Evaluation Essay Overview
The evaluation essay, like the summary essay and response essay, is an essay frequently assigned in college courses. After successfully completing this assignment, you will have gained familiarity with its purpose and requirements. Your critical thinking skills will also be honed.
The evaluation essay is similar to the summary essay in that you will devote part of your essay to summarizing; it is similar to the response essay in that it is an opinion-based essay. It differs from the two, however, in that your objective is not solely to summarize and not to offer your response to the subject of the essay you are evaluation. Instead, your primary objective is to demonstrate, through summary and analysis, an understanding of the article’s structure, purpose, techniques and, ultimately, its persuasive effectiveness.
So you are to avoid offering your personal response to the topic of the essay. Your response will instead focus on the essay as a work of argumentation.
To simplify the objective of this assignment further, your thesis will answer the following: Is this essay successful in terms of its argumentative effectiveness? Why and/or why not?
In an evaluation essay of an argumentative work, the following are considered; thus you will at some point in your essay respond to these questions:
1) What is the author’s thesis? In other words, what is his point? Is it implied? Is it explicit? Summarize it if possible in your own words.
2) What is the general structure of the essay? How is the argument organized? Describe.
3) What are the author’s key points which support the thesis? Identify.
4) How effectively does the author anticipate objections and refute opposing viewpoints? Are there any objections or viewpoints which the author neglects to consider? Identify and explain.
5) What are the essay’s strongest points or aspects? Identify and explain.
6) What are the essay’s weakest points or aspects? Identify and explain.
7) What is the overall tone of the essay? (Tone expresses the writer’s feelings toward the audience. Is the tone arrogant, confrontational, hostile, friendly, jovial, sarcastic, etc.?) Does the writer’s tone add or detract from the essay’s effectiveness? Explain.
8) What is the overall style of the essay? (Style includes elements such as wordiness, slang, clichés, sentence structure, and general level of expression.) Does the writer’s style add or detract from the essay’s effectiveness? Explain.
9) What argumentative appeals or techniques can you identify? Appeals to reason? To emotion? Can you detect any bias? Is the author’s biography (if provided) relevant?
10) What are the conventions of the medium for which the author is writing? (What does the audience expect from a newspaper editorial, as opposed to other media such as books, magazines, television, or journals?) Does the medium play a role in the essay’s effectiveness? What is the writer’s relationship with the audience?
Assignment 3: Evaluation Essay (15%)
Instructions: Write a detailed evaluation of any one of the following essays from They Say/I Say, Chapter 21 or Chapter 22:
Nicholas Carr: How Smartphones Hijack Our Minds
*Include an introductory paragraph consisting of your thesis statement and well-developed lead-in sentences, at least three supporting body paragraphs, and a concluding paragraph.
*The essay must be at least 750 words. Failure to meet this requirement will result in at most a “D” for the assignment
*Include direct quotations from the essay to which you are responding. Failure to meet this requirement will result in a “D” for the assignment
*The essay must be double-spaced, 12-point size type, Times New Roman font
*The essay must be submitted as a Microsoft Word attachment through Canvas
Additional Information for Writing an Evaluation Essay
This is an evaluation essay–-one in which you will both summarize and analyze. Your primary objective should not be to present your own viewpoint of the article’s topic; rather, your objective is to demonstrate, through summary and analysis, an understanding of the article’s structure, purpose, techniques and, ultimately, its persuasive effectiveness.
In this essay, you will include the following:
– a summary of the author’s thesis
– a summary of the essay’s organizational approach or structure
– a summary of the author’s key points he/she includes to support the thesis
– an analysis of the effectiveness of the author’s argument, including an evaluation of strong and weak aspects of the argument
– Identification and analysis of argumentative techniques, appeals, traits. For example, appeals to logic/reason (logos), appeals to emotion (pathos), appeals to credibility (ethos), author’s tone/style
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