Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais

Faculdade de Letras

2012/1

Academic WritingAcademic Writing

Professor: Vivian Margutti

Bruna Luiza, Clara Nogueira, Isabella Melano, Letícia Oliveira and Rosana

Soares.

FROM TOPIC TO FROM TOPIC TO PRESENTATION: PRESENTATION:

Making Choices to Making Choices to Develop Your WritingDevelop Your Writing

INTRODUCTIONINTRODUCTION

The Professor in theStudent's position

How to make a Writing assignment.

New ways of understanding writing and revision.

The Professor in theStudent's position

How to make decisions about Essay Developing and Revision. Using Feedback from peers and instructors. Making revision choices related to such

feedback.

Do a lot of research.

MY STUDENT’S SUGGESTED MY STUDENT’S SUGGESTED WRITING TOPICSWRITING TOPICS

Getting to Work

Choosing a Topic. "When you find about a topic that is interesting

and challenging, you've probably got a good subject that will sustain your attention during the harder parts of the writing."   (Hewett)

The motive behind research. Need or desire to answer a question for which

you want to know more.

BRAINSTORMINGBRAINSTORMING

INITIAL, OR ZERO, DRAFTINITIAL, OR ZERO, DRAFT

Great way to begin; less detailed.

Useless in a peer response session.

Preliminary Draft is based on it.

Brainstorming + zero draft = start writing with fewer difficulties.

PRELIMINARY DRAFTPRELIMINARY DRAFT

More detailed; it uses various source citations for authority.

Deep knowledge of the topic through more research; an attempt to express informed opinion through a coherent assertion.

Entire argumentative essay = support an opinion that convinces the reader it is reasonable.

Revision: content, organization, and sentence-level issues.

PRELIMINARY DRAFT AND PRELIMINARY DRAFT AND TRACKED CHANGESTRACKED CHANGES

ContextualizingSmall details such as dates can contextualize an entire argument.

ExamplesWhenever setting an example to illustrate the essay’s topic, make clear it is the starting point to your thesis, not its statement. Use examples to support your thesis statement.

Choose strong sources to support your argumentNot having one, use the best one available. Consider different assertions, use counterarguments and return to your arguments.

Try to be formalAvoid colloquial sentences.

Connect your ideasContent = what holds things together.

“We can’t convince everyone to take our position in na argument although we can present reasonable evidence.” (Hewett, page 74)

Methods for arguing

A counterargument: To consider the valid points of view;

Acknowledging (and sometimes refuting) counterarguments can increase ethos or believability, as a writer.

Arguing from anecdote (a story)A continuation of argument from past (to present).

A very convincing technique as people tend to believe that what was possible in the past can be in the present or future.

Presents “authorities” on the subjectA person that has believable scholarly authority can make his/her points stronger.

CONCLUSIONCONCLUSION

Even the best advice cannot always be put into effect in an essay revision.

Being able to explain your choices about your revision.

Accepting revision changes, spellchecking, and proofreading = editing steps to create a presentation draft (for “publication”).

Revisions could make the argument stronger.

As you begin your next essay, apply whatever version of this brainstorming, zero draft, research, preliminary draft, feedback, revision, and presentation draft approach that fits your writing process.

Bibliography

BETH. Hewett L. From Topic to Presentation: Making Choices to Develop Your Writing. In: Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing, Volume 1. Parlor Press, 2010.