September 29, 2003
English 1A Study Notes

Before you begin reading "Chapter 1" of the SMG, please make sure you have carefully reviewed the syllabus and the other materials on the 1A homepage. Each of these resources--from the course calendar through the general rubric, community of writers and civility guidelines, andthe Luis Rodriguez links--will play an important role in this class. A quiz on these materials during class on Monday should not come as a surprise to anyone.

Reading the "Introduction" to the SMG

For me, the first chapter of SMG serves primarily to explain why we are taking the time to study and practice personal and analytical writing. The chapter also lays out for the basics of the writing process and explores in detail how the text walks you through that process as you compose essays for this class. Because you will work with SMG for at least two quarters, you should invest yourself in carefully reviewing the organization of the book and the various learning resources it provides. (By the way, if you click on the SMG icon on the 1A home page, you will find yourself at the official SMG web site in all of its glory. There you will find many useful support resources.)

For Monday's class, you should also practice your college reading skills. In particular, I would like to see you annotate this (and the other texts we read this quarter) as you are reading. If you do not already know how to annotate while you read, pages 529-537 of the SMG explain the method and demonstrate its application to Martin Luther King's "Letter from Birmingham Jail."

Annotating while you read

Experience as both a student and a teacher has convinced me that annotation offers the best combination of efficiency and effectivess among the range of available study strategies. You could, for example, take detailed notes while you read. This might help you remember more, but would also consume more time than you probably need to spend as you read and study these SMG chapters for the first time. You could also just read without annotating, but that would require you to reread the entire chapter again when you reveiwed for quizzes, referred to the chapters while writing your papers, or prepared for the course final. By combining allowing you to read at a relatively rapid pace, reinforcing your reading through underlining, circling, and composing margin notes, and helping you find and quickly review the most important information later, the annotation reading and study method provides a highly effective and relatively time efficient approach. I strongly recommend--no, not really--I insist that you learn and practice this method in both of the texts we work with in this class. I think you will find this skill an invaluable tool as you study at UCR.

So you know that I practice what I preach, I have scanned a page from "Chapter 1" into these study notes. As you can see from this image, I have atrocious, nearly incoherent hand writing. That's ok. I can read it (sometimes!). But you will also note that I underline key passages, circle key terms, and jot down notes and ideas in the margin. Now, when I go back to construct the kind of quiz question that will drive you crazy and shame you into reading all of your assigned material, I have a detailed index of what I found important as I first read and studied the chapter.

The Writer's Inventory

Once you have read this chapter (and annotated it!), please move on to the writer's inventory activity (word file / rtf file / pdf file). This will give you an opportunity to reflect on what you have read and me the chance to see how you feel about writing and your writing skills. Please email me your completed inventory (jim_sullivan@mac.com) and bring a print out of your completed assignment to class. Remember, we share writing in class. So do not be surprised when I ask you to read parts of your answer to a smaller group or the class as a whole.

See you Monday.

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Page last updated: 26 September, 2003