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CM 220UNIT 5 Seminar:

Understanding Your Audience and Outlining

Your Big Idea

General Education, CompositionKaplan University

Unit 5 Reading

Reading Where to find

Intro to Unit: The invention of the printing press, audience

Click on unit 5 reading icon

The Kaplan Guide to Successful Writing, chapters 7, 13, 14 (pp. 167-168)

Posted in Doc Sharing’s reading folder

3 editorial articles Files posted in the Reading section (click on “journal” icons to access information and links to articles)

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Unit 5 Tech Lab: Podcasts and Video

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Unit 5 Invention Lab• Invention Lab 1: Formal and informal

communications of big idea (letter to editor and post on Facebook, for example).

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APOSTROPHESUnit 5 grammar workshop

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Rules

1. Use apostrophes with nouns to indicate possession: everyone’s dream, Jane’s jacket

2. Do NOT use with possessive pronouns (its, his, hers, yours, theirs, ours)

3. Do NOT use with plurals (Americans, citizens) unless they are showing possession: Americans’ values, citizens’ rights

4. With multiple nouns, use apostrophes depending upon meaning: Bill and Jane’s wedding (one wedding), Julie’s and Kathy’s weddings (two separate weddings)

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Rules

5. Use apostrophes for contractions to show omitted letters: will not = won’t, I am = I’m

6. Use apostrophes to mark certain plural forms (letters, symbols, and words referred to as words): Sassafrass has 4 s’s.

7. APA recommends omitting the apostrophe for plurals of numbers and acronyms: PCs, 1990s

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GETTING STARTED AND MAPPING IDEAS

The Writing Process

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Getting Started with Your Big Idea

• In unit 6, you will submit a 3-5 page draft of your Big Idea.

• Why is beginning early, in unit 5, helpful to you as a writer?

• What can you do to GET STARTED?

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Common Prewriting Techniques

• Freewriting• Brainstorming• Bubbling• Clustering

• See ch. 6 of The Kaplan Guide to Successful Writing for more on the writing process.

• Listing• Informal outlining• Annotating• Questioning

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Organizational Tools

• The site on graphic organizers at http://freeology.com/graphicorgs/ has links to various charts that might be helpful to start mapping ideas for the draft.

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Bubbling Chart: Food Additives

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Listing chart: Banning cigarettes

Main points Support from sources?

Audience concerns to address

Examples I could use

Cigarettes are bad for everyone’s health, smokers and non-smokers alike

Surgeon General (warnings), medical reports on second-hand and third-hand smoke effects

Should the government outlaw everything that is bad for us (fast food, etc.?)

Childhood asthma and allergies, even ear infections, often tied into parents’ smoking

Those horrible pictures they showed in elementary school of black lungs of smokers!

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Organizing and Developing Your Ideas

• Establish a thesis• Consider writing an outline (it can be changed

later)• Take the ideas in the outline and brainstorm

each concept/argument• Begin researching and incorporating evidence to

support your argument/claims

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AUDIENCE AND PURPOSE

The next step

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Audience and Purpose

• Why is paying attention to your audience and purpose KEY to successful persuasion?

• Who is the audience you would like to communicate to?

• What do you know about them and what do you need to know about them?

• What do you want to communicate to that audience?

• How can you best communicate your information to that audience?

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Letters to the Editor

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Letters to the Editor: Topics

• Truth and fiction on the stimulus bill [Editorial]. (2010, February 20). The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/20/opinion/20sat1.html

• Mr. Obama Should Fix the Flawed Stimulus Package. [Editorial]. (2009, February 1). Retrieved from http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/31/AR2009013101535.html

• The immigration law fallacy: Will Texas be next? [Editorial]. (2010, June 16). Retrieved from http://www.examiner.com/x-51717-Dallas-Tea-Party-Examiner~y2010m6d16-The-Immigration-Law-Fallacy-Will-Texas-Be-Next

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Letters to the Editor: Discussion

• Are these letters effective?• What is the argument each makes?• Are the authors and publications credible?• Are the facts that the authors use credible? You

can go to FactCheck.org to read credible information on this topic.

• Select at least one argument in each letter that you can verify, or not, and discuss how this adds to or detracts from the writer’s argument.

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Tips for Writing Editorial Letters

• Keep it short and simple (maximum 250 words)

• Let readers know who you are• Know that editors have right to alter your

submission• Only submit to one publication at a time

(wait for acceptance or rejection) http://www.publicaffairs.ubc.ca/services-for-ubc-faculty-staff/writing-an-effective-

opinion-editorial-piece-or-letter-to-the-editor/

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What other forms might I use to present my big idea to a wider

audience?

• Post on Facebook page • Blog post• Email to friend• Flyer to distribute to community• Twitter feed• Letter to specific audience (say, the

school board)

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Helpful Writing Center Tutorials

Topic URL link to Archive

Audience and Purpose http://khe2.acrobat.com/p19397839/?launcher=false&fcsContent=true&pbMode=normal

Developing Ideas http://khe2.acrobat.com/p35695303/?launcher=false&fcsContent=true&pbMode=normal

Avoiding Writer’s Block http://khe2.acrobat.com/p13592508/?launcher=false&fcsContent=true&pbMode=normal

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Reference

The University of British Columbia. (n.d.) Writing an effective opinion-editorial piece or letter to the editor. Retrieved from http://www.publicaffairs.ubc.ca/services-for-ubc-faculty-staff/writing-an-effective-opinion-editorial-piece-or-letter-to-the-editor/

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