They Say, I Say Blog 1

Chapter 1 :

In the chapter Graff and Birkenstein review over an academic conference with Dr.X, a sociologist. They talk about how Dr. X’s arguments weren’t so clear to most readers and how he would counter-act when he was questioned. Also, they go into how Dr. X’s work didn’t sound fairly confident and the point of his speech didn’t have a certain point given. They enlighten you on how to start a good argument off and not lose readers interests by evenly spacing details out. They mention that to start off you must give shed some light into the main point in the beginning then lead into the specific details as you go on. the authors also tell you how to respond to questions about ones arguments properly by stated your side of the topic and and respond to it as one. Doing all this will give your writings a more effective and enlightening outlook.

I Learned: From this chapter I learned that you can just indulge your audience in all the details you plan on talking about too early or you’ll lose their attention. I also learned, that it is better to let the suspense build up to fully engage your audience.

Chapter 2:

In Chapter 2 , “Her Point Is” by Graff and Birkenstein they go over how to properly make a summary while having respect to other and validly getting your point across being credible. How to make a summary using your words and coming with a strong confident reading within your words while bringing a strong clear point. Also teaches you how not to use strong exaggeration from the original writing to summarize making you look one-sided or biased. A good summary holds the main points from the original writing and putting the advice given into your own words making it credible. They also dig into how to counter questions in arguments by trying to tell you that you have to go use what the question is asking as your go to ammo to answering the question and not going off topic. Also, make sure that you completely understand what they are asking so you can reply to the argument or writing without skipping any important facts or misinterpret.

I Learned: I learned that there is a such thing as “the closest cliche system” which is when a writer doesn’t gather enough facts in a summary which leads to opposite views that the writing was originally intended for. Also I learned that using more thought out verbs can help gain a reader’s interest more and can lead to a more effective writing and make a better reenactment of what really happened. Example: “He was surprised when ____” isn’t going to attract you as much as “His mouth dropped of excitement when____”

Chapter 3:

A way to get immense credibility in a argument is to use quotes. Chapter 3 goes over proper quoting and showed me how to properly quote. They do so by going over that under quoting is a common thing that leads to throwing the listeners off and not connect the quote to your argument. Some quotes the listeners might not understand so you have will most likely have to give an explanation right after the quote is said to inform the listeners; although it is still possible to over explain your quote. You must know what your quote means, when to use it, and how to use it. It is key to make sure they support your argument. Also, dangling quotes are a common thing where a quote is made with no explanation and the audience can’t put together the connection.

I Learned: The templates of quoting helped me by showing you want the intro of the quote to be short and forward. Example: ” Dr. Suess stated an idea once when..” (bad) “Dr. Suess stated that….” (good), I also learned that it is possible to over explain a quote and you have to know what quote needs deep explaining and what quote doesn’t.