MON FEB 05
Link to the Daily Class Agenda
- Open the Agenda for MON FEB 05.
- To demonstrate your attendance, take useful class notes in the Reply field for this Agenda page.
- BAD NOTES: We talked about hypothesis statements and how they should be written.
- GOOD NOTES: A hypothesis is a strong, clear, narrow declarative claim that can be proved or disproved. It’s not a question or a broad topic description. The hypothesis we first submit to the blog can (probably will) be modified as our research progresses and we discover what we can and cannot prove.
- To demonstrate your attendance, take useful class notes in the Reply field for this Agenda page.
- A Demonstration of Critical Reading
- Finding and Analyzing Claims In Organ Harvest
- “Let’s Harvest the Organs of Death Row Inmates”
- Source Material for the Demonstration. Video:
“Let’s Harvest the Organs of Death Row Inmates”
- Assignment A03: Critical Reading, PTSD Claims
- DUE MON FEB 12
- Source Material for your Critical Reading
- “Is PTSD Contagious?” print version
- “Is PTSD Contagious?” podcast
- Student Sample of Critical Reading includes a fairly comprehensive list and description of Claim Types.
Brief Exercise: Consider these obvious and hidden claims.
When Caleb was finally screened for the severity of his TBI, Brannan says he got the second-worst score in the whole 18-county Gulf Coast VA system, which serves more than 50,000 veterans.
— “finally screened” means that according to Brannan or the author or both, Caleb should have been screened long before. It suggests that the VA was negligent in delaying his testing.
— “the severity of his TBI” clearly contains the claim that he in fact has some degree of TBI. The fact that he hadn’t until then been screened for it means nobody knew for sure that he did, but the author makes that claim.
— “Brannan says” means that the author has not independently verified Caleb’s score or where it ranked against all other screenings.
— “the second-worst score in the whole 18-county Gulf Coast VA system” is offered as Brannan’s claim that her husband is suffering more than almost anyone. Considering her vested interest in promoting this perspective, we have to be at least a little suspicious of the ranking.
— “which serves more than 50,000 veterans” gives the impression that Caleb was hurt worse than 50,000 other veterans. But let’s be clear. Many of these 50,000 will not have served in combat at all. Many will not have had active engagement with enemy troops on the battlefield. Many of those who did see active fighting will not have been near explosive devices. So we’re not comparing him to 50,000 TBI sufferers
Rowan Counterintuitive 
A claim is a factual statement made to back up an argument. A claim uses evidence to support an idea. A claim should be arguable and debatable.
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A claim is a statement of fact or opinion or even a suggestion that is made in the service of an argument. A factual claim might not need to be supported at all if it’s indisputable or not contestable. Arguments require evidence, much of which will be claims of one type or another. A thesis must be arguable and debatable (and many claims are too), but factual claims require neither.
Yeah, it’s confusing, LBirch, which is why we don’t spend much time trying to parse the language and instead concentrate on the mechanics and craft of writing. (You should hear the breakdowns of the several MODELS of argument that use even more ridiculous terms like Warrant and Grounds and Backing that confound the most determined philosophers. Be happy we’re only using Claim, Thesis, and Hypothesis. 🙂 )
2/3
Two out of three available points for making specific notes instead of general “about” comments. If the points matter to you, understand that in future classes, the bar will be raised by your classmates until it’s harder to achieve 2/3.
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From this point on, this agenda will be used for attendance and class participation. A good hypothesis becomes a thesis that you claim if it is able to be proven with research. Also learned that our grades do not matter to Mr. Hodges. The word “reportedly” should be treated with caution because there is doubt to the truth of the claim. In class we watched, “Good: Let’s Harvest the Organs of Death Row Inmates”, which suggested that we use organ removal as the method of putting inmates to death in order to save others in need of organ donation.
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Also learned that your heart and soul DO matter to Mr. Hodges because they are more essential to your value as a human being. 🙂
2/3
Two out of three available points for making specific notes instead of general “about” comments. If the points matter to you, understand that in future classes, the bar will be raised by your classmates until it’s harder to achieve 2/3.
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Unfortunately, heart and soul won’t be on the documents that I present to potential employers in the future, only academic achievements and the like will be.
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That’s the fault of the documents. 🙂
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– leaving good replies equals good participation grade!
– “a hypothesis is a strong, clear, narrow declaration claim that can be proved or disproved.”
– recieved critical reading, ptsd claims
– debate on inmate organ donations
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Your first two notes are valuable reminders of concrete lessons learned in class, summergirl. Your third and fourth are merely reports “about” what was talked “about.”
Possible alternatives:
3. “The time we spend examining the claims made in the PTSD reading will train us to critically analyze the claims made in the sources we seek and use as evidence for our papers. It will also make us careful how we phrase our own claims.”
4. “The time we spent so productively breaking down just the title and the first few words of the Organ Harvesting video made it clear that every word has evidential weight and should not be wasted.”
Maybe that’s not what you were thinking during class. (It’s what I was thinking. 🙂 ) But considering you have fifteen minutes to make a note about the PTSD assignment, make the note count.
2/3
Two out of three available points for making specific notes instead of general “about” comments. If the points matter to you, understand that in future classes, the bar will be raised by your classmates until it’s harder to achieve 2/3.
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We learned to take strong notes in the agenda reply field in order to receive a good attendance score every day. We each were assigned a paragraph of the “Is PTSD Contagious?” article to complete the homework on. We also learned to closely examine claims to pick them apart, revealing unstated claims.
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I LOVE “revealing unstated claims,” picklerick.
2/3
Two out of three available points for making specific notes instead of general “about” comments. If the points matter to you, understand that in future classes, the bar will be raised by your classmates until it’s harder to achieve 2/3.
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Understanding that your hypothesis will become your thesis in your research paper. Knowing that it has to develop over the time as you discover more research.
Explaining the PTSD assignment 01 A03: PTSD claims
-read or listen to the whole podcast about PTSD and if it is contagious
-focus on the section of the writing that was assigned to you by spending one hour looking over that section.
-start to criticize the claims made in your section using critical reading techniques such as watching for single trigger words that can help analyze the writing
Organ harvest
-let’s: implying that we should all agree on the idea
-harvest: a controversial term as it could mean killing or recycling
-death row: wrongly convicted? Or injustice towards inmates
Analyzing claims:
-picking apart each sentence and noticing anything that can be used to make an argument with the article or proposal
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I like these, TheNaturalist. They’re personal and very particular. Instead of naming the general topic (which is already obvious in the Agenda and therefore doesn’t require restating), you’re dropping breadcrumbs to guide your mind back to the ideas you had during class. That, it seems to me, is the better use of notes.
3/3
Three out of three available points for making specific notes that will help you recall what you believed to be important during our time together. If the points matter to you, understand that in future classes, the bar will be raised by both you and your classmates until it’s harder to achieve 3/3.
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The notes you want to take should be clear and help your hypothesis. It is not a question. The next assignment is critical reading in an article called “is PTSD contagious”. The task is you will be assigned on some section of the assignment. Next we watched a video to show how hypothesis should be clear. Next was the class discussion on inmate on death row with organ donation. Just like harvesting organs of of death row inmates we are going to analyze the claims made by authors and determine whether the claims are just and clear.
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PatrickStar, please forgive me if this is intrusive. I’m going to revise your notes to eliminate the second-person (you, your, yours, yourself) language, and to refine their effectiveness at indicating specific lessons. You may, of course, resist or ignore these models. I lean on them because they require less language than responding analytically to each of the notes individually.
—My notes should be clear and help my hypothesis.
—My hypothesis is a bold, direct, clear, specific, arguable claim: It is not a question.
—I have been assigned Section 06 to evaluate for assignment A03: “Is PTSD Contagious?”
—Watching the video “Let’s Harvest the Organs of Death Row Inmates,” we evaluated both obvious and unstated claims to practice critical reading of our research sources. (Even the very first word, “Let’s,” is a claim, according to Mr. David.)
—The same way we evaluated claims in the organ harvesting video, we’ll analyze claims made by authors of our source materials, to determine whether they’re just and clear, beginning with the assignment A03, “Is PTSD Contagious?”
Is that OK?
3/3
Three out of three available points for making specific notes that will help you recall what you believed to be important during our time together. If the points matter to you, understand that in future classes, the bar will be raised by both you and your classmates until it’s harder to achieve 3/3.
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This reply form is now used for attendance
Good notes you can come back to to learn about topic, purposeful summaries.
Hypothesis has to be disproved
Every claim made has to be thouroughly checked out
Don’t make bland broad claims that cannot be proven
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I don’t know what to make of comments made by someone called “Anonymous.”
I’ve seen quite of bit of material from Anonymous, and it disturbs me not to know who contributed it. Something is wrong in the way you’re addressing the blog, Anonymous, and it will get VERY MESSY at grade-recording time if we don’t figure out and solve the problem soon.
I can’t credit you with attending if I don’t know who you are. Please text or email me to identify yourself.
0/3.
Currently absent.
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Class started with some hits from the Foo Fighters. We learned the difference between good notes and bad notes. Good notes describe what was talked about, while bad notes just say what it was (see top of agenda). A hypothesis is a strong, clear, narrow declarative claim that can be proved or disproved. It’s not a question or a broad topic description. The hypothesis we first submit to the blog can (probably will) be modified as our research progresses and we discover what we can and cannot prove.
The assignment assigned today will take 2 hours “by design” and we are each being assigned a small section of the podcast. Prof. cares about us and being better writers, but not about our grades. I am responsible for A03: portion 2.
We were asked to debate what we learned in the video “Lets Harvest the Organs of Death Row Inmates.” The whole class agreed it would be good to harvest the organs, but we didn’t all agree if we should ask the inmates’ permission. We went through and discussed the claims made by the video based on time stamps of the video as well. The last thing we did in class was briefly talk about how to analyze the statements made in the homework assignment.
Class was enjoyable and fun, and I liked having a somewhat smaller class today.
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Good strong specific reminders of the actual content of the time spent in class, Knuckles.
3/3
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Good notes are ones that you can go back to and understand what you were learning when you wrote them. Also, our hypotheses will most likely change as we progress in our project. We debated whether or not it is right to “harvest” the organs of death row inmates. We all got assigned a section of an article and have to analyze it within an hour, no more. I really liked having a small class. I feel like it was easier to talk about certain topics.
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I liked it too, PaulaJean. Controversial conversations are always enjoyable.
2/3
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Good notes consist of factual information and not questions about the topic, we learned that our hypothesis will become our thesis. Then we watched a video about “Harvesting the Organs of Death Row Inmates” which we later debated if it is a good idea or a bad idea. Everyone agreed it sounded like a good idea at first but after hearing possibilities maybe not so much.
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What you’re describing here is the subject matter and the method, TTJ, not the content. There’s not a clue here in your notes that we were practicing a critical analysis of claims.
2/3
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