Example of Workshop

Hello

The most important daily writing that you complete in this class is the workshops and the response to the workshop. I will try to give you as much feed back for these as I can, but I also want you to pay attention to what your peers are doing as well. The workshop is important to do because it lets you look at other writer’s work and compare it to the assignment. This is often easier to do then comparing your own work to the assignment as some people find it hard to make a clear delineation between what’s on the page and what’s in their head. It is very important to have a well organized prewrite and to refer to that prewrite frequently as you prepare your draft -- this will help to keep you from getting lost in unnavigable halfspace of the essay in progress. When you’re out there trying to find the way to your own argument, it can be very helpful to hear from some one still standing on the firm ground of objectivity. The feedback of your peers is indispensable, and it is likewise just as important to serve as the sounding board yourself. In looking for inconsistencies and elements in need of improvement in the work of others, we further develop the ability to recognize these same faults in our own work.

The response to workshop is a record of your reaction to this valuable peer generated feedback. Your response is a chance for you to work out (in concrete writing) how you will change your project based on the objective reaction received from your intended audience. It will be busywork if you are not invested in the process -- the response is a very easy assignment to boilerplate your way through. It is also the greatest opportunity available for clear reflection and doing the work of a writer.

I have included an example of a well-written example of a workshop. Notice the advice given is specific and refers directly to the assignment.


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1. What is the thesis of this essay? Why do you think this is the thesis?
I think your thesis is “The internet is a political sphere.” I think this your thesis because it is stated quite plainly both as the title of your essay as well as in the last sentence of your introduction. I was, however, left wondering what you meant specifically by “political sphere” because I am not familiar with that term. The meaning is given implicitly in your essay, but I would understand your essay better if you made the definition of this term explicit.

2. Which of the body paragraphs supports the opinion contained in the thesis the most effectively? Explain your answer.
I think the second body paragraph best supports the opinion contained in your thesis. I think this is the most effective body paragraph because it starts off with a clear topic sentence about how the internet allows people to challenge political power structures and goes into some depth to explore that topic. I think this paragraph is the most unified and makes the most sense. The wording of the topic sentence also ties this paragraph in to your essay map very well since you use the same term, “challenge power structures” in both.

3. Which of the body paragraphs supports the opinion contained in the thesis the least effectively? Explain your answer.
I think the first body paragraph least supports the opinion contained in the thesis. I think this is the least effective body paragraph because it seems to lack a unifying topic sentence. When I read this paragraph, I get lost and am not really sure what central idea you are trying to express. This paragraph reads more like you are brainstorming a concept rather than logically and coherently expounding upon a central idea. Based on your essay map, I think the central idea of this paragraph is supposed to be “allows participants to gather and engage in political dialogue”, so perhaps if you created a topic sentence that states that it would give the paragraph a unifying idea.

4. What do you feel is the most effective or successful element in this essay so far?
I think the most effective element in this essay is the thesis. Even though I can’t explicitly grasp what you mean by ‘political sphere’, I can guess easily at it by your essay. Your topic is original and the voice you write with is very engaging and easy to read. I also like that you have a well-written and well-defined essay map.

5. What do you feel is the least effective or successful element in this essay so far?
I think the least effective element is the lack of a unified flow. You obviously have thought a lot about this topic and have a lot to say, but I felt myself getting lost. Your essay reads almost as if you were brainstorming and still needed to go back and “tighten” everything up. I think you have an excellent thesis and essay map, so to help unify your paragraphs it would be nice to take each point from your essay map and create a topic sentence for each separate paragraph under which to unify and develop your ideas.
I also think it would be nice if you explicitly define what you mean by ‘political sphere’. I think that this might help me to organize my thoughts to better follow your essay. For example, the first part of your second body paragraph starts with, “Today, politics is a profession that aims to create and control messages…” and goes on to explain what politics outside the internet is like. I’m not convinced that this information needs to be in your essay as you are just trying to convince people that “the internet is a political sphere” and not necessarily that it is a better political sphere. So maybe this is a place you can dedicate to simply defining ‘political sphere’.
Another thing I noticed is that your essay doesn’t follow the format laid out by Professor Gallegos. First, we are supposed to discuss “pre-existing, established examples of the category.” So you would need to discuss existing examples of “political spheres”. Then define the characteristics for the group. So you would describe what criteria all of these political sphere’s have in common. And then explain how your topic, the Internet, possesses these same characteristics. So I guess discussing the established political sphere of the media would be appropriate, but you would want to center on what characteristics it has so that your other political sphere, the internet, can be placed in the same category. Perhaps categories of political spheres could be the newspaper, cable news programs, and student political clubs?
Right now, I feel like your essay is more “evaluative” (the internet is a better political sphere) rather than definitive (simply, the internet is a political sphere). If you look at the Argument of Definition Reminder on the ‘schedule’ for this class it will probably help a lot.
I also think you should get some references to back-up your claims and use citations. Maybe you could find the opinion of some experts who agree with you and use their opinion to help back-up your own.

6. Describe the voice of the essay.
The voice of your essay is very fluid. You write as though you are talking which is a good thing for clarity. Your voice is very forceful and opinionated. I feel like you aren’t one to disagree with. You use a lot of complex sentences that require a lot of commas. You also have a big vocabulary and use a lot of big words, but I found them to be natural choices that worked best to express your ideas (which you appear to be very passionate about).

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