Analytical Synthesis Papers

 

 

Introduction

 

In L216, students do not take examinations.  Instead, they write copiously, as the course is designated as a university “intensive writing course.”  In addition to the daily practice of completing their Writer’s Journal assignments, students must write four formal papers in the same rhetorical style throughout the semester.  The type of paper, which I call the “analytical synthesis paper,” asks students to read and interpret a handful of texts from the course, to arrive at an idea about those texts in the context of the course topic, and to discuss their idea by referring to ideas and evidence from the texts.  I believe this type of writing, when executed successfully, is one of the hallmarks of reflective and systematic – i.e. “academic” – thinking.  Hence the importance I lay on this particular rhetorical structure in L216.

 

Assignments

 

Below I summarize the prompts for the four formal papers students are asked to write, including the length and relative weight of each.  Links connect to assignment sheets, as handed out to students.

  • Essay 1, “Point of Departure Essay,” 2 pages, 2% of final grade.  Students are invited to comment on how they see the values of the business world forming society’s values.  Since the paper is assigned on the second day of class, sources for the essay must be from the students’ own experience.
  • Essay 2, “Success in America Paper,” 3–4 pages, 10% of final grade.  I ask students to consider the costs that arise from the way Americans typically define success.  Sources must include three works from early in the semester, including a play.
  • Essay 3, “McEssay,” 4 pages, 15% of final grade.  Students critique a rationalized sector of the American economy so that they can apply the new concepts they have learned from the middle unit of the course.
  • Essay 4, “Course Topic Paper, 4 pages, 20% of final grade.  In this assignment, as in essay 1, students comment on their understanding of a hidden cost(s) associated with the American consumerist/capitalist economic system.  Sources for this essay must include three or more humanistic texts studied in the seminar, including at least one play.

 

Objectives

 

  • Turned in already during the second week of class, Essay 1 is designed primarily as a diagnostic exercise, both to poll the students’ positions vis-à-vis the course topic and to measure their writing ability.  This short paper is the first step of the students’ journey toward thinking about the course topic in a more sophisticated way.  It asks them to engage the topic seriously and perhaps to realize that they have not thought about the topic much before.
  • Essay 2, handed in around week 5, is the students’ first major paper, but at only 10% of the grade, the stakes are low enough so that the paper can still be seen as practice.  For many students, the return of this essay with my comments and a grade is the proverbial “wake up call,” i.e. a realization of deficit writing skills.  The paper asks students to reflect on some of the factors that motivate Americans to link notions of success closely with wealth.  Its rhetorical reflexivity also sets in motion student reflection on some of the many hidden costs associated with American notions of success.  While writing this paper, many students begin to see how the close linkage of wealth to American conceptions of success can be quite harmful to various members of society.
  • Essay 3, handed in around week 10, asks students to practice the writing skills of synthesis and analysis as they apply theoretical concepts to a particular sector of the economy.  In so doing, students are confronted with the extreme extent to which the American economy is rationalized, often to the detriment of quality or other difficult-to-quantify products and services.  I have intentionally sequenced this paper after students write about success in America so they will connect the linkage of notions of success and wealth with the drive to rationalize economic structures and maximize profit.  In drawing these connections, students should also notice the costs incurred when much emphasis is placed on efficiency and profit.
  • The final essay, handed in on the last day of the semester, represents the culminating writing assignment for the course.  This paper gives students yet another try at synthesis and offers them a forum where course material can be pulled together to show what they have learned and what they think with regard to the course topic.  It also offers an ideal instrument, when juxtaposed with essay 1, for measuring students’ intellectual development.  If students engage the material earnestly, one can reasonably expect to see significantly greater sophistication and complexity of thought when comparing the two essays on the same topic.

 

Results

 

After teaching the course for the first time in spring 2001, I decided I needed to find out systematically how much students were learning with respect to the specific skills associated with writing analytical synthesis papers.  I also wanted to be able to document whether students were growing intellectually vis-à-vis the main topic of the course.  As a result, I embarked on a formal classroom research project that both confirmed my hopes and raised further questions about my work as a teacher.  The results of this study and the conclusions I draw from it can be found in the “Classroom Research” section of this portfolio.

 

Possible Directions for Change

 

While the results of the classroom research project show definitive improvement in students’ writing skills, I continue to be surprised at the difficulty students encounter in mastering some of the basic building blocks of writing.  Writing a solid paragraph, for example, in which evidence is brought to bear and discussed, remains a mystery for some students throughout the semester.  Therefore, even though the four essays in L216 are carefully sequenced and have helped students to grow intellectually and improve their writing skills, I think they need additional help and practice with discussing evidence successfully and with writing strong paragraphs.  In the next version of L216 (to be taught spring 2004), I am considering replacing the first two-page diagnostic essay with three separate paragraph assignments so that students will have the opportunity to learn and practice writing paragraphs that begin with a topic sentence, incorporate evidence effectively, and connect coherently to the main point of the paper.  After students try their hand at these skills, we will move to the “Success in America” paper and thence to papers three and four, as described above.  I think these changes will allow the writing program of the course to maintain its strengths while at the same time better adapting to the needs of the students.