Assignments for Friday, October 4, 2013

• Complete rhetorical analysis essay
• Read "The Parent Trap"

Assignments for September 27, 2013

• Read & study PA 89-109
• Don’t worry about “The Parent Trap”
• If you didn't complete it in class, finish 3-paragraph critical response to “One Man, Many Wives, Big Problems”
• Do plagiarism exercises, LBH 654-55
• Complete outline of rhetorical analysis and be prepared to go over it in class
• Familiarize yourself with MLA style, LBH pp. 667-713

Choices for rhetorical analysis

Choose one of the following essays for your four- to six-page rhetorical analysis.

• "Yes, a College Education is Worth the Costs" (PA 29-31)
• "We Send Too Many Students to College" (PA 32-35)
• "College is a Waste of Time" (PA 38-39)
• "What is a College Education Really Worth?" (PA 40-42)
• "Violent Media is Good for Kids" (PA 58-61)
• "When Life Imitates Video" (PA 62-64)
• "One Many, Many Wives, Big Problems" (web)
• "Social Harmony" (web)
• "Excitement Deprives Children of Happiness" (web)

Assignments for Friday, Sept. 20, 2013

• Read PA 51-73 
• Study and learn these vocabulary words: acquiescence, authoritarian, copious, deprivation, egalitarian, evangelical, hierarchy, infanticide, polyamory, polyandry, polygamy, regime, scarcity 
• Read “One Man, Many Wives, Big Problems”
• Be prepared to discuss all assigned readings in class
• Read the plagiarism chapter in LBH
• Bring these two completed exercises to class: Safe practices and the final three exercises here (Here's an extra credit question: Was our use of the first five of these exercises in class today plagiarism?). Also, here is a good treatment of avoiding plagiarism, especially in showing how to use one citation for an entire paragraph.

Assignment for Friday, September 13

• Vocabulary: chasten, emulate, exemplar, meek, menial, predisposition, prowess, rend, revere
•  PA 24-50
• "Social Harmony"   (This essay is part of a much larger web page, so I don’t advise trying to print the whole thing.)

Evaluating persuasive writing

1. Is the main idea stated clearly?
2. Does the writer take a firm, clear stand on a debatable issue?
3. Does the writer use adequate evidence to support that stand?
4. Does the writer take good account of his or her audience?
5. Is the author credible?
6. Are the arguments based on logic but employ emotion effectively?
7. Does the writer take good account of and refute counter-arguments?
8. Does the writer offer or call for solutions?

Ode to a Spell Checker

I have a spelling checker

I disk covered four my pea see.

It plane lee marks four my revue

Miss steaks aye can knot see.

Eye ran this poem threw it,

Your sure real glad two no.

Its very polished in its weigh–

My checker tolled me sew.

A checker is a blessing:

It freeze yew lodes of thyme.

It helps me right awl stiles two reed,

And aides me when aye rime.

Each frays comes posed up on my screen

Eye trussed too bee a joule.

The checker pours o’er every word

To cheque sum spelling rule.

Bee fore wee rote with checkers,

Hour spelling was inn deck line,

Butt now when wee dew have a laps,

Wee are not maid too wine.

And now bee cause my spelling

Is checked with such grate flare,

Their are know faults in awl this peace,

Of nun eye am a wear.

To rite with care is quite a feet

Of witch won should be proud,

And wee mussed dew the best wee can,

Sew flaws are knot aloud.

That’s why eye brake in two averse

Cuz eye dew want too please.

Sow glad eye yam that aye did bye

This soft wear four pea seas.