Today in class Professor Joyce introduced us to effective ways of analyzing a source before deciding whether or not the source is applicable in a research paper.

First, one must ask these questions:

1. What do you know about the topic before you read about the topic or issue?
2. What can you tell about the source before you read it?

After answering those questions spot read.

• examine the table of contents, index, or glossary
• Read the introduction and conclusion
• Write down observations/ read in a critical manner
• Read the first scentence of each paragraph
• Look for key words and transitions

Next, analyze the organization of the source by using rhetorical analysis and honing in on headings and chapter titles.

Finally, examine points of difficulty.

• points of disagreement
• points of confusion

Prof. Joyce administered a handout in class today and on Monday we will do a deep analysis of the article and will turn in short write F.

Short write F is on JAC page 50 ( answer questions in detailed prose and be analytical)

Wednesday, October 13th, 2010

In Class today:
We signed up for conferences. Unlike the previous conferences, these are individual cnferences, as opposed to group conferences. Many sign up times are still available for Tuesday, as most Monday slots are filled up.

Because it was difficult to get all of the classes into the library, we got a tutorial on refining searches via screen shots.
We read Refining Searches in the WVU databases: A Quick Tutorial.
As an example, we did Global Warming, which is one of the 6 topics you may not use. The search brought up 23,501 results. That is way too many. Idealistically, you would like to refine your search so it's down to an amount that you can sit and skim through. She added "Greenland Shark", and it narrowed her search down to 1, which is far too few results. She changed it to "The Effects of Global Warming on Polar Bears." That expanded it to 163 articles. By adding "Breeding" it narrowed the search down to 4 articles.

We also did a Keywords and Synonyms Research Exercise.
It involved extracting keywords from the 3 articles we picked, and then found synonyms for those keywords. Lastly, we found words that were associated with the keywords, but not necessarily synonyms. At the end of the exercise, we had a good amount of words we could use to better search our topics.

The Homework (Due Friday, October 15th)
1. Read the JAC pages 109-116
2.Write a 1 page proposal and bring to class friday.

Monday, October 11, 2010

In class today:

JAC covered all the activities that we did today. First of all,  We started off by brainstorming those two questions that Prof. Joyce provided us. Such as :

1. If you want to change the world, how would you change it? 
2. What process do you have to go about?

Later on, we did more brainstorming according to those questions that were in the JAC on pg 83, and we needed to answer all the questions to give us heads-up for our next major paper.  Finally, on pg 84, Prof. Joyce explained to us the differences between Subjective and Objective. 

• Subjective- judgmental, emotional, and opinionated
• Objective- factual rational, and researched (ex: News Analysis & Editorial) 

Some of the forbidden topics for this assignment are :

1. Global warming
2. Euthanasia
3. lowering the drinking age
4. Legalizing marijuana
5. Mountaintop removal   

Homework due on Wednesday (13th):

1. Read JAC Pg 96- 102
2. Find 3 articles (don't have to be on same topic) and create reader response sheet (JAC Pg 65) for all 3 (Print the form and bring the response of your articles - Double Entry Notes)  

  

Monday, October 4

Today in class we learned about plagiarism. Prof. Joyce discussed illegal downloading of music as well as other forms of multimedia and how this is considered plagiarism. We discussed the law of copyright. Authors can have a copyright claim on their work for over 80 years. Their children and descendants can claim that work and reap the benefits even after the author has passed. We also talked about creative commons which is when someone takes someone else's work and changes it in some way. There are different levels of creative commons starting with just taking a work and changing it for your personal use all the way up to changing a work and generating money from it. Wikipedia is an example of a creative commons.

The overall message today was don't plagiarize the information in your papers. Here is a list of what must have a citation.

1. quotes and paraphrases

2. fact when not widely known

3. claims that are arguable that isn't your own

4. judgments or opinions

5. photos, charts, graphics, etc.

6. collaborative work

Homework: Continue working on your midterm portfolio including the midterm memo, editorial analysis, and edits to the news analysis. The midterm portfolio is due on Friday. Bring Everything's an Argument to class on Wednesday.

Oct 1

Today we went over the worksheet on MLA citations from last week.

Our homework is to continue work on our editorial analysis and midterm memo.