depth about my “skill” of being able to teach the connections of reading and writing to the students.  Of course, I will first give a reason and explain the benefits of the importance of knowing about the reading-writing connections. 
• ·      This genre will be going into depth about my knowledge, as opposed to the comic book, which gives enough information, but not too much, or the reader would become disinterested.  The purpose of this genre is to leave a good impression on the possible future employer, and so this will be written in a serious matter with impressive diction and written skills. 

thlog # 8

By looking at the different styles of painters this week in class, I used a more artistic approach at discovering the moves of each artist.  Usually I have been trying to find the rhetorical decisions within textual genres, but this approach of trying to find them within the creation of an image will improve my ability to point out decisions writers make.  I learned a lot through how they described each move in their own words and how each artist -- in the Disney video -- chose to draw different parts of the tree in their own way.  One guy decided to paint one specific part of the tree, while others painted the entire tree.  Also, they used different and unique forms and styles of painting the tree, including the instruments and brushes used to convey the illustration onto the canvas.  I believe that this activity opened up the artistic side of my mind, which will definitely help me for the upcoming WP3.

I also found the activity of finding different sources of textual genres for older and younger audiences.  I realized that there are so many different types of genres that have audiences of different age groups.  Older audiences tend to read and are familiar with pieces such as resumes and tax papers, while younger audiences read genres of less difficulty such as lego instructions and picture books.  There are age appropriate material in each genre.  For example, kids menus -- for a younger audience -- usually have visually appealing pictures that a younger person would enjoy, but it does not consist of many words and descriptions of food items.  So during WP3, part of our assignment is to see  what choices writers make to fit the genre description.  Doing more and more activities about discovering moves in genres are helpful in being able to point out and analyze the rhetorical decisions authors make in their writing.

thlog #7

        This week, we created our first drafts of WP2 and had them peer reviewed.  The first journal question really helped me think about my writing process, and how to further revise my essay.  I thought about my strengths and weaknesses, and how my writing improved from my last essay.  My main weaknesses were procrastination and creating an essay that flows with clear transitions.  With so many parts from the prompt to write about, I was not sure how to piece everything together.  Having my essay flow and letting the reader know what was coming next was also a weakness of my first WP1.  Starting off with this journal helped me realize that I need to improve on this weakness.  After finding out that there were other people in the class who had the same problem, I concurred that I should find the main points of the prompt, write about that, and then describe and analyze the main points with the other possible questions from the prompt.  I can also start off with a simple thesis, and then maybe add more to as I continue writing the paper and analyzing the prompt.  This is a process I feel will take me a while, but if I keep working on allowing my essays to flow and transition better, it will help my writing skills in the long run.

I realized from this journal entry that I improved on writing my thoughts onto the paper, without much care for how it sounded like for the first draft.  Like what was said in class, when stuck on how to write a word or phrase it is best to attack it and be aggressive. I was able to use this technique on my essay so that I was not stuck on any part of the writing process.  

thlog # 6

This week in class, we learned about the importance of style.  Discovering a writer’s style helps me understand a writer’s moves in a more complex way, and this allows me to read like a writer.  Each different type of style has different effects on the reader.  Learning about several of these in class will further develop my writing skills.  One that will help me a lot is parallelism.

Being able to show parallelism in writing makes it a lot easier for the reader to read the piece because the wording is more structured and easier for the brain to process the information.  As mentioned in class, the patterns of parallelism make it so that there are similarities of structure throughout sentences.  But how can i be able to show parallelism in my writing?  To help answer this question of mine, we had to point out examples of parallelism in a resume.  From the alignment of the dates on the right side of the events to the same amount of bullet points used for past work experience, parallelism was abundant throughout that textual genre.  By reviewing other people’s writing and finding examples of parallelism -- or any other kind of style -- I will be able to write with similar styles and even form more creative ideas to make my writing a thoughtful piece that is easy for the reader to read.  

To learn about more styles, I found it very helpful when we broke up into groups of three to find different forms of style throughout the course reader.  By doing this activity, I was able to work with a style -- alliteration -- that I was not too familiar with by looking up examples in the book and finding out why it is effective to the reader.  To be short, alliteration is a play on words that adds variation to writing.  After listening to the other descriptions the other groups discussed, I feel like I am now ready to use these styles to write an awesome WP2.   

pb2b:moves

Moves are present in every piece of writing.  I can examine the concept of moves while reading to give me a better sense of awareness of the text and to improve my writing style.  Here are a few examples of moves from the course reader that I found interesting:

• Introducing Quotations: “In fact, according to rhetorician Kenneth Burke, rhetoric is everywhere: ‘wherever there is persuasion…’” (Carroll, 47).
• It is okay to go straight into a quote, but to change things up and giving a little introduction before the quotation makes it less dull.  Giving a proper introduction of a quote gives the reader a preview of what is going to happen next and some background information of the circumstances surrounding the citation.
• Commonly used Transitions (contrast): “Instead, you took in the information and made an informed, and likely somewhat accurate, decision about that person” (Carroll, 46).
• The author may have used the transitional word instead to transition to the next sentence.  This allows the reading to be smoother, and it lets the reader know that the next sentence will be an opposition to the previous sentence.  This move transitions from a statement someone else says to an opposing statement he believes is true.  
• Establishing Why Your Claims Matter: “This is important because it’s the same thing you should be thinking about while you are writing…” (Bunn, 81).
•  Claiming that a matter is important allows a reader to know that it is important.  Without this move, it will be another random sentence with the same amount of significance as the others.  One must make sure an important claim stands out, even by simply mentioning that it is important.
• Signaling Who is Saying What: “And learning every genre would be impossible anyway, as Devitt notes that ‘no writing class could possibly…’” (Dirk, 259).
•  It is useful to let the reader know that Burke is the one who said/wrote what was in the quote to let the reader know who is speaking to them, and to give Burke credit for the original piece.  It is good to add several voices in an essay by adding in quotations, and extra research can be done by stating who was responsible for the original quote.  
• Explaining Quotations: “In other words, most of our actions are persuasive in nature” (Carroll, 47).
• Restating a quote in your own words reinforces the original quote and adds even more detailed analysis to the paper.  This is effective because providing a lot of analysis gives more support for a claim to prove that it is believable.  
• Italics tricks: “But notice that what most heightens this critical awareness is not so much the writing down of words in the first place, though of course that helps, but the coming back to a text and re-seeing it…” (Elbow, 58).
• The author used italics to distinguish certain words from the others.  It is an effective way to use it because it is not to distracting and it is legible, while it still creates a change to the format of the chosen word or phrase.
• The Additional Abbreviation: “For most college students RLW is a new way to read, and it can be difficult to learn at first” (Bunn, 75).
• This strategy makes it so that we don’t have to read all the words of that phrase each time, and it saves space.  Bunn uses the abbreviation RLW (reading like a writer) many times throughout the text, and it gets a bit annoying if he spells out the whole phrase each time it is used.  
• Big Bullets: Used in the beginning of Janet Boyd’s Murder! (Rhetorically Speaking) pg 88.
• Using bullet points is an effective way of communicating when trying to list multiple ideas of the same topic.  It makes it easier to read, as all the words are in a list instead of being congested within a paragraph.  Bullet points send an effective message that differs from the normal paragraph form and allows the reader to remember the information.  
• Multiple NOTS!: “Not like a teacher.  Not like a judge.  Not like an editor or critic” (Straub, 19).
• Throwing in the word not to start off three straight sentences emphasizes the peer editor how not to edit the paper.  Restating words multiple times throughout a paragraph, especially when put in a few sentences in a row, establishes a great way to put a point a point across to the reader.  
• Terrific Titles: “The Rhetorical Situation, Or Discerning Context” (Carroll, 48).  
• Putting in titles within a text is useful so that it separates the reading into several categories, and it allows the reader to know the topic of what he/she is going to read next.  It is effective because it allows the reader to take a break, process the information of the previous part, and then start reading about the next topic.

thlog #5

This week in class, we learned about  “moves.”  At first, I was not able to fully understand how to relate this concept with writing, but watching the youtube videos -- the Rock’s People’s Elbow and the Michael Jordan layup highlights -- helped me understand the process.  We were to pick out each detail of their move, and put them in order of first to last.  Since we had to pick out each and every detail of the “move,” this helped me realize that there are many moves in writing that should be able to be picked apart by the reader to be analyzed.  Paying close attention to detail, which was done by watching the youtube videos and can also be done while reading, can help me in my writing process.

How to Read Like a Writer by Mike Bunn was an interesting piece that will definitely help me improve my writing by following what I learned.  Picking apart the moves in the videos helped me pay more attention to detail.  So, as I learned in the assigned reading, finding the moves while reading will help me to read like a writer.  When reading like a writer, it is useful to pull apart the moves the author makes from his or her writing choices.  From there, I can ask questions such as the purpose of that move, or if it would be more essential if another move was used in its place.  Then from finding these moves, I can question whether or not if I’d like to use that move in my own writing.  So the next time I read a text, I will read like a writer to develop my own writing skills.  This can be applied to any genre, such as online news articles or social media.  As long as I read to understand why the moves were put together, as well as to enjoy the content, writing and reading will be more intertwined and help me become a better writer.