Article of the Week

Each week--or most--you will have an Article of the Week (AoW) assignment posted on the blog.  Once we get into our once-a-week lab days, that is one of the things you can use that lab time for.  The objectives for this assignment are simple:

• Practice your critical reading skills on short arguments, paying attention to both effective and ineffective rhetoric.
• Respond to the variety of topics and opinions in current discourse which may lead you to ideas for your own arguments.
• Add to your cultural literacy--know what's going on in the world! =)

The assignment is also simple:

1. Read the article.
2. Make note in your journal (under date, title, and author) the rhetoric that makes the argument strong or the rhetoric that weakens it.  What to consider: mode, ethos, pathos, logos, format, length, evidence, style.
3. Write a 1-pg reflection in your journal about the article, responding to its topic, the information you learned, your opinion on the issue, your opinion of the argument itself, and/or any rhetorical strategies you see working in this piece that you could use in your own writing.

The first one we'll do as a class--here it is.