From what I've gathered from our peers, and even myself, there can be a difficulty having a cohesive argument that identifies with your audience throughout your paper. There may be times you veer off topic, rant, or even start taking your argument to whole new place completely. By the end of this assignment, I hope a connection can be made between your audience and argument. We should all be making an argument that makes sense for the group we are writing for, and strengthen the weak points of our argument whenever possible.
Step 1
Sharon Crowley's essay on invention says, "I use the term argument to refer to any rhetorical situation in which people disagree with one another, although ' argument' can also refer to the proofs developed by a specific rhetoric for use in a given situation"(32). Within your own paper, I want you to find areas in which someone may disagree with your argument. Then ask yourself, what is there to disagree with? Write a response on the areas of disagreement, and then afterwards, try and think of ways to reach disagreement your audience may have with your audience.
Step 2
Find areas where your argument speaks the best to your audience, then write about why this is.
Ask yourself the following while finding these areas:
- What am trying to tell my audience?
- Why should my audience agree with me?
- Are there any potential setbacks by making this argument to my audience?
Once these are established, I want to then try and find the weakest areas of your argument and answer the previous three questions again. This time around, by viewing these setback, you can then try to find and address the misunderstanding a person in your audience may have. This will allow you to expand your thought process in your writing, and understand any questions your audience may have while reading your piece.
Step 3
Now that you have pinpointed your weakest areas, have you realized that some of what you wrote doesn't apply to your audience at all? If this is the case, scrap the area (but save it just in case!) and try to write a new paragraph that helps target your audience. Then afterwards, ask yourself why this new paragraph fits your audience and arguemnt more so then it did before.
I am testing this assignment.
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ReplyDeleteMy argument states that online writing instructors may need additional tools to help students become effective writers. I think that there may be some who disagree with this notion. Sometimes as traditional teachers who transition to online, we assume that we can just do the same things that we did in the classroom. In reality, this is not always easy and what translates face-to-face may not come across the same way in an online setting.
ReplyDeleteSome teachers may argue that the two environments are essentially the same, and students should come out with the same experience. I am trying to tell my audience that online instruction can be effective, but some strategies may help the process along better. For example, the use of videos and other visual/verbal means of instruction may be helpful to students. The use of these tools may help them to produce better essays.
My audience should agree with me because…(that’s a tough one). Some of my research has found that online students are dropping out at alarming rates. While there are many factors that play a part in the process, one of the factors is faculty expertise. In other words, this is a real issue that will affect students and anyone involved with their lives. If students cannot learn in an environment that the schools have said is effective, then maybe it is time to revisit how we teach online. We should study the best practices of successful online classrooms.
The only setback is the person who may state that everything can be done the same way. This person is misinformed and the only way that it can be done the same (in both settings), are if the additional tools such as video, discussion groups, etc. are added to the online classroom.
Was what the assignment asked you to do clear? Yes, the only thing that wasn’t was the last part where it asked me to write another paragraph? I kept wondering…paragraph for what, the introduction? Where should this paragraph fit?
ReplyDeleteDid the assignment really ask 30 minutes of work? If not, what made the assignment go over? It took me about 25 minutes, but I could have easily gone over the time limit had I written the last paragraph. The paragraph would have taken more time for me, because my argument is still a little fuzzy for me personally.
What did you learn from carrying out the assignment? That is, did your learning match up with the goals/outcomes of the assignment? I really enjoyed this assignment because it made me THINK about what my argument was. I also had to start thinking about counterarguments, and how I would address said arguments.
Was what you learned useful to you, given where you are with your paper? Yes, this assignment was definitely useful. In fact, it helped me to shape my argument more. I will definitely revisit this assignment as I work through my draft.
What recommendations can you offer the assignment writer for how this assignment could be shaped to better achieve its goals/outcomes, or be clearer, or be of more assistance to writers at your stage of the writing process? The only thing that I would change is the last paragraph. That should have been clearer to the reader. One objective of the assignment was to help the reader stay on course with the argument, and I found myself staying on course. Nice job!