WRiTing A SynTHESiS 177■ (^) make Connections among different texts
The texts by Thompson, Haven, and Keller all deal with the emergence of
new electronic media and their effects on students’ development as writers.
These texts are very much in conversation with one another, as each author
focuses on what research tells us are the benefits of the new media and the
potential ways that electronic media can limit young writers’ growth:
• ^ Thompson uses the Stanford study to emphasize the ways that stu-
dents’ participation on blogs and the like helps students learn to adapt
their writing for specific audiences and to write fairly complex texts to
affect the ways readers think and act.
• ^ Haven provides a more elaborate analysis of the Stanford study to
argue that we are witnessing a revolution in literacy, the likes of which
we have not experienced since the development of classical rhetoric.
• ^ Keller offers converging pieces of evidence to support the findings
from the Stanford study that Thompson and Haven discuss, but addi-
tionally he provides a more detailed counterargument that is also
based on research.
All three authors seem to agree that the introduction of new electronic
media has contributed to a paradigm shift in the uses of writing — to cre-
ate agency and community — but they seem to vary in the concessions they
make to counterarguments.
Notice how our annotations call out connections. “Keller uses the
same student example as Haven to make the same point about college writ-
ing assignments.” “Keller adds the voices of scholars of writing to com-
ment on the value of new media.” “unlike Thompson and Haven, Keller
provides the counterarguments of scholars who dispute the findings of the
Stanford study.”
With these annotations, we are starting to think critically about the
ideas in the essays. Notice, however, that not all of the annotations make
connections. Some note examples that support the argument that elec-
tronic media benefit writers, while others point to examples that provide
compelling evidence for the counterargument. Still other annotations raise
questions about the basis on which researchers and teachers reached their
conclusions. In the end, you should not expect that every annotation will
contribute to your synthesis. Instead, use them to record your responses
and also to spur your thinking.
■ (^) decide What those Connections mean
Having annotated the selections, we filled out the worksheet in Figure 7.2,
making notes in the grid to help us see the three texts in relation to one
another. Our worksheet included columns for
• ^ author and source information,
• ^ the gist of each author’s arguments,
07_GRE_5344_Ch7_151_210.indd 177 11/19/14 1:59 PM
http://www.ebook3000.com