The document provides instructions for students to analyze a sample revision of a piece by Hillary Clinton. It asks students to:
1) Notice the extent and nature of revisions between the original and revised versions, whether minor word changes or larger additions.
2) Focus on revisions that change how the audience is addressed.
3) Identify sections that underwent major revision.
Students are then asked to apply these skills of analyzing revision by developing revision plans for papers by other authors, suggesting how to address problems, better support the thesis, appeal to audiences, and what content needs more or less emphasis. The plans will be discussed in the next class.
2. Next up: Revision
We’ve talked a bit about revision, but I wanted to
show you revision in action. Bear in mind as you look
at this example, you don’t have to agree– or have to
disagree– with the content. We’re looking at
rhetorical moves and the nature of the revision.
I know I say that a lot, but I want you to remember–
this isn’t politics class. You aren’t being judged for
your stance on issues, nor do you need to agree with
anything we use in class.
3. On my Tumblr
You will find this image, and a link under it. Please
click the link and read over this piece.
4. Key points to take away
There are three things I want you to notice in
particular about Clinton’s revisions:
1) Notice the differences in how fine grain some are
vs. others. Sometimes it’s just a word choice, or
word order, but often it’s the inclusion of longer
phrases or entire new sentences.
2) Notice how many of them are about knowing his
audience (changing “people” to “folks” for
example)
3) Look at the mostly green spots– the points of
MAJOR revision. What do you notice?
5. Having seen this…
We now have a sort of way to visualize revision.
What I’d like you to do next pick one of the two
readings from CCM today.
What we’re going to do is what you will do next clas
when you workshop your inquiry 2 drafts: we’re going
to build revision plans for the author based on our
sense of their text.
On the next slide are the tasks for building this plan.
6. Revision Plan:
You want to ask these things:
1) Are there MAJOR problems? If so, how can you
highlight them and what do you suggest to correct
them?
2) What’s the thesis/major claim? Does the essay
support that throughout?
3) Where are places where you feel that better
appeals could be made to the audience? How
might this be achieved?
4) Where do you want more? What do you want
more of? Why?
5) Where do you want less? What do you want
instead?
*more on next slide*
7. Revision Plan:
Your goal as you answer these questions is to
present the author of the CCM piece with a sort of
road map to revising, a carefully, thoughtfully written
piece of advice on what to change and how to
change it so that the final product is better.
Write these up, save them as word documents (or if
you want, put them on your Tumblr) and have them
ready for class discussion to start us off on Tuesday.
8. Next Thursday
Next Thursday, there will be a guest speaker on
campus: Dr. Cindy Selfe from Ohio State University.
She’s going to speak about the topic of Transnational
Literacy.
I’d like you all to attend, but it’s at a weird timeslot: 5-
6:30. I am going to hold a modified in the afternoon
so that you can attend, but if you cannot make that
time, please let me know ASAP.
Earlier class: you get to choose. Would you like to
meet, or would you like to go to the presentation
instead?
9. For Tuesday: Homework
Bring your rough draft of inquiry 2 for workshop. We will
be developing revision plans, as we did here, so most of
class will be dedicated to that. Bring a digital copy– I want
to show all of you how to do some commenting in MS
Word.
Forum prompt: We’ve now learned a host of new terms,
taught each other even more terms, and we’ve taken a
rhetorical stance toward texts. So now… we figure out
where we are. Post one term you’re unclear on, then look
at other posts until you find a term you feel confident
about and post your definition to help that student to
better understand.