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Yasmin Martinez
Mr. Matt Moberly
Writing 10
M/W 8:00-9:50 a.m.
RR for Chapter 2
In their article "Critical Reading: Getting Srated", Sylvan Barnet and Hugo Bedau assert that
even before we read, we already know what the book will be about because of our understanding
of the subject and author. They supports their claims about previewing by showing examples of
essays, which include the thesis, underlining, and annotating when reading something. Their
purpose is to teach us how to think critically and know how to summarize and paraphrase essays
better (these two things are completely different things). They seem to have written this for
college students who cant figure out how to write a good argument essay, and the tone they use
is calm and relaxing because they really want us to master these procedures.
One interesting thing that I read was that what you annotate will depend largely on your purpose
of the writing. I found this meaningful because when I usually annotate I never thing about, oh
this might be something important, but after reading this it made me think that I should start to
annotate better and actually understand the purpose that the article, book, or essay is trying to get
across. Another thing that was really meaningful and interesting was summarizing and
paraphrasing. This was interesting because I though they were the same thing. However, I found
out that they arent. Summarizing seems to be shorter and paraphrasing seems to be longer with
more indebt thought. Lastly I realize also that plagiarism is a big problem. I knew that were not
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suppose to do this in college, but I found that even if you think you didnt plagiarize in some
occasions you might just end up not citing good enough.
The process that authors uses to make his/her argument is by showing examples of essays that
people have written and then explaining how the topic, thesis, summarizing and annotating fit
into one. They do this so we are able to understand and visualize what they are trying to get
across from. This is very effective because I could take notes and learn from these example
better so when I write any future essay I will be able to know how to write a good topic and
annotate good as well. Secondly they use ways to summarize and paraphrase. They do this by
having something to read and then showing the difference between a summary and a paraphrase.
This helped because now I could distinguish both.
The medium of this article is to know how to write a good argument essays with all the factors it
needs to be flawless. This article is specifically for first year college students who dont really
understand how to write good essays. The purpose to having this article is to let college student
see that if you follow the rules and make these changes that were presented, then the next essay
we do, or have will be good and well be able to get our point across to our audiences.
After reading this article I agree to what each topic was about. The reason why is that when I
read about the topic paragraph, it made me think thats so true because thats what the audience
will start to read first. This is important because they then will decide if they actually want to
ready my essay or not. The part that I disagree on was summarizing each paragraph and then
going back to re-read to underline and find out the key ideas. For me I feel that one time is
enough and that the key ideas should just come right through your mind somewhat quickly.