Purpose

A response essay with summary asks the writer to read rhetorically and respond to ideas presented within a text.  As a college student, you’ll often be asked to write papers in response to readings. Professors assign response papers because they allow you to demonstrate your ability to read complex texts carefully, understand what they mean, and think critically about them. Response papers invite you to do more than just memorize key course concepts for a test. They invite you to begin taking your place in the college community by “entering a conversation” about those concepts.

Skills: The purpose of English 111 is to help you develop and practice writing and thinking skills essential to your success in college and in your professional life beyond school. Drawing on Blooms Taxonomy of Learning Domains, we will focus on developing writerly moves that characterize strong written communication. This assignment will ask you to practice the following writing skills: Understanding, Applying, and Analyzing.

Knowledge: This assignment will focus on developing knowledge in the following course learning objectives:

• (1) Compose texts that exhibit appropriate rhetorical choices, including attention to audience, purpose, context, genre, culture, and convention.
• (2) Develop and apply strategies for critical reading, critical thinking, and information literacy.
• (5) Develop and advance thesis-driven compositions in an organized progression with appropriate supporting information.

Task

For this assignment, you will consider ideas presented in a text, write a focused summary of those ideas, craft a thesis statement outlining your response to an idea presented in the text and then support that response with evidence from the text.

 From Gerald Graff & Cathy Birkensteins They Say/I Say:

the underlying structure of effective academic writingresides not just in stating our own ideas but in listening closely to others around us, summarizing their viewsand responding with our own ideas in kind. Broadly speaking, academic writing is argumentative writing, and we believe that to argue well you need to do more than assert your own position. You need to enter a conversation, using what others say (or might say) as a launching pad or sounding board for your own views. The best academic writing has one underlying feature: it is deeply engaged in some way with other peoples views (3).

In order to prepare for this paper we will read the following articles and choose one for the paper: Anne-Marie Slaughter Why Women Still Can’t Have It All (Module 1) or Richard Dorment Why Men Still Can’t Have It All (Module 2).

To approach this assignment you will read the text carefully and begin to consider some of the following questions surrounding a focused idea presented in the text:

• As reader, what was your response to that idea? Why?
• What of the authors appeals to emotions, or reason influence your response?
• Do you trust this authors knowledge and information? Why or why not?
• What of your own knowledge, biases, or pre-conceived notions of the issue influence your response?

In your draft, briefly summarize the reading and develop your paper in response to one idea presented by the author. You will draw quotations and examples from the text to support your response. Information and ideas that you use to support your ideas should be documented with appropriate APA style in-text citations and a bibliography.