Comparing Graff And Birkenstein's 'They Say I Say'

Advancing in my critical thinking skills is as important as my writing skills. I have to take the appropriate steps in continuing to engage the readers throughout the writing process. Writing is crucial as a student and everyday life because it is a form of communication. I will utilize the necessary resources to assist me in applying the lessons being instructed for completion of each assignment in accordance with the University guidelines. Allowing myself to create an outline for the topic before the rough draft is setting

It’s hard to imagine that just ten short months ago I was sitting in a classroom building a spaghetti tower with no idea what a rhetorical analysis essay was or what the word anaphora meant. Now, just a couple of months later, I have read and analyzed six different novels, learned to write an argument, synthesis, and rhetorical analysis essay, expanded my lexicon of literary terms, and sat through a three hour AP exam. This class has not only given me the skills to master the AP exam, but it has also given me knowledge to succeed in future English courses and in life. Through this course, I have experienced unparalleled growth in my reading comprehension and writing abilities.

In Freshman Composition I learned what metacognition means, and how it applies to academic writing. Next I learned about textual evidence and backing up your opinions with research. *I expect this class to help develop my writing skills, as well as find my voice in writing, all together I expect this class to be challenging but rewarding. Therefore I have set a few goals for myself, my first goal is to step out of my comfort zone and research topics I have never heard of before. My second goal is to not second-guess myself on my writing topics and/or choices. Furthermore I expect great things to come from this

The first strategy described by the author is to always know who is arguing and where they are coming from. By identifying the author’s viewpoints and meaning of their statements, you can better understand their stance: what it is and how they want it conveyed. When writing, it is also important to exude such qualities to your audience for formal and direct purposes.

Before taking on the challenge of critical reading, writing, and researching, I would like to

I observed Dr. Jenny Crisp’s English 98 class on January 19, 2016. The class began at 12:15 PM and lasted until 1:20 PM. The room that the class met in was on the third floor of the Liberal Arts building, and the room had individual computers for each of the students to work on. The class was divided into two sections on this day because Dr. Crisp had scheduled an introductory visit to the writing lab, which began at 12:45. Prior to the visit to the writing lab, Dr. Crisp guided the class in a discussion on the topic of revision in regards to the first paper that the class had submitted. The stages of revision were discussed and the students were shown where additional help could be found within the book. Dr. Crisp told the students that the reason that their grades on the essays were significantly lower was because the essays were lacking in detail and had Type One errors. She stated that revision is important and that could help bring up the grades on the essays.

When it comes to critical thinking, reading and writing are two factors that deal with the critical thinking process. A few key aspects of critical reading and writing are identifying the tone in ones writing, how to throughly read and annotate a text, and the revision process. In the essay, “The Maker’s Eye”, Donald Murray explains how the attitude of a writer, listening to what readers have to say and how to edit your own writing makes your work better when critically thinking in college. These aspects of critical thinking, reading and writing make will keep the reader interested and make the writing easier to translate when read.

The article “They Say I Say”written by Graff and Birkenstein discusses several ways to not only write academically but express thoughts in an academic manner. The first aspect talked about is how to write about what others are saying. This helps clarify what exactly the author is talking about. After you have stated what “they say”, you can state your own argument and tell what you agree with. Graff and Birkenstein also state that stating your own opinion as quickly as possible is also important; this gives the reader an understanding about the motivation of your argument is. In contrast to this article, the article “Agonism in the Academy: Surviving High Learning's Argument Culture” written by Deborah Tannen explains how agonism is like a

To truly be conversant, you have to form your own questions, not just scan for answers (107). When reading to absorb, and translate you must read actively and critically. (108) In order to do this you must, “pay attention to the actual words in a reading and to use them when you write” (Rosenwasser 108). This can be done by individually breaking down passages, and picking apart the meanings (108). When “Passing your eyes or highlighter over the text or generalizing about it or copying notes from someone else's power point will not teach you the skills to become an independent thinker” (Rosenwasser 108).

However, my progress as a reader has significantly improved and changed during this semester. First, I learned to improve my critical reading skills through the in-class reading assignments. My professor provided very useful help in assigning us the first reading response question: “Summarize the main ideas of the reading assignment. What questions do you have?” I think that a combination of being able to understand, summarize what the text says as well as interpret its meanings is a helpful approach one can apply to better his or her critical reading skills. Therefore, I have applied this approach to any reading I had for this class and I am still using it for other classes as well. Secondly, I changed my reading habit after the third essay in which I chose a research topic in my discipline to write about. While doing the research, I noticed that I was also encouraged to become familiar with many different subjects in my discipline. The essay assignment was to pick a topic that I am personally interested in writing about. Coincidently, this was also one of the goals that I listed on the first class writing “read articles and

For the past week we have been learning about critical analysis essays. Before coming to composition I didn't know much about critical analysis essays, I knew they were conducted in MLA Format and they were basically a comparison between two books. After learning more in class I was informed more in-depth about critical analysis essays.

During the semester we have been reading the work of various authors. Most of the readings we have done are examples of academic writing written by philosophers ranging from Plato all the way to Henry Thoreau. All of these texts have a common characteristic: they revolve around either the idea of proving a point or the idea of providing a new perspective on knowledge. When reading an academic paper, it is crucial to identify this idea or thesis and to try to find and follow the stream of thoughts that the author provides to justify his assumptions. Because of this, using closed readings is essential. Furthermore, the elements of an academic paper include a thesis, a motive, a logical structure, key terms, and a specific stance.

While reading these three engaging articles, we made sure to incorporate critical thinking skills. During our discussions, we made sure to ask each other questions, clarify our thoughts whenever speaking unclearly, and making sure to not stray away from the topic at hand. Occasionally, if we ever had thoughts that were not relevant to our discussion, one of us would remind us to stay focused. During our discussions, we tried to connect the article to each other and how they related.

There are a few different reading strategies that can help a person become a critical reader. A reading strategy that could lead upcoming undergraduate students to become critical readers is a strategy that is called “Crap Analysis”. There are more strategies used to become a critical reader that includes increasing

Throughout my reading of Michel Foucault's The Care of the Self, I used a number of different strategies to comprehend this text. First, I made sure that I would have optimal concentration so I could understand the text the best I could by doing my reading in a quiet environment, which happened to be my apartment. Aside from having a peaceful space, I utilized a couple of the reading strategies from Hacker & Sommers' A Writers Reference. One of the techniques I used was previewing through the text. I found that skimming through the entire text initially was actually really valuable as well because I could get a basis of what his key arguing points were. After doing that, I annotated as I read the material, highlighting sections that I thought were of importance or that had ideas or topics that stood out. The cluster diagram that we created was also extremely helpful as well because it helped me transform the points I had written down into a visual diagram that made my thoughts far easier to comprehend. The diagram we did in class as a group was also super useful because hearing other peoples' understanding of the text brought new ideas and arguments into perspective that I didn’t pick up on my own, as well as helped me form a more in-depth understanding of what the text was trying to argue. In addition, presenting each group’s figures to the room helped me understand more what the overall opinion of the class was about the subject.