"Come writers and critics who prophesize with your pen and keep your eyes wide, the chance won't come again..."
REACTION/REVIEW PAPER: GUIDELINES
Six reaction/review papers are required of all students. These should be no more than one page. The reports should focus on the assigned readings/listening assignments/films. These reports should not be synopses or content summaries. They should, rather, focus on particular sections, subsections, scenes, themes, or characters and address one or more of the following questions:
The report can be personal and address issues from your point of view. Thus you can present your reactions using the first person and referring, perhaps, to your experiences. The report could, however, deal with the issues and ideas from a more detached "objective" viewpoint. Such an approach would be most effectively rendered in third person.
Tip: In so short a paper, you are more likely to be successful if you limit your focus to a particular point or very few points and address that point(s) with great specificity.
Technical guidelines (key to a professional presentation)
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EVALUATION FORM: REACTION/RESPONSE PAPER
M. Thomas, Instructor
Student:
Paper title or subject
Dimensions of Evaluation - (0 = unacceptably flawed, 1 = major and minor flaws limit success, 2 = one major or numerous minor flaws, 3 = perfection spoiled by minor flaws, 4 = superb
Overall, in Sum (5 points possible)
Narrative Response: (My notes on the paper)
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REACTION/REVIEW PAPER: GUIDELINES
Six reaction/review papers are required of all students. These should be no more than one page. The reports should focus on the assigned readings/listening assignments/films. These reports should not be synopses or content summaries. They should, rather, focus on particular sections, subsections, scenes, themes, or characters and address one or more of the following questions:
- What is the purpose(s) of this work? How does the artist or author want to affect the reader or audience?
- What techniques or methods does the author or artist use to achieve his/her purpose(s)?
- How effective is the work and why is it effective (or ineffective)?
- What was your reaction to the particular points the author addressed or details the author emphasized?
- How does the author or artist deal with a particular issue or employ a specific stylistic device?
- What can the reader/listener/viewer learn about effective expression from this work?
The report can be personal and address issues from your point of view. Thus you can present your reactions using the first person and referring, perhaps, to your experiences. The report could, however, deal with the issues and ideas from a more detached "objective" viewpoint. Such an approach would be most effectively rendered in third person.
Tip: In so short a paper, you are more likely to be successful if you limit your focus to a particular point or very few points and address that point(s) with great specificity.
Technical guidelines (key to a professional presentation)
- 1inch margins - top, bottom, both sides
- A conventional font (12 point) - Arial, Calibri, Times New Roman, Tahoma, or Verdana, for example. Courier is also OK. It is a "throwback" font that looks like typewriting.
- For these papers use parentheses to indicate the source, page number or line number of any quotation, anecdote or etc. that you refer to (Wilentz, p. 12). In longer papers citations will have to be more thorough.
- Use "left only" justification.
- For quotations that extend to more than four lines of verse or prose, place quotations in a free-standing block of text and omit quotation marks. Start the quotation on a new line, with the entire quote indented one inch from the left margin; maintain double-spacing.
- All of this basically exists to make the tasks of professional editors less tedious.
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EVALUATION FORM: REACTION/RESPONSE PAPER
M. Thomas, Instructor
Student:
Paper title or subject
Dimensions of Evaluation - (0 = unacceptably flawed, 1 = major and minor flaws limit success, 2 = one major or numerous minor flaws, 3 = perfection spoiled by minor flaws, 4 = superb
- Presentation (titling and cosmetics) – 10%
- Structure, sentence/paragraph level/continuity – 40%
- Insight – 25%
- Support (logic, documentary references) – 25%
Overall, in Sum (5 points possible)
Narrative Response: (My notes on the paper)
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