Getting into Academic Conversations: Crashing, Gliding, Climbing, Bungee Jumping, Parkouring, Questioning, or Easing?

Getting into Academic Conversations: Crashing, Gliding, Climbing, Bungee Jumping, Parkouring, Questioning, or Easing?

Joining the Academic Conversation

Objective: To figure out how to paraphrase academic writing, putting it into your own words, in order to boost our level of thinking about our inquiry project

Class, I know that Wednesday's activity was very challenging! I appreciate your hard work on the activity, and I want to let you know that it will pay off throughout college! Please write a regular blog entry on the experience. Be sure that you try to write a whole journal to get the most benefit, not just a series of short answer questions. Think about your main beliefs about the process of trying to integrate an academic source. You can use mini-headers if that format helps (it sure helps me when I write).

Here is your chance to vent. What was the most confusing part about trying to paraphrase "The Corleone Chronicles"? Did you have any trouble with the article? How did your understanding of this article compare with your understanding of Sarah Vowell's podcast on The Godfather? Why is the focus on academic writing in college as opposed to more popular writing like Sarah Vowell's podcast? Do you agree with the academic focus? Do you think that learning this new way of arguing and debating will help you to understand other parts of your world?

What was your process? How did you choose the passage from “The Corleone Chronicles” to add to your journal? How did the passage relate to your way of thinking about genre and originality? Did you think that it was a big jump to link the two different views of originality and genre? Were they unrelated in your opinion? If so, how hard was it to find a place to relate it back to your journal, and did you feel like you were just plugging it somewhere? Had you considered The Godfather in your original journal before today? What examples had you previously included to support your view of originality? Finally, how helpful was the article in helping you to rethink the views that you had previously explored in your first journal?

If you had to do the process again (and you will!), what would you do differently to make the process go smoothly?

This is due on Thursday, April 12th at 9 am.

Thank you for your hard work,
RW