Moving from Narrative to Argument
Essay Basics While Workshopping the Process of Writing
Dr. L. Lennie Irvin
San Antonio College
San Antonio Writing Project
Theoretical Underpinnings and Goals of this
Assignment

Building on students’ natural capacity for making meaning
with language (Berthoff)
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Writing assignments that mesh with cognitive development
and a growing ability for abstraction (Moffett)
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Teaching writing as a process and activity
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Increasing students awareness of audience and rhetorical
stance
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
From narrative to argument
Moffett’s curriculum ascending the ladder of
abstraction

“my idea would be to have a curriculum recapitulate,
in successive assignments, the abstractive stages
across which all of us all the time symbolize raw
phenomena and manipulate these symbolizations”
(25)
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
The Spectrum of Discourse
Recording--the drama of what is happening
Reporting—the narrative of what happened
Generalizing—the exposition of what
Description
Narration
Exposition
happens
Theorizing—the argumentation of what will,
may happen
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
Argument
Sequence of assignments

building toward the higher level analysis and
argumentation of college writing
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Narration/Description—The Family Story
Illustration—The Illustrative Essay
Analysis
Argumentation
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
From narration to argument

Story

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close observation, detail, showing and not telling,
sequence, narrative form
Illustration

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makes point (thesis-driven); essay form (point-support)
builds concept of “showing” through exemplification
using stories to illustrate (show, prove, exemplify, support)
added layers of purpose and audience (purpose driven)
argumentation (theorizing) that builds on generalizing and reporting
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
Sequence of assignments

building toward the higher level analysis and
argumentation of college writing




Narration/Description—The Family Story
Illustration—The Illustrative Essay
Analysis
Argumentation
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
Teaching the Basics of Essay Form

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Introduction
Body—dividing up the proof
Conclusion

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Essay Form
Organization—put only one primary support per Body
paragraph (in this case, one story/example per body
paragraph)
Introductions
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
Encountering the Writing Situation

What do I want to say? (message)

–Who do I want to say it to? (audience)

–Why do I want to say it to them? (purpose)

What do I want them to see, think, feel, or do when or after they read
my text?
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
Images of the Writing Situation
James Kinneavy’s Communication Triangle, A Theory of Discourse
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
Images of the Writing Situation
Mike Palmquist’s “Social Model of Writing” | Writing@CSU
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
Encountering the Writing Process: The
Writing Feedback Loop
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
Looping Through the Writing Cycle

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Invention exercise(s)
Draft 1
Peer Response 1
Writer’s Review 1
--Draft 2
Peer Response 2
Writer’s Review 2

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Draft 3
Peer Response 3
(celebrate writing)
Writer’s Review
--modeling/lessons at various
places along the way
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
The Power of Heuristics

A heuristic is any form or procedure that leads
to knowledge

prompting thinking!

A sequence of questions that lead a student along
a path of consideration (they might not otherwise
have gone down)
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
Kenneth Bruffee and Peer Response
“Collaborative Learning and the ‘Conversation of Mankind’”

Social construction of knowledge

“…our task [as writing teachers] must involve engaging students in
conversation among themselves at as many points in both the
writing and the reading process as possible, and that we should
contrive to ensure that students’ conversation about what they read
and write is similar in as many ways as possible to the way we
would like them eventually to read and write. The way they will
talk to each other determines the way they will think and the way
they will write” (400)
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
Peer Groups/Writing Workshop

Beat Not the Poor Desk, Marie Ponsot and
Rosemary Dean

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Making observations and separating them from
inferences
Peter Elbow and Pat Belanoff

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Sharing and Responding
my guide on peer response
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
Writer’s Reviews

A chance for writers "between the drafts" to think and strategize on paper
about where they are in working on a piece of writing and where they plan
to take it.

These writing pieces ask writers to consider feedback they have received,
stand back and look at their writing, and gain some perspective. These
self-evaluations prompt students to consider their draft in light of what
they conceive to be the goal or success on this essay assignment.

From this consideration and evaluation, writers generate plans and
strategies for productively revising their essay to better reach the goals of
the particular assignment.
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
Writing Activity:
Illustrative Essay Invention
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
Viewing Student Examples
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College
How Might You Use This Writing
Activity in With Your Own Classes?
L. Lennie Irvin, San Antonio College