Peer Review Grading Grid; Essay Two

Grading Grid

1. Essay incorporates a minimum of two original research sources with proper quotation, citation, and works cited page; essay describes two different points on fast food assembly line (20%)
1              5              6              7              8              9              10

2 .Thesis statement addresses how feelings are made, who makes them, who feels them, and consequences of them (30%)
1              5              6              7              8              9              10

3. Essay contains “critical thinking” explanations in paragraphs that explain significance of feelings (20%)
1              5              6              7              8              9              10

4. Essay contains a revised sense of organization (topic sentences, unified paragraphs, transitions) (20%)
1              5              6              7              8              9              10

5. Essay contains a revised sense of style at the sentence level (free from major grammatical issues, has awareness of sentence boundaries) (10%)
1              5              6              7              8              9              10

Context and Main: Eating Animals

Jonathan Saffran Foer’s son motivated him to write his book on food ethics and factory farming, Eating Animals. In his introduction “Storytelling,” he talks about the role that digestion plays in storytelling, and how family bonds and tradition travel through food. For him, food both nourishes our bodies and helps us remember important stories about ourselves. The sensations of eating trigger memories, and childhood seems to play an important role in forming those memories – perhaps that’s why his son is so important to him. If we turn to the text by Dr. David Kessler, The End of Overeating, we might begin to learn why this is the case. Foods that are concentrated in sugar, fat, and salt help the brain’s reward center to stimulate the production of “opioids.” These endorphins go in the bloodstream and give our bodies feelings of being relaxed, comfortable, and blissful. Perhaps we can imagine, then, that the “palatable” foods we eat when we’re young give us such warm feelings throughout our life. They act as the cues for us to associate our food with those we care for, and love the most.

Foer, however, might not want to make the story here about opioids and food dependencies. In the closing section of the book, he recounts the time his Grandma ran away from the Nazi Germans during World War II. She was starving and sick from eating whatever she could find, including garbage. When she was near death, she encountered a Russian farmer who went into his house and gave her some pork. She refused to eat it. She explained to Saffran Foer, who was mystified at the decision: “if nothing matters, there’s nothing to save” (Foer 17). For her, only having a life of integrity and values was worth living. She would rather die for her identity – and her food traditions – than live doing something that went against her beliefs. Her beliefs were identical with her. This lingering line at the end of the introduction tells us something: that Saffran Foer wants to communicate the same thing. He wants to tell his son, something matters. Something is worth living for.

In the first chapter of Eating Animals Foer discusses his relationship with his dog, George. He elaborates on how odd it is to communicate with her. It is a task for him to openly communicate with his dog as an “other” being (Foer 23). For him, an “other” is a non-human “someone” (Foer 23). It is a life-form that can communicate, but not verbally. Like humans, the human-dog relationship involves vocal and physical communication; dogs, like people, have needs, emotions, and feelings. They have a kind of intelligence. Yet there remains a gap in consciousness. Foer describes the way that much of what is important between him and George remains hidden, like a secret. He and George can only be “photographs” to each other – images that obscure, at best, feelings that they can only guess at (Foer 24).

Library Visit Next Tuesday

Please be ON-TIME for the Library Visit. An in-class quiz will be given after the visit based on the session.

COME TO:

E101-B on Tuesday, 10/25, 9:15 AM – 10:15 AM

Summarizing Main Ideas: Eating Animals

Finding Main Ideas
 
In their first essays, most students had difficulty introducing the main ideas of a full text before discussing it and using quotation. To improve upon this skill, students will practice locating, defining, and summarizing the main ideas (so far) from Eating Animals. One dependable strategy is finding the author's keywords, defining them, and writing down why they're important to the text.

On their own, students will find (or create) one keyword from the reading this past weekend. When they have found it, students should note the page number, the keyword, and a brief definition. When this task is complete, students will Tweet that information in ONLY 140 characters.

After the entire class has Tweeted, students will observe what other students Tweeted and note each unique keyword that the class posts. Students should remember to write down the page numbers associated with those keywords.

When they have concluded this step, students will compose a "main ideas" context paragraph that introduces the text and its main ideas. They will then post this paragraph to their blog, and Tweet their blog to their fellow students.

Reading Quiz 8: Twittering Keywords as Critical Thinking

 Directions

Go to your Twitter homepage. Read some of your classmates Tweets about the past weekend's reading for a couple minutes. Select one that interests you, and locate the passage in the text Eating Animals. First, paraphrase the passage in question. Next, create a "keyword" that fits the the passage. Define the keyword, and then use the keyword to explain something else from the reading (open book).

For examples of keywords, refer to the class activity this past Thursday.


Keywords

Keywords are important words or phrases. They can appear in the text or they can be terms that you create to describe something important in the text.  To be a keyword, the important word or phrase must be defined in two ways. It must defined first for how it makes meaning in the specific passage from the text, but also it must be defined as a "big idea" that we can transfer to other passages and other texts. As a "big idea," the keyword becomes very valuable becomes it helps us define more than one thing (more than one situation, more than one event, more than one text, more than one conflict, more than one issue).

LIB 110: Research Determination Forms

All students need to send in their Research Determination Form ASAP. I have received it from three groups.

Blog Three: The End of Overeating

Assignment

For their third blog, students will turn to The End of Overeating and their notes on it. Keeping in mind that the blog will be read by an outside audience, students will introduce the text and summarize the main ideas from it (context). They will then focus on a specific passage that they believe is especially important. They will practice a typical paragraph: set the immediate context for their readers, correctly quote and cite a key passage, paraphrase it, and then explain the meaning of the passage using a combination of critical thinking strategies.

Directions: Students should remember to GIVE DIRECTIONS to their reader, as well as USE their critical thinking strategies in the critical thinking section.

Twitter: Students should consider Tweeting by pressing the "T" button at the bottom of their blog (near the +1 symbol).