EWRT211-62: portfolio suggestions

The portfolios are due Wednesday night. 

At this point, whether you pass or fail EWRT 211 has nothing to do with your grade in the class. Now it all comes down to the strength of your portfolio.

Make sure you have read the portfolio guidelines carefully. If there is anything that you are unsure about, then ask me. Here are a few additional comments:

• The portfolio should contain three essays: the reflective essay, an out-of-class essay, and an in-class essay.
  
• The reflective essay should be a clean final draft. It goes on top of the portfolio. You should not include any other drafts or notes.
  
• The out-of-class essay will be either essay 1: family, or essay 3: writing. You should rewrite this essay. Clarify the thesis, add additional illustrations or explanations where necessary. Fix grammar, spelling, and punctuation. Keep in mind that the other reader of your portfolio will have copies of all the essay prompts, so the reader will know if your essay is on prompt or not. Include only a clean final draft in your portfolio. Do not include other drafts or my comments.
  
• The out-of-class essay will be the one you've had the most time to work on, so it'll be the one that will carry the most weight in your portfolio.
• The in-class essay will either be essay 2: melting pot, or essay 4: art and communication. This essay cannot be rewritten. You must include the actual essay you wrote in class, no matter how messy it is. Please remove my comment sheet before you include the essay in your portfolio. Obviously, you can't remove the comments I made in the body of your essay.
• At least one essay must be an analytical essay. An analytical essay is an essay that takes apart a text and looks at how that text works. The only essay that is not analytical is essay 1: family. So if you decide to include this essay, make sure that your in-class essay demonstrates that you can provide a clear and well-supported analysis of a text (or texts). If both your in-class essays are weak, then you may want to consider including essay 3 as your out-of-class essay, since this one involves the analysis of two texts.
• You don't need a fancy folder or anything for your portfolio. Just staple or paper clip the three essays together. 

EWRT211-62: portfolio guidelines

Just in case, here's a .pdf of the portfolio guidelines and the prompt for the reflective essay.

E-mail me in you have any questions about this or the partner projects.

EWRT211-62: essay 4 prep

There will be four prompts for essay 4. Again, you will choose one to write on. The first three prompts deal with one essay each. Each prompt asks you to evaluate how well the essay makes a certain point. The fourth prompt asks you to contrast two essays to explain how one is written more successfully than the other.

The main goal of this essay is to take something we've read and to show the relationship between the pieces of the essay and one of its main arguments. This is what we've been working on in your own writing: getting all the elements of your paper to work towards proving the thesis. Now I want you to show how another author does this, or perhaps doesn't do this.

So the elements that you could show in your examples are all the ones we've gone over this quarter. You could look at the clarity of the thesis statement itself (is the main argument clear in the essay?), the PIE structure (do the paragraphs have clear points, examples, and explanations?), the amount of evidence (is there enough to prove the points?), the explanation of the evidence (is it clear what the evidence is there to prove?), the understanding of the audience (does the author explain things that the audience needs to know?), and appeals (how does the author use logos, pathos, and ethos to make the points?). You also may want to point out the rhetorical modes used by the author. For instance, does an author use contrast successfully to make a point? Does the author do a nice job of explaining a process? Is there a cause and effect relationship that is not adequately explained?

Overall, this essay will require a close reading and a clear understanding of the essay you will be writing about.

Feel free to e-mail me with any lingering questions. Or post a comment here so other students can read it.

EWRT211-62: essay 3 final draft

So the final draft of essay 3 is due Monday, March 9. Hand in both drafts at that time. Remember to use MLA citation, both in text and works cited. See pages 529-538 of our book.