Posted: September 13th, 2017

Free write 6 (E)

Free write 6 (E)

Project description
Please be sure to read Chapter 12 on thesis statements in Writing Analytically before completing this activity!

Step 1: Reflecting on all the thinking you’ve done so far, if you had to state your thesis for Essay 3 right now, what would you say? Write out your tentative thesis in one or two sentences. Remember that your thesis might address both similarities and differences between the poems (the reading from our textbook as well as the comparison/contrast handout in the Essay 3 folder will give you some ideas for generating a thesis).

Step 2: Chapter 12 in Writing Analytically offers great strategies on thesis-building, and for this freewrite, we’ll look at the ideas for rephrasing thesis statements. Try using at least TWO of the following tips, and then write out a revised version of your thesis. In addition, post a couple of sentences of explanation in which you state which tips you’re using in your revised version (something like “I made my noun more specific by…, and I modified my thesis by specifying that…”).

Thesis Tips:

Choose a more active (and informative) verb for your thesis. Are you using a verb like “is” in your thesis? See if you can find a more active and specific verb that more clearly indicates your point.
Make sure the nouns in your thesis are very specific. “Voice,” for example, is pretty vague, but “First-person, highly conversational voice” is specific.
Modify (or “qualify”) your thesis in a specific way. If you are saying that the poems have “strong emotional content,” you need to modify this to tell the reader exactly how and why this is true: you could use a word like “because” to easily modify your thesis (maybe the poems have “strong emotional content because the poet utilizes repetition and vivid imagery to evoke the sadness surrounding divorce“).
Try subordination in your thesis. Use a subordinate (dependent) clause in combination with an independent clause in your thesis: begin your thesis with a subordinate clause, and then put your most important/significant point in the independent clause which follows. A thesis doesn’t have to use subordination, of course, but using this “complex sentence” pattern is often a quick tool to add more detail and clarify important information within your thesis.
If there are other tips in Chapter 12 you want to try, feel free to specify the ones you are using!

Set Two: Ted Kooser, So This is Nebraska and Two
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/171336 http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/248688