Guide to Example Progymnasmata

Guide to Example Progymnasmata

Assessing Fable/Tale • Prompt: A tale is a short narrative that focuses attention on interesting actions and events within a narrow time period. For this exercise, you will compose three short tales (200 words each) that narrate stories or incidents that are particularly relevant to your research topic. The tales should be persuasive and interesting, and more importantly, they should draw readers’ attention to details that are important to your topic. Remember that the tale is most useful for concentrating larger themes and events into the space of a small and interesting story. Choose details carefully and pay special attention to the words used to describe action. • Topic: Looking at the consequences of video games in contemporary American culture. • Audience: General middle-class newspaper readers • purpose: inform about positive medical uses of video games

Assessing Fable/Tale • Example 1 • (1) The minute you push the “start” button on the title screen of Packy and Marlon, you are hooked into a strange world of adventure, challenge, and odd medical terminology. The screen opens with a cute, highly bitmapped image of two cartoonish looking elephants: one wears a red baseball cap and dark, Terminator-style sunshades, while the other looks a bit more goofy with a silly smile and a couple of teeth missing. Both elephants make the “thumbs up” sign at the player, beckoning him to push start. Immediately on the first level, you realize that this isn’t going to be like any other game you have played. The player must immediately figure out how to toss peanuts at enemies (mangy sewer rats) that come charging towards the screen, and after that first hurdle, the player has to answer several trivia questions about insulin dependency in order to progress through the level. The action is surprisingly fast-paced for a game designed to help the medical community. One particularly interesting moment involves convincing the king rat to give up his stash of sugary-goodies in order to help the other elephants who are learning to eat poorly. Involving a complex sequence of memorization and button-pushing, the game both challenges and entertains.

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 1 • General impressions • Lots of detail and description; writing seems to describe without reason; focus on writer’s experiences without interest in reader; obvious attempt to engage narration

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 1 • Rhetorical purpose • Does not seem to develop tale in a way that is relevant to readers • By focusing on details that readers may not know or be interested in (i.e. bitmaps, gameplay, title screen of game), does not seem to recognize audience beliefs and values • Narration does not focus on a particular “story” that engages readers

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 1 • Rhetorical methods • Shows little attempt to recognize purposes of invention; does not appeal to audience’s networks of belief, community ideologies, or situated knowledge • Instead, engages details interesting to a different audience familiar with game reviews

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 1 • Writing Strategies • Attempts to dramatize player’s experiences by narrating sequences of gameplay • Creates vivid images of characters moving onscreen through words such as “beckoning,” “charging”; • Organizes time by using narrative cues such as “after that” and “immediately”; attempts to show sequence of action • Pacing of events is evident, but impeded somewhat by switch between overall impression and “interesting moment”

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 1 • Invented ethos • Some switches from third-person (“the player”) to second-person (“you”) that detract from engaging audience • Few spelling or grammar errors • Fairly sophisticated sentence construction, appropriate to audience

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 1 • Organization/Arrangement • Essay overall is not confusing to follow; reader is guided by arrangement cues such as “the minute you” and “immediately” (although this second word is perhaps overused) • Essay attempts to hold attention through sequential arrangement of beginning of game; breaks with this sequence at some points

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 1 • Rhetorical purpose: 07/10 • Rhetorical methods: 32/40 • Writing strategies? 27/30 • Invented ethos: 08/10 • Organization/Arrangement: 08/10 • TOTAL 82/100

Assessing Fable/Tale • Example 2 • (2)Packy and Marlon is a video game about elephants who have diabetes. Packy and Marlon was created in 1995 by Bob Whitehead, a software engineer worked at Activision. One day, Whitehead was watching the television when he noticed a story about a medical clinic that was trying new methods to get kid interested in going for treatments. Whitehead thought to himself, “Hey, I can do something about this.” He quit his job the next day and started a new company which the aim of the company was to create games that could be used to help kids with medical conditions. He made games like Packi and Marlon, which was a game for helping kids who had diabetes. In Packy and Marlon, you start out on the first level of a playground and you are supposed to use peanuts as a weapon to kill the rats who have invaded the playground. When you get to the end of the first level, you have to aswer a lot of questions about diabetes in order to get the next tool that helps you defeat the boss. Although I liked the elephant characters who were funny, but I thought that the level design was bad because you had to repeat the same parts of the level several times in order to pass it. I do think that kids would like this game if they had diabetes and needed to learn about there medical conditions. Packy and Marlon was a great idea by Bob Whitehead, and more games like it should be made.

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 2 • General impressions • Rhetorical purpose? • Rhetorical methods? • Writing strategies? • Invented ethos? • Organization/Arrangement?

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 2 • General impressions • Overwhelming “facts” without any strong theme or argument • Lack of engaging narrative or interesting details • Seems to show confusion of audience and purpose

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 2 • Rhetorical purpose • Shows some attempt to develop relevance to audience by focusing on Whitehead’s story; overall relevance to audience weakened by other unimportant details • By switching to first-person, demonstrates little concern for audience values • Shows little control of fable form or ability to shape narrative into story

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 2 • Rhetorical methods • Writing shows signs of attention to conflicting reasons for invention: part history, part review; part game description, the exercise has not settled on a coherent use for its invention work • Overall, the exercise seems to be in itself an attempt to develop invention strategies (this may be one way to approach comments with the writer)

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 2 • Writing Strategies • Attempts to use some narrative strategies (“whitehead was watching television when”) • Does not use narrative cues to create a strong sequence of action • Shows almost no attention to pacing (next, then, after, momentarily, etc.) • Begins by emphasizing movement and dialogue of Whitehead, but breaks this narrative sequence by switch to second-person “you”

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 2 • Invented ethos • Some issues with sentence structure which detract from writer’s ethos (i.e. “a new company which the aim was…”; “Although I liked…but I thought”) • First-person switch draws attention to writer unnecessarily

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 2 • Organization/Arrangement • Switches in grammatical person (I, you, Bob Whitehead) draw significant focus away from important narrative details • Essay does not hold attention on one engaging story, but switches too quickly from one detail to the next

Assessing Fable/Tale • Example 4 • (4) In 1994, Al Miller he was at the top of his game. He had everything you could want, a successful job, a big house, and he was also at the top of a career that growing in popularity, which was the video game industry. He was unhappy about one thing, though. He was not happy with kind of work was doing. He was make games that were not to help people only to entertain people with ideas about war and sports games. So in later of that year Miller decides to make the new company of MediGames. His first goal to bring advanced technology to medical situations specially to children who would pay most attention to games. Also Miller has good friend with diabetes and one day he finds out that friend’s son also has diabetes. The firend tells to Miller “I really wish I could find way to make my sone like his shots better” Suddenly, the light goes off in Miller’s head. He thinks to himself, “I can help this kid to like his shots and learn about diabetes!” Miller goes to work next day and gets all his employees togethr. We can make a agame about diabetes he says. Lets use elephants for the main characters. Here was the first time a game had ever been about medical conditions. Now it is almost 15 years later and the game called Packy and Marlon is still used for children with diabets.

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 4 • General impressions • Rhetorical purpose? • Rhetorical methods? • Writing strategies? • Invented ethos? • Organization/Arrangement?

Assessing Fable/Tale Example 4 • Remember that “grammar” is part of a writer’s ethos and thus an aspect of the writer’s “invention” • Difficult grammar may reveal a writer really struggling to use forms and strategies that are unfamiliar • Look for opportunities to praise writers’ inventiveness and emphasize opportunities to revise

Assessing Reflective Analysis Look for: • Specific analysis of writer’s choices • Reference to examples from writer’s actual exercise and experience in writing • Strong claims for writer’s deliberate attempt to understand and use rhetorical methods • Reflection on strengths and limitations of forms, conventions, and/or strategies used

Assessing Reflective Analysis • Fable/Tale – --Reflective analysis-- • Prompt: The reflective analysis for each Progymnasmata exercise asks you to track your own decisions and reflect on how the Progymnasmata form changes and alters as you apply it to a new purpose, audience and situation. The goal of reflective analysis is for you to be able to look at your own work rhetorically, thinking about the choices you make as you attempt to work with new rhetorical strategies and learn new forms of writing. It is not essential that you demonstrate “progress” in your writing: instead, your reflection should carefully document (using examples) what you learn about the act of writing through the process of forcing yourself to adapt to new forms, situations, and purposes. Your analysis for the Tale should focus on ways that your use of narrative and choices of detail meet the particular expectations of the audience you are trying to inform. Length: 250 words. • Topic: Looking at the consequences of video games in contemporary American culture. • Audience: General middle-class newspaper readers • Purpose: inform about positive medical uses of video games

Assessing Reflective Analysis Example 1 • (EX 1) In this exercise, I attempted to put a face and identity to the “data” that suggest the value of video games as a method of improving the way that children who have been diagnosed with diabetes respond to medical treatment. My specific audience was a general adult readership who would not likely know about the use of video games as an educational tool in the process of diabetes treatment. I decided that this audience would engage best with a story about the positive effects of video games, and for this reason I attempted to create an opening paragraph that would draw readers into the narrative about the struggles of a young boy, Aaron, to adjust to a condition of diabetes. I tried to open with details that would suggest that this situation could happen to anyone. Thus, I focused attention mostly on Aaron’s “tummyache” and his confusion at learning that he has a more serious condition than just stomach trouble. I tried to engage readers’ interest in Aaron’s story first, so that the “facts” about video games in the medical community would be more relevant to readers’ investment in Aaron’s condition. I realized when I was completing this exercise that it is easy to tell stories but difficult to shape a story to a particular rhetorical purpose. My early drafts were full of details that I added about Aaron’s New Year’s experience and about his anger at his parents that ultimately were not focusing enough action on the main theme of my topic. I still think that there is some risk that the story may take readers too far away from the main idea, but I think that I could use a strong thesis paragraph to make the transition more clear.

Assessing Reflective Analysis Example 1 • Recognition of audience values; attempts to “engage” audience values • Specific references to rhetorical decisions • Some disconnect between recognition of audience and strategies used • Evidence of writer considering fable/tale as form; little development of this idea

Assessing Reflective Analysis Example 1 • Grade: “B” • This exercise is close to an “A,” but needs to give more attention to its own purpose (consequences of video games) and to the claims it makes about the tale as a limited form. Strong analysis of writer’s choices make this exercise very close to an “A”

Assessing Reflective Analysis Example 2 • (EX 2) I loved this exercise because it let me tell a story about a particular person instead of just listing facts and data about the results of video games in the medical community. It is very important when writing to interest readers in the particular topic you are discussing, and narrative can be one powerful way to get readers invested in a topic. By using strong verbs that carry readers into the action, you create a better chance that readers will like your story and be willing to accept the information or arguments that you are giving them. Especially for a topic that may be unfamiliar, such as the experience of children undergoing treatment for diabetes, it is important to appeal to objects and scenes that may be more familiar to an audience. For example, if you are writing about video games in the medical community, you probably do not want to start with an in-depth description of the video game if your readers are not really video game players. It is useless to include a lot of action unless it is the type of action that lines up with what readers value. Instead, you would maybe want to write about a story about a more “normal” person who has contact with the subject you are trying to explain. That’s why I decided in this case to focus on the story of Aaron, because it is a story that any reader can understand. And then through the story, I was able to get readers to start becoming interested in video games.

Assessing Reflective Analysis Example 2 • Rather than analysis of writer’s choices, simply gives a “step-by-step” approach to creating a fable/tale • Misunderstands purpose of reflective analysis by converting writer’s experiences into universal “rules”

Assessing Reflective Analysis Example 2 • Grade: “C” • Writer understands importance of providing details and examples but does not analyze his or her own choices • Writer may be encouraged to revise by giving more consideration to the final sentence, which focuses on one of the writer’s particular rhetorical decisions

Assessing Reflective Analysis Example 3 • (EX 3) I learned a lot about writing from this exercise in writing a “tale” Porgymnasma. Specifically, I learned three things. One is that you should use details and action to help someone who is reading get interested in your idea. I did this when I wrote a story about Aaron. He was a boy who palyed video games as part of his treatment for dibetes and the video game helped him to learn about his treatment and helped his not being angry at his parents. Second, I learned that you should start with a story first and then go into more details that are about the topic your writing about. This iw why I started by talking about Aaron and his story first. Then I started to talk about video games. Finally, I started to talk about a specific video game that was the focus of my essay. You could also start specifically, like with a particular video game then move outward to talk about all video games that are used with medical treatmnts. Finally, I learned that you have to “invent” new details and actions for each different audience. If you were writing for children, then you would have to tell the a story of Aaron with different words and probably not so complex. You would focus more on the game then on how Aaron learned to give his insulin shots himself. If you write for parents then you can focus more action on how Aaron learns to agree with his parents.

Assessing Reflective Analysis Example 3 • Creates opening towards reflection by analyzing specific rhetorical choices • Does not move from simply relaying writer’s experience to analyzing the rhetorical significance of each choice • Never questions “form” of progymnasmata • Frequent spelling and editing errors detract from writer’s claims

Assessing Reflective Analysis Example 3 • Grade: “C” • Writer engages in reflection but stops short of critical analysis; writer should be encouraged to use this draft to frame questions about the limitations of form • i.e. what is the difference between starting with a “specific” example and starting with more general “facts”? Why/when would these choices be appropriate, and why did the writer choose one over another?

Assessing Reflective Analysis Example 4 • (EX 4) What does the form of a Progymnasmata tell us about writing? One could almost see the specific form of the “tale” shaping the way that one tells stories and, indeed, learns to see the world around him or her. A “tale” is a story of action and intrigue, which hooks an audience into a story by appealing to the thirst in all of us for significance and meaning. In order to write a “tale,” one must learn to see drama and excitement even in the most mundane experiences of life. Thus, writing through this form forces one to focus on embellishing the facts of a particular time and place in order to make the scene or object seem extraordinary. Is this essentially lying to an audience? Perhaps, but are we not always lying just by virtue of the fact that each of us looks at the world differently and always selects only a portion of our experiences to engage in conversation? We cannot really fault the tale for encouraging us to repeat this habit, for it is in our nature to spend more time with facts and data that have personal meaning to us. Still, we must be careful to recognize the ways in which our experiences are manipulated, so to speak, by the forms that we use to tell them. When one tells a tale, one is always sacrificing some element of the “truth” in order to make the “truth” more delightful, interesting, or action-packed for the Everyman who one is trying to inform or convince.

Assessing Reflective Analysis Example 4 • Focuses exclusively on the question of form to the neglect of details about the writer’s own choices • Never indicates author’s awareness of why specific rhetorical methods might be more or less appropriate in this particular context and for this particular topic

Assessing Encomium/invective • Focus particularly on premises of argument • Are they plausible? • Are they appropriate to writer’s audience? • Are they persuasive? • Are they well-supported?

Assessing Encomium/invective • ENCOMIUM / INVECTIVE • Prompt: Encomiums and invectives are exercises that cast praise (encomia) or blame (invective) on a particular person, place, or idea. The encomium/invective form is particularly helpful for exercising rhetorical skills with logical proof, since praise and blame are more typically matters of ethos and pathos. In this exercise, you will write both a declaration of praise and a declaration of blame against a particular person or event that has had a significant effect on the topic you have chosen for this course. The thesis and premises of your logic will be particularly important to this exercise. Make sure that you are giving careful attention to the probability of your claims and supporting all assertions with logical evidence. Each exercise needs to be about 400 words in length. • Topic: Looking at the consequences of video games in contemporary American culture. • Audience: UNT students • Purpose: Persuade readers that the Media Library is not fulfilling its mission when it rents video games to students • Thesis: The UNT Media Library deserves blame for renting video games because the purpose of a library should be to promote education and learning rather than entertainment and violence

Assessing Encomium/invective Example 1 • (EX 1) The UNT Media Library deserves blame because it has begun renting video games to college students who should be studying and not playing video games instead. Specifically, I will discuss three reasons why the UNT Media Library deserves blame. One reason is that the purpose of a library should be to offer information and not to provide entertainment. A second reason is that audiences should know that most libraries do not rent video games because they know that these are not of the same educational value as books. Finally, I will argue that students should protest the Media Library’s decision by refusing to check out video games. • Imagine that you go to the UNT library and you have a research deadline due. You are sitting down at a table to look for sources to use for your research paper in composition class and all of a sudden the table next to you is extremely loud and is talking about the latest video game that they are all going to be playing. It is so disruptive that you cannot study. So then you get in line with a huge stack of books to check out and you have to wait because the guys in front of you are renting an XBOX system, which takes ten or fifteen minutes to check out. Also, the XBOXes are very expensive to replace if they are damaged, while a book is usually only a couple of dollars. • The Media Library should be blamed because it is trying to offer video games even when they have no educational value. One exception may be a few games that do teach people to think carefully and think critically. One example may be the game Portal, which requires players to solve problems and think crtically about challenges of physics. The game is even advertised as a game of physics challenges. But most games, unlike Portal, do not teach anything. Most games like Gears of War and Halo are shooters which only require players to blow up everything in site. Should the Media Library promote students blowing up everything in site? Definitely not. • Finally, students should protest the Media Library’s decision. Obviously it is not logical for a library to provide entertainment when the purpose of a library is to provide education. Let’s look at the Media Library’s motto, which is to serve faculty and students by providing “instructional and research” resources. It should make most students angry that our money is being spent to buy games and game systems when the library should be getting more copies of books that we need. Most students who have had to look at a book online becaue there is not a print copy in the library are already upset that the library is not spending money on buying more print books. Now we know where our money is going: obviously for video games rather than for more instructional material. • In sum, the Media Library should be blamed for not holding to its mission and for not using its resources in the best ways. As a Media Librarian said, “it is true that many students who check out games do so for recreational purposes only.”

Assessing Encomium/invective Example 1 GRADE: • Rhetorical purpose: 07/10 • Rhetorical methods: 26/40 • Writing strategies? 24/30 • Invented ethos: 8/10 • Organization/Arrangement: 6/10 • TOTAL 71/100

Assessing Encomium/invective Example 2 • (EX 2) The UNT Media Library should only be praised if it is fulfilling its goal of providing research and instructional materials to students. Currently, the Medial Library is not fulfilling this goal through its policy of renting video games to students. Therefore, the Media Library should be blamed. • Premise 1: The Media Library should fulfill its goal of providing research and instructional materials to students. The library itself promotes this goal on its website. Additionally, several librarians at the media library have been quoted as reporting this mission. A historical example of the media library fulfilling this mission is when the library began to include DVDs of important documentaries and instructional videos beginning in 2002. These videos are useful in classes. Many instructors show videos to students and it helps students to be able to visualize information instead of just hearing it in lecturers. Similarly, the Media Library fulfilled its mission when it included audio books several years later. Audio books allows students to listen to important texts that they may have to read for their classes. Therefore, these materials are still educational and the Media Library should include them. • Premise 2: The Media Library is not fulfilling its major goal when it rents video games. The implication is that video games are not education. This claim is supported by referencing popular data. For instance, a research study by Stanford University found that over 70% of all people between the ages of 7-15 had played the video game Grand Theft Auto. The report found that students who had played Grand Theft Auto were 30% more likely to get into fights than other kids who had not played the game. This fact demonstrates that video games are more often violent than educational. What can students gain from playing a game where you’re goal is to crash cars and kill people? Another example of violent video games is Halo. In Halo, a player is supposed to act as a space hero that saves the planet from aliens. What do people learn through playing this game, except how to fantasize about being a space hero? • Overall, because most video games are not useful for research or education, the Media Library is making a mistake by renting them. The Media Library is only promoting entertainment, and it should be blamed.

Assessing Encomium/invective Example 2 GRADE: • Rhetorical purpose: 08/10 • Rhetorical methods: 32/40 • Writing strategies? 27/30 • Invented ethos: 8/10 • Organization/Arrangement: 5/10 • TOTAL 81/100

Guide to Example Progymnasmata