Author: JSylvor

Your final assignment for English 2100 is to complete your End of Semester Reflection and Grade Proposal. You can access the form HERE. Please take time to think carefully and honestly about how this semester has gone for you. I am looking forward to reading your reflections. Congratulations on completing your first semester at Baruch! It has been a pleasure and a privilege to share in your time here. I hope you will stay in touch as you continue to grow and explore. (I am also here should you hit any bumps along the way….).

Wishing you the very best,

Professor Sylvor

We are swiftly approaching the end of the semester, so I want to be sure that you are aware of all your upcoming deadlines.

• Wed., Nov. 29th – Bring one source for your paper with you to class. Preliminary list of sources is due and should be placed in your ENG 2100 folder. Your research proposal should already be in your folder.
• Mon., Dec. 4th – Draft of Analytical Research Paper is due. Bring three copies of your draft with you to class.
• Wed., Dec. 6th – Presentations (1-12)
• Mon., Dec. 11th – Presentations (13-24)
• Fri., Dec. 15th – Essays Due. Finished essays should be placed in your ENG 2100 folder together with your other finished essays.

Office Hours: I will be holding drop-in office hours from 9:30 – 11:30 on 12/4, 12/6, and 12/11 with possible additional hours by appointment on Wed. 12/13.

Unfortunately, I still have not had a response to my request for a computer lab for today’s class. However, I still want to move forward on our research projects, so please, if at all possible, come to class with a laptop or tablet. You can check out a laptop or tablet at the Technology Loan Desk on the third floor of the Newman Library . Feel free to email me if you have questions about this.
Sorry for the short notice!!!!

See you soon,
Professor Sylvor

• No class on Wednesday, November 22nd!
• By midnight on Wednesday, please log onto the blog, scroll down to the post “Homework for Sunday, November 19th” and in a comment on your original comment, share an update on your Analytical Research Paper topic. What topic have you settled on? How have you refined or modified your topic? What is it you are hoping to learn about this topic?
• Reach out to me via email if you have any questions about this assignment (or anything else).
• Check your Baruch email and this blog for information about a possible room change for Monday, Nov. 27th.
• Have a wonderful Thanksgiving Break! I hope that you will take some time to do whatever relaxes and restores you. I am grateful to have such smart and committed students and appreciate all the effort and good cheer you’ve brought to our work together!

Please share three possible ideas for your Analytical Research Paper. Your topic should be a problem that you have observed in one of the communities in which you are a member or stakeholder. Be sure to choose problems that you genuinely care about and feel motivated to research.

Before our class on Wednesday, please spend some time getting acquainted with ChatGPT. To do this, start by setting up a free account at chat.openai.com . Then experiment with assigning the platform to produce various kinds of texts. Think about creative ideas to challenge the AI platform.   Once you have spent around 30 minutes exploring ChatGPT’s capabilities, please share your findings in a comment on this post. Your comment must be shared before 12pm on Wednesday. What did you ask the “bot” to do? Where was it most successful? What limitations did you observe? Did anything surprise you about this experience? How might you imagine yourself using this resource in the future? What role do you think ChatGPT should have in your coursework at Baruch?

Here are some ideas of tasks to challenge ChatGPT. You can use these as inspiration to come up with your own ideas – the crazier, the better:

• Write a sonnet about Thanksgiving including your favorite dishes
• Write a resume for Joe Biden applying for a job at Starbucks
• Write a diary entry for a student at Baruch College
• Compose a cover letter for you for your dream job
• Plan a cross-country road trip
• Write a song by your favorite artist about the NYC subway
• Give ChatGPT the question you used for your Literary Analysis essay
• Ask it to give you advice about a personal problem
• Ask ChatGPTto teach you how to solve a challenging math problem

In the NFL recently there have been so many issues regarding the debate Grass vs
Turf. In the NFL they use turf for the grounding on the football fields mostly due to Price
and the very little maintenance it requires as opposed to real grass. Recent studies
show that the turf allows players to become more prone to ankle and foot injuries.
Recently one of the NFL’s biggest Stars, Aaron Rodgers suffered a huge season-ending
injury with a torn Achilles tendon. Research has shown that the area in which Aaron
Rodgers suffered his injury can be largely due to the turf they were playing on. About
half the teams in the NFL use turf as opposed to real grass. According to the AP news
players have been 16% more likely to be injured on turf compared to regular grass. I
wrote about this because I believe that an organization as big as the NFL has a
responsibility to take care of its players especially since they are the reasons why this
sport is so popular.
https://apnews.com/article/nfl-aaron-rodgers-achilles-grass-artificial-turf-79212f5443cd2
a0d30fe8c9d981b13c0

Don’t forget that your Literary Analysis Essays are due by midnight on Sunday, November 12th. Your completed essay should be placed in your personal ENG2100 Google Docs folder. You can find the instructions for the essay above under the “Essays” tab. Before you submit your essay, double-check the following:

• Your essay has a title that reveals something about what the essay will be exploring.
• You use the present tense when you are describing what happens in the text.
• You have carefully proofread and corrected all errors.
• You have followed proper formatting guidelines each time you include a quotation.

Don’t hesitate to reach out if you have any questions about your essay. I am looking forward to learning from your analyses.

Instead of our regular classes, each of you will be meeting with me together with your peer review group on either Monday or Wednesday to discuss your Literary Analysis Essays. You can find the schedule below. These conferences are mandatory.

You should be continuing to work on your essay steadily during the entire interval between now and when the essay is due. As I suggested in class, I recommend spending a short time on revision each day (20-30 min), rather than trying to complete the assignment in one marathon session the day before it’s due.

Please place an updated draft of your essay in your personal ENG2100 folder by midnight on Sunday, November 5th. This will be the draft I will be referring to when we meet for our conferences.

In addition to these group conferences, I am also available for one on one meetings next week – both in person and over zoom, so please email me if that is something you would like to set up.

Conference Schedule

Mon 11/6

12:00 – 12:30. Jacqueline, Leilani, Sarahy

12:30 – 1:00. Kadijah, Ezra, Garelys

1:00 – 1:30 Daiyan, Reno, Rogelio

1:30 – 2:00. Rich, Isabel, Angelina

Wed 11/8

12:00 – 12:30. Felix M., Sahir, Ken

12:30 – 1:00. Felix R., Christian, Rony

1:00 – 1:30 Alyssa, Kaitlyn, Lisbeth, Yasmarlin

1:30 – 2:00. Shemar, Ryan

Just as we did with the Literacy Narrative, we will start the process of completing the Literary Analysis Essay with a free-writing process. The goal of this pre-writing is to start developing the ideas that will form the core of your textual analysis.

When you have completed the Pre-Write, using the instructions below, please give the file the name “Your Name – Literary Analysis Pre-Write” and place it in our shared folder, which I’ve linked to HERE. Please make sure that your work is in this folder no later than 9 am on Monday.

Pre-Writing Instructions

1. Start by identifying the text you’ve decided to write about.
2. Next, decide which of the prompts listed on the assignment sheet makes the most sense for you to pursue. (Remember, that you also have the option of proposing your own prompt, if none of these works for you.)
3. Combining your chosen prompt with your text, identify the question that you want to try to answer in your essay. Keep in mind that the purpose of these essays it to try to figure out something that you don’t fully understand about your text – not to just describe something about the text that is already obvious to you.
4. Reread your text.
5. Once you have figured out your question and reacquainted yourself with the text, the next step is to start generating ideas through free-writing. For this pre-write, rather than trying to write in paragraphs or to create a narrative, I suggest that you brainstorm using a list format. See how many different ideas you can generate that respond to the question you have asked. You may want to experiment with setting a timer and writing for a specific amount of time (perhaps 20 minutes?) or with setting a goal of how many ideas you want to come up with (8-10?).

***Place your pre-write in the designated folder. We will be using this material in class on Monday, so make sure that you will have a way to access this work either electronically or by printing it out.

***If you get through all of this and want to continue working, the next step is to start collecting quotations that relate to your question. As you find quotes that might prove helpful in your essay, copy them into your Pre-Write document, making sure to include the page number, where appropriate.