David Mcraney's You Are Not So Smart

2. What writing strategy does the author use that you think is effective, and why? For example, does he use examples, or does he make

I found the book to be a wealth of knowledge. The chapter titles were catchy and I was able to put visual images with some of things which were discussed in the book. In Chapter 2 Allies and Enemies, I automatically saw boys against girls; each group thinks they are better. However we are interchangeable.

In my personal opinion, this book was very hard to read and follow. At certain times I had a hard time figuring out who was talking in the book. I really wanted to enjoy this book and it’s “case studies” but I simply could not get past the confusion and enjoy this like I would any other book. I feel like the author wrote a lot of the situations for shock

Personally, I did not enjoy the book. It didn't get all that interesting until the last couple of chapters. Before that, it spewed facts in my face and lacked an intriguing plot. I learned a lot from this book, but You would be better off reading a science journal, magazine, or website. Otherwise, it was an okay book.

Everyone knows some young person who is impressively street smart but does poorly in school. What a waste, we think, that one who is so intelligent about so many things in life seems unable to apply that intelligence to academic work. This is how Gerald Graff’s essay titled “Hidden Intellectualism" begins. Although this is not Graff's personal belief, he is approaching us with a common stereotype. After reading Graff's article I would say that I agree with him from beginning to end. Gerald Graff begins with differentiating between “book smarts” and “street smarts". Book smart is defined as a person who is intelligent and very well educated academically. People that are book smart can write and discuss subjects taught in school. On the

What really defines a dreamer? Is it the children who have unrealistic dreams of playing in the big leagues or is it someone who has a plan and will go out of his or her way to achieve it? Both of these options can be true. Dreamers are special in this world because they have hope for something they believe in. Nothing is more fascinating than seeing an individual who never gave up and worked extremely hard to reach their goal. Having read only three sections so far, I have explored the individual’s purpose and passion for the work they pursue. The “Dreamers” section has made me analyze what I have and want with my future career. Overall, the elements of the book defining dreamers explains the meaning of a risk taker, the hard work and dedication involved, and the passion it takes to reach your goals.

After reading Gerald’s story, I think students will believe in themselves more than ever before. Gerald showed us that book smarts doesn’t just mean doing well in school but that things you do in everyday life is showing your own intellectualism. He also states how once students and children realize that if they can argue and talk about things that are important to them or that they are passionate about then they can hopefully use that to tap into things they are leaning about in school.

Knowing that this book is very "wordy", I was excited to determine the readability of the text. To determine this I used a website created by Brian Scott. The site allows users to copy and paste passages from the textbook to be analyzed. From my textbook, I copied and pasted two separate sections. I copied from the introduction of

The book was very well put together and organized with documented evidence and interviews from important people. A lot of research was put into this book and all the research used is cited in the back of the book. Since the topic is such a controversial topic I understand that all the information had to be correctly used which is why the research was so in-depth. The book was easy to read there was a few words I was unsure of and had to define in order to better understand them. The situation itself brought up other issues of that time such as: social, economic, and politics. The conclusion at the end really helps by summing up some main points considering there is a lot of information throughout the reading. The drawing and pictures included in the text are very interesting and it is really cool to get to see

The book to me was interesting. The author use make history sounds more exciting than the

The author is very descriptive and gives readers a lot of information. Sentences like “The wait was electric, for Chicago was a prideful place” (13) are very formal and hold the character of that time. The author’s style is descriptive, and thoroughly narrates events. Sentences like “mounds of quicklime; a large kiln; a dissection table stained with what seemed to be blood” are very descriptive and add to the eerie feeling that readers get (364). The words the author chose helped readers know how they are supposed to feel about certain subjects. An example is the sentence “He possessed them all and reveled in his possession” (350). This sentence makes readers such as myself feel uncomfortable and adds to the depiction of Holmes. His wording helped readers understand his characters. This books serves as a reminder for other books like Great Gatsby but heavily contrasts Great Gatsby in the fact that it depicts much more gruesome events and is a darker read that Gatsby. The author also uses a lot of paragraph breaks to try to highlight something that is important for readers to not. The book was easy to read but packed with information. The author also implies a lot of things instead of outrightly stating

The most universal goal every human has in common is the pursuit of happiness or “creation or construction of happiness” (Achor, 78). To be able to fulfill this wish of becoming happy, people often think the key to achieving happiness is success. In the book, The Happiness Advantage by Shawn Achor, he debunks this theory of success leading to happiness by illustrating the reverse theory of success. Through dozens of studies and experiments as forms of evidence, the author argues that an individual needs to achieve happiness in order to be truly successful. Achor 's argument is valid in that happiness should come before success because there is a clear advantage to being successful in an individual’s work life, personal sphere, and liveliness if they are happy first and foremost.

“You are Not So Smart” is a book about the fallacies, false judgments, and the ideas that we believe to be true about ourselves but are in-fact fictitious beliefs we have. It was written by journalist David McRaney who won two William Randolph Hearst awards. McRaney’s book was originally a blog that he created then later converted into a book. He uses different imagery, vocabulary, and studies to bring his ideas across in this book, and is showing various amounts of evidence from examples and his own experience of these concepts first hand.

Attention Getter: A famous author by the name of Wayne Dyer once said, “Procrastination is one of the most common and deadliest of diseases and its toll on success and happiness is incredibly heavy.”(1) In todays society it seems as if procrastination has become a normal and acceptable thing to do. It is often joked about amongst schoolmates and co-workers around the world. Nothing seems to get done until it absolutely needs to get done, then everyone runs around getting things done quickly and often times inaccurately. The trouble with this mentality however is that some things will never get done because something will come up tomorrow or the next day and what you are putting off now gets pushed even further back. Today I will persuade you to stop this habit from continuing. I will be explaining the problems we face when dealing with procrastination as well as how to deal with it and actions you can take to prevent it in the future.

Self-help books have become an entire nonfiction genre for today’s society in which psychological science, statistics, political opinion, or basic author-created theory is presented in order to present solutions of one sort or another to understanding, preventing, acting upon, and solving some of our greatest personal, professional, political, and economic struggles depending on our needs. In virtually any facet of life that can be offered help and an opinion upon, there is a self-help book that has been written on the subject.