Literature Thought
Papers (10% in total)
(There are a total of five Literature
Thought Papers worth 2% each)
General guidelines:
- Thought papers are certainly very simple and short
assignments.
- They are two paragraphs long, and the length of the
paper in total should be between a minimum of 100 words to a maximum of
150 words.
- To make certain your word count is correct (in MS Word)
you can click on “Tools” and then click on “word count.
- Use the
formatting guidelines established during class lectures.
- The
assigned text will always be poems from Reading Literature and Writing Argument.
Prompt:
- I simply want your thoughts on the assigned reading,
which might take the form of addressing one or more of the following:
- How the setting helps you to interpret the poem.
- Who the speaker is, and how that helps you to
interpret the poem.
- How the language and word choices help to establish
the tone of the poem.
- The above list (1 through 3) is just an example of an
approach to this assignment. If you have other thoughts then feel free to
take a different approach.
Grading Criteria:
- The total number of words in your two paragraphs must
be 100 to 150 words.
- Use a document header, as you should for all
assignments.
- The formatting guidelines on the syllabus must be
observed.
- The paper should be two paragraphs long.
- Writing must be free—or predominantly
free—of typos, awkward/unclear phrasing, and sentence level errors.
- Do not use first person pronouns such as
“I” “me” and “my.”
- Do not use second person pronouns such as
“you” “your” and “yours.”
- Do not use contractions.
- Do not use sentences that begin with conjunctions, such
as: and, but, for, so, yet, nor, so.
- Do not use personal stories of your own life
experience, or the experiences of friends, family, and so on.
- Do not pose any questions in your paper.
- Use a two part title, separated by a colon, but do not
use the words “literature thought paper” in your title.
- Because literature thought papers are so short, do not
quote more than a brief line or two from of the poem.
Some Important Points:
- Remember that part of this course involves working
toward higher level writing skills.
To that end, your writing should sound less like a verbal conversation
between friends, and more like an academic paper, which means it has a
formal tone. We are all
attempting to make our prose sound more scholarly.
- Engage the Assignment Calendar section of the course
syllabus for due dates and the poems over which you will write these
papers.