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All students are required to comment TWICE a week. A week goes from Monday to Sunday. A comment can be a response to my or others' posts --- or a new post. All posts must be relevant to class discussions and assignments. Each post should be 1-3 paragraphs. Remember, it is OK to disagree with one another, but we must always be RESPECTFUL of one another.
27 comments:
For my persuasive essay, I found that research and coming up with facts was very easy. There are lots of articles out there on the internet about numerous topics, and they have great information to use in any essay. My topic was animal testing, and there were many organizations that had their own websites that were for/against animal testing that provided me with lots of good facts and information to use. The part that I found difficult was that I did not know how to argue against animal testing without using emotion. I had to focus on using logic and morals to persuade my audience, which took some time to figure out. Another hard part was finding statistics that were accurate, because there are many sites on the internet that are either old, or made up, so it was hard to find a site that I could trust. Also, once I had all of the facts and articles about my topic, I found that it was very easy to just write about why it was wrong, because it was a topic that I actually cared about, so I was interested in what I was writing about. Overall, this assignment was easy to write once I had my arguments, but hard to start off by picking things that didn't have to do with emotion.
When writing my persusive essay, I thought it was difficult to stay on topic. I had three different reasons, plus my devils advocate, but within those three reasons, there are more reasons. It was difficult to stay on the same topic throughout the paragraph because all my ideas were some how connected, and it was hard to write so much about one of my ideas. Therefore, since it was difficult to not connect the ideas, it was easy to transition from one paragraph to another. Also, it was hard to avoid logical fallacies. They are so common in essays and now that i realize it, I probably have written my essays with plenty of logical fallacies. They are difficut to stay away from and very common to use.
For me, it was easy to write so much about my side of the argument. My topic was Chris Christie's idea of cutting school budgets in the state. Because I am a student, it was very easy to state my opinion on cutting the budgets for schools. It's probably harder for someone to write an essay for this topic when they are not a student.
I wrote my persuasive essay on teen driving, I found that it was difficult for me to right because it was hard for me to find information on topic. I found alot of information that was not specific enough, so I had to keep looking till I found more details. Another thing that was difficult was finding three major topics to argue and sticking to them. There are alot of little things wrong with the laws, so it was hard to find three main ones to fight against. The thing that was easy for me was making a devil's advicate because there are so many websites online with people arguing for the laws. It was easier there was more information for the laws for government officials, then real faults. There was alot of people complaining about the laws, but there arguments were not as strong as the people for it.
For this last essay, which I focused on the topic of Legalizing Marijuana. This essay was one of the easier ones for me, because it wasn't involved in the current book we were reading at the time, which is usually more difficult for me. However, there were still a few aspects that were difficult.
I found it easy to get information that I needed. I easily found facts, statistics, and a devils advocate that made my argument stronger. The hardest part though, was using the information I found to put into a good and organized manor that would effectively help my side of the argument. I believe this was because I had some random, but useful points that I had to leave out because I could not find an appropriate place to put them in my paper. Overall, I enjoyed writing this essay and it was not too difficult.
I agree with eelphick in the fact that the research was easy. I did the healthcare bill, and there was much controversy on that topic. It was also easy to find quotes for my essay because many different politicians on different sides stated their opinion. However, the hardest thing for me to do was write the devil's advocate. It was difficult to think of a realistic argument that the other side would have. It was also difficult to avoid creating a strawman out of my devil's advocate. The devil's advocate had to be realistic and hard to argue against, which was difficult for me. Also, once I had come up with a good devil's advocate, I had a hard time arguing against it. I had to think of many different approaches to it, and see which one is the best. It took me the majority of the time that I was writing this essay to write those two paragraphs.
The easiest part of writing my persuasive essay was thinking of three main reasons why people should agree with my side. This was easy because from the beginning I already had ideas of what to write about even without looking up information. The harder part was the details and finding the right information to go with what I wanted to write about. Another tough part about writing my persuasive essay was finding the details for my devil's advocate. I knew from my information what I wanted to write about for my devil's advocate but none of the information I found was detailed enough to help me write a lot. Finding information was easiest for most people but for me it was not as easy. There was a lot of information but none of it had much details it just explained the main points to each view and point on what I was writing about. Putting the whole essay together at the end was probably one of the easier parts of the essay. It was not too difficult to edit and put everything where it should be.
The hardest thing for me to do with my persuasive essay, was probably finding examples or evidence for my reason. It was hard because most people are against gay marriage, and there seems to be more reasons to be against it, than for it. Also, developing my whole essay was sort of difficult because when you're writing about an extremely controversial topic, it is hard to get all the information you want into a well developed essay. You want to make sure you hit every point just right. However, you don't want to make it too long or too short. You always have to make sure you have enough evidence too support your argument. On the other hand, the easiest thing for me, like most of the others said, was the research. Researching gay marriage was quite easy because there are many people who have opinions about this topic and I was able to read some of the opinions, and get to understand different point of views. Overall, this persuasive essay was at a medium difficulty for me.
For my persuasive essay, I thought it was very challenging to find a good devils advocate. My topic was deforestation, and the more I researched I realized that this really was a controversial topic. Thus, it made it difficult for to find one strong devils advocate since all of the opposing sides arguments were strong. Once I finally found a strong devils advocate I went straight to work and everything from there seemed to be easy. Another issue I had was my transitions I seemed to have very strong arguments but I had trouble to really introduce them in a smooth and effective way. I feel one of my strengths in this essay was that I avoided logical fallacies. I made sure that all my augments were strong enough to bring my point across, in doing this I made sure that these arguments could be backed up by facts and quotes in order to make them stronger. I also thought that I was able to argue my topic very well because deforestation is something I cared about. After researching further into this topic I realized how important this current issue was. That is why it was hard for me not to put to much emotion in to my arguments.
For my persuasive essay, the hardest thing for me was finding facts that supported my argument. It would have been easy to just appeal to emotion and that is what i tried to avoid doing the most. I think i appealed to logic and reason for the most part but the research for that was not all cut and dry. It took a while to fins information that I could use. This was frusterating because i wanted to be able to just sit down and right and not have to reference anything. Persuading my audience with the truth and logic of what really happens in our prisons and on death row was my best bet to a strong argument.
For my persuasive essay, there was a combination of both easy and hard elements. I agree with eelphick in that the research was relatively easy. I was able to find a great amount of percentages, studies, and statistics on bullfighting that were accurate. I was able to locate peer reviewed sources easily. In addition, I could understand the process of bullfighting very clearly after doing an adequate amount of research. Therefore, understanding my topic was another element I found to be easy. There was also a clear side I was on after being informed of the topic.
However, my devil's advocate and arguments were the most difficult thing about constructing my persuasive essay. I found myself becoming to emotional and basing my argument off of morals rather than finding more fact based information. The opposing side to bullfighting are most likely not going to appeal as much to the emotional side of arguing. Therefore, it was difficult grasping another tone/argument to my essay. In addition, I often made a weak devil's advocate so I could argue against it more easily. I found myself representing to opposing side with a straw man. In the end, I believe I was able to overcome the difficulties and write a strong essay.
In the writing of my persuasive essay I found a few things to be difficult. One of those things was not using any logical fallicies. I found this hard at times because today most arguments you hear a chalk full of fallicies and things that do not pertain to the argument at hand. Another thing I found to be difficult was finding peer reviewed sites that contained the information I wanted to make a solid argument.
There were also easy parts to the essay. The writing its self wasn't to hard once I got going. Also putting all the information I found into a coherent argument for my topic wasn't to difficult after I had compiled the information.
The easiest part of my essay was finding reasons why my argument was correct and is the best decision. THis was because i put a lot of research into it and found things that would get my point across. The hardest part of my essay was putting this information in a way that would persuade readers of my point. Many people disagree with my argument because they think it's not humane. THis made me not able to use emotion in my argument because facts and logic would be the only way of gettig past their emotion.
When writing my persuasive essay, I ran into some problems but also found a few things easy. I found it difficult to write my essay without turning it into my opinion. I had to remember to base it on factual information versus my own view on the topic, which was lowering the drinking age to eighteen. It was a hard topic to do this with since it is very controversial and I have strong thoughts on the matter, but it was easy to find information to support my opinion. Also, at first I had a lot of hypothetical situations but realized that that wasn't enough to back me up since it isn't a solid argument. I solved this by making sure I did a lot of research to make sure I was using legitimate facts. The easy part of writing my essay was finding details to support my opinion and convince the opposing side without putting them down.
Much to my disbelief, I found the most difficult aspect of my persuasive essay was overcoming my devil's advocate. I decided to state the devil's advocate first so I could pick out all of the logical fallacies throughout the rest of my essay, but I found in my attempt to make the best possible devils advocate I had countered all of my original points. I was actually debating switching sides and starting the essay over again, but I decided I was far to lazy to do that and instead rethought my argument.
In the same way that overcoming my devil's advocate was difficult, writing it was incredible easy. I simply thought about every point in my original argument and pointed out how they didn't really work out. Since I knew what my argument was in advanced, it was easy to pick out the parts that were not cogent.
For my persuasive essay, the part that I found most difficult was finding a good amount of material to come up with a strong argument against my devil's advocate. I did abortion and my d.a was that abortion is murder and it is taking away a life. When I went online and did a lot of research I found it easier to plan out how I would specifically argue against the devil's advocate and show that my side of the argument is valid. I also found it difficult to not be repetitive. I still think I said somethings over and over again which is what I need to work on for my next essay.
Once I did my research I found it fairly easy to sit down and write the essay. I think this is because I was writing about a topic that is important and means something to me. I found that it was easy to explain why my side of the argument is right and that people should be more open to allowing women to make decisions for themselves. I also think it was easy for me to avoid logical fallacies.
When writing my persuasive essay, I had troubles in some spots but not in others. One part that there was some trouble in was the research or fining articles to prove or verify my points. When I would go in search for them, i would find some but the information I was looking for would either not be in there or it would be extremely vague. This was a problem, but I finally came across some very helpful sites and articles. One thing that really helped me is that in middle school we wrote persuasive essays all the time. However the down side to that was that we learned a different way of writing them this year from last year. I enjoyed the paper overall, and I learned a lot about the topic it self and where I stand in it.
When writing my persuasive essay, I had troubles in some spots but not in others. One part that there was some trouble in was the research or fining articles to prove or verify my points. When I would go in search for them, i would find some but the information I was looking for would either not be in there or it would be extremely vague. This was a problem, but I finally came across some very helpful sites and articles. One thing that really helped me is that in middle school we wrote persuasive essays all the time. However the down side to that was that we learned a different way of writing them this year from last year. I enjoyed the paper overall, and I learned a lot about the topic it self and where I stand in it.
when I first sat down to work on it, I make it through somewhat of a decent paragraph and then stopped, no longer having anything to say. It was very difficult to round out my ideas enough to make the essay persuasive, engaging, and to the point - meaning I can't just go rambling off in the middle of it. It was very easy to be able to use the internet and take in some of the ideas that other people put out there on the topic I was doing. There are so many opinions and voices that can be seen and from those I drew my inspiration, as well as my outline.
I think if I had to give hints to the next kid to do this assignment, I'd make them it in steps, with an outline and then a more detailed one. I didn't use a lot of research and citations within mine, but I know it could have used it. I also would have rather liked to have some peer reviews on it before it was turned in, in case I missed any logical fallacies.
In my persuasive essay what i found hard was that I was supposed to be writing with the appeal of ethics and morals, but I sometimes used emotion to persuade the reader. I was arguing about how killing a poor innocent baby, when I should of maybe focused on why abortion is killing a poor innocent baby. other than that the persuasive essay was pretty easy. I found useful information but I didn't really need to do a lot of research. I thought finding a devil's advocate was easy because my topic is very controversial and many people have argued against me so I just used one of their arguments that i thought was good. Overall i thought the persuasive essay was pretty easy.
My persuasive essay on year-round schooling was more or less easy to write. The only road block was procrastination, which I believe I handled very well this time around. The research was a little hard to find, but I managed to get enough information on the subject at hand.
The websites that I used helped me solidify my argument. And when I relized that some of my preconcieved notions were wrong, my research helped me rebuild my argument. My Devil's advocate changed a couple of times, but eventually I found that had good points and a strong defense against my argument.
In my persuasive essay, it was easy finding cogent arguments against animal testing. However, the hard part for me was not using emotion as much as I would have liked. The whole reason I chose animal testing as my topic is because it is something that I am very passionate about. Not being able to use emotion was very hard for me, even though it made sense not to. My emotion is the thing that drove me to choose this topic, so naturally I wanted to incorporate it into my essay. Not only that, but usually the main reason anyone is against animal testing is because they consider it morally wrong. Since I couldn't use emotion, I had to focus on statistics and logic, which actually wasn't as hard as I thought it was going to be.
When it came to writing a persuasive essay about how to convict the five co-conspirators of 9/11, forming a devil's advocate and appealing to emotion was quite simple. The devil's advocate was easy to form because the argument itself was fairly evenly weighted. Because of how touchy the subject is (of war crimes toward America), appealing to emotion practically figures itself out. Strangely enough, the hardest part about the persuasive essay was to find credible information about the subject online. This I found odd as the subject was pressing and current. having said that, background for the topic was difficult, but manageable. All in all, the arguments and emotional appeal was fairly quick, while the core information gathering was a much harder task.
For my persuasive essay, I found that there were more easy things than hard, but there still was more than I thought that there would be. I only expected difficulty in procrastination. Yes, I procrastinated; I left the entire writing of the essay for Saturday and Sunday before it was due. A problem that I did not expect was the length of the essay. I expected that I would have alot to write about, but when I actually wrote it, some things overlapped, and I was only at 800 words when I was done. An easy thing for me was the research. All the information that I needed was on three sites, and they each had exactly what I needed.
In writing my persuasive essay, I found procrastination to be difficult. I tend to wait until the last second to do things, and this made writing the essay a lot harder. I would have been able to make my argument a lot clearer had I made an outline earlier than on the day I was writing it.
Also, finding a devil's advocate was difficult. I wrote my essay on abortion, and there are a lot of arguments, so it was difficult to find one that I could argue against. Also, a lot of the reasons were based on ethical and religious beliefs against abortion, so it was difficult to counter that. Something I found easy, though, was research. There are so many websites out there that are peer reviewed and dedicated to making the right choice with abortion, that it was fairly easy to find many reasons for and against abortion.
So far this year, persuasive writing has by far been my favorite. It gave me a chance to argue about a topic that i felt strongly about. The easiest thing for me was proving my point and giving a solid argument that would hopefully leave the reader considering my ideas. Also, it was easy to come up with many things to talk about and not having to repeat myself in order to reach the word requirement. However, I found it difficult to come up with a "devil's advocate". There weren't as many topics and ideas on the other side of the argument,which made that portion of the essay a little harder to write. Overall, the persuasive essay was a fairly easy writing assignment once I found good arguments and valid information.
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