Oral Presentation, Reading Response, and Essay Assignments
Winter, 2002
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Each student in the class will be asked to make an oral presentation NO LONGER than five minutes in length on a topic related to the term's assigned reading. The topics have been selected by the instructor and a specific date given for the presentation of each one to correspond with the reading. Students may begin signing up for the presentations on a first-come, first-served basis on a sheet posted outside the instructor's door at 529 PLC beginning at 1:00 pm on Wednesday, January 9.
The topics vary in scope--some are definitional (e.g., sentimental novel, allegory); some relate to events (e.g., Continental Congress, Constitutional Convention); some explain literary movements (e.g., Romanticism, Transcendentalism); some ask for a comment on important related works that cannot be covered in class; and so on. Because of the variety of the topics, what will be covered by each student in the oral presentation will also vary. A list will be available in class on January 9 so students can think of two or three possible topics they might be interested in working on in case their first choice has been taken by the time they sign up.
The presentations, worth 5% of the final grade, will be evaluated on preparation, content, and presentation. Students should turn in, following their presentation, their notes, a working or topic outline, and/or a written summary of their presentation to demonstrate what work has been completed to prepare for the presentation. Content evaluation will depend on completeness and accuracy, along with how well the presenter links the information to the assigned readings. Some judgment calls may be needed for topics which are somewhat broad; presenters must decide in these cases which information is most important to include to help their classmates understand and interpret the assigned readings. Presentation evaluation will include such aspects as did the presenter speak clearly and distinctly, organize the presentation so it could be easily followed, meet the time limitations, speak without distracting mannerisms (such as avoiding the use of "um," "ah," "you know," and "like"), and appear calm and poised.
Forty students are currently enrolled in the class, and 42 topics are available. Two more topics than students have been supplied so that no one need sign up for a presentation the first week. Two topics are available, however, for Friday of the first week (January 11) if someone wishes to tackle them. After that, all topics must be "claimed," for no additional topics will be added during the term and someone trying to sign up at the last minute may not find an open slot and thus earn a zero for the assignment. Because the number of topics available after the first week exactly matches the number of students in class, students who miss their presentation date would also not be able to complete the assignment.
Some research will be required for most of the topics. Suggested places to start are
- The Norton Companion Website for the Norton Anthology of American Literature
- Encyclopedia Britannica Online (access through the Knight Library's Janus Homepage)
- Richard Ruland and Malcolm Bradbury, From Puritanism to Postmodernism, PS88.R795 1991 (soon to be on reserve)
- The instructor, who will be happy during office hours to suggest references, discuss topics, and provide assistance
Use this link to check the list of topics, dates, and current status of the sign-up sheet.
Each student will write three reading responses during the term. Students will select the reading they respond to from the assigned reading listed on the course calendar. Reading Response #1 must be completed by Monday, January 28; Reading Response #2 by Monday, February 18; and Reading Response #3 by Friday, March 8. Reading responses are due by the beginning of the class period in which the selected reading will be discussed. (For example, if someone wanted to write the first response on the Navajo coyote tale "Coyote, Skunk, and the Prairie Dogs," the due date would be by the beginning of class on Friday, January 11.) Because students will choose what selections they will respond to, though, they may complete these early in the term. (For example, someone could write in response to Bradford's Of Plymouth Plantation, Bradstreet's "Verses Upon the Burning of Our House," and Rowlandson's A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson and complete the assignment for the entire term. These responses would be due, respectively, on Monday, January 14; Wednesday, January 16; and Wednesday, January 23; all would beat the "last possible due dates" for each of the assigned responses.) However, students should wait to receive at least one reading response back with comments before undertaking the next, to make sure that they are meeting the assignment requirements.
Each reading response should be one page in length (no longer) and double spaced, using appropriate MLA format for a student essay and, if it includes quoted material, correct MLA format for quoting and citing sources. The one-page limit to the length, however, means quotations should be short and few, if any. Unless quotations refer to sources other than the course text, a "Works Cited" page is not required. The title of the reading response may simply be "A Reading Response to '[Insert Name of Assigned Reading]'" or students may be more imaginative if they prefer (remember, the title is a writer's first chance to gain the reader's attention).
The content should focus on the student's response to the assigned reading. Some ideas students can think about and that might be included are:
- What was remarkable about this particular work?
- What caught the reader's [your] attention?
- Who/what was the writer's audience?
- Did the writer's audience affect the form of the writing?
- What was the writer trying to accomplish? Did he/she succeed?
- Did the writer use any effective symbols or symbolism?
- Are stylistic elements important in assessing this writer's work?
- Has the work historical importance?
- What general impressions might a reader have about this work?
Clearly, this list is neither exhaustive or inclusive. All these ideas could not possibly be covered in one page, so students might select one or two to discuss. Additionally, students might have other ideas about the reading that would be equally as insightful and interesting. What the assignment requires is each student's brief but thoughtful response to the reading assignment selected.
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Friday, January 18 |
Discuss assignment in class. |
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Friday, January 18 through Monday, February 4 |
Work on drafting and revising your essay (outside of class). |
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February 4 |
Turn in Essay #1. |
Procedure
This assignment asks students to select one of the works assigned during the first half of the term from the text (up to the midterm), to complete a careful (second) reading of that work, to develop ideas or draw conclusions about the reading that will lead to a thesis statement, and to develop ideas in support of that thesis statement from the reading in a two-page, double-spaced essay. The work selected for the essay should be different than the ones selected for the reading responses. A secondary goal of the essay is for students to learn to incorporate quotations smoothly into their writing and accurately cite them parenthetically in their essays following MLA style.
This essay will be similar to the reading response assignment, but will be twice the length (2 pages), will require a thesis statement, and should be written in a more formal style. Using a more formal style does not mean using inflated or grandiose language, but recognizes that, because the purpose of the essay assignment is different than the purpose of the reading response, the form will be affected. For example, reading responses are often written using the first person "I," as they are designed for students to write about their personal response to the reading. But the first essay will more likely be written in third person, which allows the writer to make a broader statement--most readers or people in general will respond positively to a particular writer's work, for instance, not just "I" (the student as writer) or "you" (the instructor as reader).
The ideas given for the reading responses are also a good starting point in thinking about the work selected for the essay, so are repeated here:
- What was remarkable about this particular work?
- What caught the reader's [your] attention?
- Who/what was the writer's audience?
- Did the writer's audience affect the form of the writing?
- What was the writer trying to accomplish? Did he/she succeed?
- Did the writer use any effective symbols or symbolism?
- Are stylistic elements important in assessing this writer's work?
- Has the work historical importance?
- What general impressions might a reader have about this work?
After rereading the selected work, thinking about it, and analyzing it, students should develop a thesis statement, the central idea they will write about in their essay. The thesis should clearly state the idea about the work that the student wants to develop in the essay. As this essay is somewhat short, the focus should be on only one aspect of the work that the student thinks is important in interpreting or reading that work. An example might be, "Thomas Harriot's feelings about the native inhabitants he encounters in Virginia are clearly expressed in A Brief and True Report both by his language and by his responses to their culture." Another might be, "Images used by John Smith in The General History of Virgina . . . show how the New World was viewed both as a new Eden and as the home of Satan." Or, "Anne Bradstreet's poem 'Here Follows Some Verses upon the Burning of Our House' includes lines that represent Anne the private person and Mistress Bradstreet, Puritan and wife of the Governor of Massachusetts Colony." The success of the essay will in part be measured by whether its thesis is clear to the reader and whether the essay successfully develops and clarifies the thesis.
Support for the thesis should be developed using the students' own ideas and analysis and evidence quoted from the text. However, as the assignment is brief, students should be careful not to use too many quotations, or any that are extremely long. This assignment does not require library research or quoting from outside sources. A Works Cited page will not be required unless quotations are used from sources other than the text.
Students might want to read/review the following pages prior to completing their essays.
- How To Avoid Plagiarism [J. L. McGrath, Rio Salado College]
- MLA Parenthetical Citation
- How To Format a Student Essay
- Using Quotations
- Helpful Hints
- Revision Guidelines
- Mechanics
Checklist
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Friday, February 8 |
Discuss assignment in class; learn how to find sources; decide on topic for your essay. |
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Monday, February 11 |
Work on planning your essay and begin locating outside sources (outside of class). |
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Wednesday, February 13 |
Turn in bibliography note cards in MLA format for at least three different types of sources you have located to use in writing Essay #2. NOTE: One of these may be from the text. |
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Friday, February 15 |
Turn in Thesis Statement and Preliminary (Working) Outline. |
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Week of February 18-22 |
Write the first version of your essay (outside of class). |
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Monday, February 25 |
Peer Review Workshop (in-class)--first draft of Essay #2 due. |
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Wednesday, February 27 |
Revision Workshop (in-class)--bring essay #2 to class |
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Friday, March 1 |
Use a folder with pockets so you can turn in the following:
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Procedure
This assignment asks students to select one of the works assigned anytime during the term from the text (headnotes and period introductions do not count), to complete a careful (second) reading of that work, to develop ideas or draw conclusions about the reading that will lead to a thesis statement, and to develop ideas in support of that thesis statement from the reading and using outside sources in a four-page, double-spaced essay. The work selected for the essay should be different than the ones selected for the reading responses and the first essay. A secondary goal of the essay is for students to quote from several types of sources, to integrate these quotations smoothly into their text, to accurately cite them parenthetically in their essays following MLA style, and to prepare a Works Cited page following MLA style.
While students will consult other authors and critics for this essay, they should first develop their support for their thesis using their own ideas and analysis. They will use outside sources as a means of "backing up" their ideas. They should also quote from the text itself to provide evidence to support their viewpoint. As with Essay #1, students should be careful not to over-quote and should sparingly select material from the text to illustrate main ideas and analysis and from outside sources to provide additional "weight" to ideas.
To fulfill the secondary goal of learning to prepare a Works Cited list, students should use at least three different types of sources in preparing their essay. These might be, for example, any three of the following: a book, an article from a printed journal, an article that is reprinted in an electronic data base, an article that has been reprinted in an edited book, or an article from a newspaper or magazine. One of these may be from the text, which would be categorized as a work in an anthology.
This essay will be similar to the first essay assignment, but will be twice the length (4 pages). Like the first essay, it will require a thesis statement and should be written in a more formal style than the reading responses. As noted for the first essay, using a more formal style does not mean using inflated or grandiose language, but recognizes that, because the purpose of the essay assignment is different than the purpose of the reading response, the form will be affected. For example, reading responses are often written using the first person "I," as they are designed for students to write about their personal response to the reading. But the essay should be written in third person, which allows the writer to make a broader statement--most readers or people in general will respond positively to a particular writer's work, for instance, not just "I" (the student as writer) or "you" (the instructor as reader).
The questions listed for the reading responses and the first essay will also be a good starting point for the second essay. After rereading the selected work, thinking about it, and analyzing it, students should develop a thesis statement, the central idea they will write about in their essay. The thesis should clearly state the idea about the work that the student wants to develop in the essay. As this essay will use outside sources, the thesis developed need not be one that can supported only by evidence from the text, but that can also be supported by evidence obtained from outside sources.
As the essay is limited in terms of length, the focus should be on only one or at most two aspects of the work that the student thinks are important in interpreting or reading that work. Students can refer to the instructions for Essay #1 for ideas about developing the thesis statement. The success of the essay will in part be measured by whether its thesis is clear to the reader, whether the essay successfully develops and clarifies the thesis, and whether all the steps in the writing procedure (see below) are followed.
As for the first essay, students might want to read/review the following pages prior to completing their essays.
- How To Avoid Plagiarism [J. L. McGrath, Rio Salado College]
- MLA Parenthetical Citation
- How To Format a Student Essay
- Using Quotations
- Using Ellipses
- Helpful Hints
- Revision Guidelines
- Mechanics Checklist
Part of the final assessment (grading) for this assignment will depend on the student's writing process. Students should plan to prepare a preliminary list of sources they will cite and bibliography cards for those sources, a preliminary (working) outline, notes (on notecards) from their reading, and a rough draft. Peer review, revision, and mechanics checklists will be completed in class. Any missing part will result in a lower grade.
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Last Updated 02/08/02