in-text citation - ellipsis

Ellipsis (plural ellipses) deserve some discussion. Check out the following sources:

• wikipedia
• Purdue's online writing center
• the JCCC writing center on ellipsis

In prose, ellipses are not generally needed at the beginning or end of a quote. The rule is different for poetry - and if there is confusion between the above sources - my rule is no ellipsis at the beginning or end of a quote. Even if you end a quote before the period. Even if the first part of the sentence is left off.

MLA has gone back and forth on whether brackets [...] are needed to clarify that you inserted ellipsis rather than include punctuation found in the original source - so that one is you call. Just be consistent.

in-text citations the basics

Duke has a great guide to parenthetical citations with MLA - and as a KU alum it's hard to praise Duke. St. Cloud U. Writing Center also has a guide which points out how to cite when the author's name is mentioned in the text.

Something that bugs me - when I see the long and drawn-out slow wind up. It isn't concise. It amounts to filler. For example

Stephen Krashen, a world authority on No Child Left Behind and author of "Remarks on Race to the Top," wrote an interesting article. In it he said, and I think correctly, "Students from well-funded schools who come from high-income families score outscore all or nearly all other countries on international tests."

This is too wordy. The end text citation will give me the title of the article, and appeals to authority should be carefully used. Krashen is popular, but not the authority you might expect among serious scholars. It's better to frame the quote for your purposes, and let the parenthetical citation do much of the work for you.

Testing may not be the solution to our problems in education, but fighting poverty. "Students from well-funded schools who come from high-income families score outscore all or nearly all other countries on international tests " (Krashen).

It's shorter, and conveys much more information. Note: the above came from a web source. If it's a pdf, or paginated source - such as print - insert the page number after the author's last name but without commas. The two links above to a great job explaining that.

Semicolons and colons

One of the punctuation issues that recurr most often involves the use of semicolons. This matters because - the way a semicolon functions - if one uses a semicolon where a comma or colon are needed, it creates a sentence fragment, which is a grammatical misdeed of the most heinous order.

I like semicolons and don't want to discourage their use - so check out the Oatmeal's humorous exploration of semicolons - they have the grammar right.

Also, check out a less funny but equally useful comparison contrast explanation of semicolons vs. colons at Xavier University's Writing Center website.

On word count and length requirements

I've never understood when students turn in work that doesn't meet the word count or length requirements, especially on the papers after the first turned in for grade.

If you've played a sport - or studied a martial art - consider this analogy. In basket ball or football coaches routinely ask their players to run sprints, where (in Bb for example) they run from baseline to touch the free-throw line, then return and touch the baseline and then run to touch the mid-court line, return to baseline, sprint to far court free throw line, back to baseline then run full court and back. This completes one cycle. Different teams may have different names for the drill, but the drill is repeated multiple times in a practice. [update: most common name according to students - suicides]. Football will use the grid lines on the field and go 10 yrds and back, then 20 yrds, etc.

These drills develop agility, build endurance and foster team dynamics. But players don't enjoy them.

What would a coach do, if asking players to run 5 cycles, a player runs just 1 or 2, then says, "Well coach. You get the point. I think I've shown I understand the drill. I like to be concise."?

Or imagine if you study martial arts, like: wrestling, kung-fu, karate, aikedo or the like. When the coach/teacher (and in Asian martial arts the coach is addressed as "teacher" - Sensei means teacher in Japanese, Lao Sher means teacher in Chinese - these cultures respect teachers as much as Americans respect coaches) - when a new move is taught the coach/ teacher will ask the student/ athlete to repeat the move multiple times - or for a set period of time - say 5 minutes. This builds muscle memory and as well ties verbal and visual instruction to physical movement - which creates neural pathways that make permanent the memory and facilitate recall.

What would a martial arts instructor do if the student/athlete did one repetition and said, "That's enough. I get it. I won't do any more"?

Having participated in formal athletics - and been a scholarship athlete in a martial art - I am hard pressed to remember an example of a student questioning a coaches request for repetitive action, though martial arts instructors are famous for stepping in and working on the move in question with students - which when studying a pugilistic sport, may amount to a butt whipping.

Why is there reluctance to meet minimal length requirements? Colleagues I worked with at KU would simply fail or not grade a paper that failed to meet any minimal requirement. This seems logical.

How can we address rhetoric and grammar, and be fair to all students, if most follow directions and take the necessary risks involved with engagement with the assignment - but some take far fewer risks, and disclose much less information?

Technology expectations in the classroom

Had a couple students balk at using the Learning Management System - and even computers in general - in an English class. Teaching writing has always been about teaching technology, and inventions from the printing press to the typewriter and word processor have redefined our writing processes.

You get to this by going to the school website> enroll> Search class schedule>then enter “English> as a search term> then hover over f2f (face to face). It may be for all classes on campus - but I know it works with any English class.

Click the image to see it larger - and I'll reproduce the text below:

Face-to-Face Courses (F2F)

Face-to-Face instruction takes place in a classroom. Based on JCCC's Statement of General Education. Students in all classes, including face-to-face classes, are expected to use technology appropriate to the course content and as needed to access web-based course materials. Face-to-face classes typically require access to computer equipment (either at home or in college labs provided for student use) and basic computing skills utilizing standard office, business and web browsing applications.

When students enroll, they agree these conditions - but they may not be aware of it.

Protests in China?

Several reports have come out of China alluding to unrest similar to what we've seen in Egypt, Libya and Wisconsin. Boingboing.com blog on the 26th (Saturday) noticed the censorship and detention of bloggers who used the word "jasmine revolution" online. (update: first reported by the Committee to Protect Journalists). Wikipedia has coverage here, but the item is flagged - of course it is disputed. [Update: NY Times reports on the governmental prevention of reporting on the Protests. ]

Apparently significant numbers of people are taking to the streets, but with the government controlling so much communication it's hard to say what is really happening. At least one of my friends in China has told me this blog isn't accessible.

Human Rights in China has translated a manifesto published by the protesters and the English translation can be found here. Excerpts from the document:

Every good and honest Chinese person, please think: So much public housing has been sold to individuals, so many state-owned enterprises and so much land have been sold, and nearly all state-owned property has been sold off. But where has all the money from these sales gone? It goes without saying that state-owned property belongs to the entire people. But what did the people get? Led by an authoritarian regime, the opaque process of privatization has made a small number of people rich, but what did the vast number of ordinary people get?

Every good and honest Chinese person, please think: When Japan, Korea, and Taiwan were in the process of industrializing, they were able to make the overwhelming majority of their people prosperous. Why is it that during China’s industrialization the ordinary people are becoming poorer? Why is it that in just the last few decades China has gone from being a country with the smallest gap between the rich and the poor to one with the largest? It is because the unfair system has made a small number of people incredibly wealthy, and the vast majority of people remain poor.

If anyone has information please share it. The rallies are supposed to continue - the following is a screen grab from the blog

(photo courtesy wikimedia commons - https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/File:Voa_beijing_230_20feb11.jpg)

Manners and Higher ed.

The image comes from one of my guilty pleasures - a meme themed blog on graphs and images (original found here). I've edited it for my more sensitive and/or delicate audience.

Much of what we teach - particularly in comp 1, seems to be life skills or manners: how to behave in a professional environment. Maybe that's a bit of what "analyzing your audience" means - thinking about how others will perceive you.