This is our final class day for this session. We will discuss the updates made to the essay based upon the previous meeting. We will discuss future coaching opportunities.

For our final class, we will review the strengths and weaknesses of your final essay. We will discuss future opportunities for development before returning to college.

This week, we will transition from short answer responses to essays. our focus will be on developing a strong thesis (the main idea of your essay), strong topic sentences (to expand your thesis), and creating strong evidence to support your topic sentences. We will also cover the “reflect and project” conclusion. Our goal is to review these skills and create a method for you to use to be able to create an essay quickly, especially in exam situations.

Homework - Chapter 6 "Writing Essays"

• Complete an outline for an essay on the topic of your choice. We will use the information we have covered in our reading selections (and beyond) to support a thesis that will be proven throughout the essay. 

• Focus on establishing a strong thesis, engaging introduction, and topic sentences. 

• Find the evidence needed to support the topic sentences in the articles (or secondary sources)

We are moving from writing summaries (to demonstrate comprehension) to writing paragraphs to demonstrate “reason”. This week we will develop our analytical, evaluative, and persuasive writing skills through the short answer response. We will work on this skill because as you move beyond freshman-level writing, you will have more short answer response exams.

We will explore the structure and methods for writing short answer responses.

Homework - Chapter 5 "Writing Paragraphs" - (Establishing Claims, Citing Evidence and Developing Warrants)

Complete practice short answer responses over Ige Guobadia's "Spoils of War: Repatriation of Benin Kingdom Artifacts" and "Hillary Clinton's Women's Rights are Human Rights".

Lab #7 “Writing Paragraphs and Quoting Evidence”

We will merge what we learned about topics and main ideas to write an academic summary. You will read Ige Guobadia’s, “Spoils of War: Repatriation of Benin Kingdom Artifacts”, find her main points, and write them in your own words using the objective tone. The point of the summary is to inform, so you will need to write in the third person, attribute all ideas to the author, and accurately communicate the main point of each paragraph using the skills we learned in the previous classes.

Homework - (Chapter 5) - "Writing Paragraphs" (Communicating Major Details)

• Write a summary of Ige Guobadia's "Spoils of War: Repatriation of Benin Kingdom Artifacts" in Mythology and Belief for Readers and Writers (Chapter 8 "Rhetoric")

• Lab 5 - “Topics”

• Lab 6 “Main Ideas”

Week 4 - Annotating - Finding Main Ideas, Thesis Statements, and Topic Sentences.

Homework - Chapter 3 - "Topics and Main Ideas" - Mythology and Belief for Readers and Writers.

• Complete practice exercises for locating topics, topic sentences and finding main ideas.

• Read Hillary Clinton's "Women's Rights are Human Rights" in preparation for the next class. Mythology and Belief for Readers and Writers (Chapter 8 "Rhetoric")

• Lab 4 “Topics and Main Ideas”

Annotating - Questioning and Finding Topics

During our class meeting, we will discuss vocabulary strategies and the importance of understanding vocabulary to build general comprehension and develop the technical language needed to write academically.

We will discuss language and vocabulary in relation to tone. We will work on objective toned writing (informative/formal/academic writing) versus subjective toned writing (entertaining/persuasive/casual/emotional writing).

We will review the foundation of rhetoric, Subject/Topic, Audience, Occasion, Purpose, Speaker, and Tone. Chapter 8 - "Rhetoric" - Mythology and Belief for Readers and Writers

Homework - Annotate Article #2 - Look for topics in paragraphs. Annotate them in the margins. Write a summary of the article using an objective tone.

• Each paragraph of the article should have a sentence conveying its message. 

Lab 2 “Speaker, Occasion and Audience”

Lab 3 “Purpose and Tone”

During our first meeting, we will review five articles appropriate to the results of the aptitude tests. Articles will be selected according to the student's Lexile reading level based upon the TSI results. We will review the information covered in her previous INRW 0405 class and assess her ability to annotate and summarize. 

Homework - Annotate Article #1 - Locate the main ideas and write a summary.

• Explain your overall impression of the article by offering a general overview of its content.

• Chapter 2 - "Vocabulary" from Mythology and Belief for Readers and Writers

  • Practice using words in context with synonym clues, antonym clues, example clues, and inference clues.

• Lab 1 - “Vocabulary”

Visit any of the Collin College Campuses to take the “My Plan” aptitude test.

"My Plan" is free to Collin College students at the  Collin College Career Center.  Students must go through an orientation with one of the career counselors. The orientation takes about 20 minutes. After completing orientation, students take the "My Plan" assessment, which usually takes about an hour. There are four sections of the test: (1) Personality, (2) Career Interests (3) Skills Profile and (4) Values. Although you are not required to take each section, I would like for you to take ALL of the assessments so that we can interpret and apply the data.

We will review your results and schedule a follow-up meeting with a career counselor. We will consider academic degrees/majors and non-degree options.

I also would like you to complete the "Strengths Finder" assessment. I am interested in your top five strengths. The information for that exam is below. 

https://store.gallup.com/p/en-us/10108/top-5-cliftonstrengths#

If you would like to have all 34 of your strengths and weaknesses ranked, choose the second link below.

https://store.gallup.com/p/en-us/10003/cliftonstrengths-34#details