UNIT 4 INSTRUCTIONS
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Deadlines
Green Zone (Apr 24-May 7): Essays turned in during this time
period will receive comments and 10% extra credit. All discussion messages must
be posted to the Discussion Forum during this time period to receive credit. If
you want response to your Outline before you write the essay, you must post it
to the Discussion Forum during this period. Try to do your work within this
time period as much as possible to get the most out of this class.
Yellow Zone (May 8-May 11): Essays turned in during this time
period will receive feedback and full credit. Nothing posted to the Discussion
Forum from this point onward will receive credit or feedback.At this time,
submit the collection of all Discussion Messages you wrote for this Unit to me
via the Homework Submission Page. Try never to submit your essay later than
this period, as doing so puts your grade in jeopardy.
Red Zone (May 12-May 14): Essays turned in during this time
period will not receive any feedback, making it unlikely that you will improve
your writing or raise your grade. If you didn't already do so, submit the
collection of all Discussion Messages you wrote for this Unit to me via the
Homework Submission Page. Try to use this time period only for true
emergencies, and do NOT make a habit of turning your essays in during this
period.
Since I am not monitoring your
performance on the online exercises, they can be done during any
"zone." Technically, the same is true of the readings and lectures,
but the reality is that you'll need to have read most of these before you can
successfully do the Forum messages and essay.
Textbook Readings
For Unit 4, read the
following material from Chapter 14 of Behrens & Rosen:
Everyone needs to read the introduction to Chapter 14 and the
two pieces under "A Note on the American Legal System." Also read
180-188.
The rest of the articles are organized into four categories:
Emotional Distress, Freedom of Speech, Child Custody, Homicide, and Parental
Responsibility. Nobody is to write
about Child Custody. Beyond that, you really only need to read in the
category you will be writing your Discussion Message(s) and/or Essay about.
Once you've decided which category(s) you want to focus on, it isn't required
to read the others (but you can if you want to further participate in
Discussion). Again, no writing on the Child Custody articles, please.
Heads Up! Unit 5 requires you to write about
one of the optional novels for this course: The Naked Sun, The Little Girl and the Cigarette or The
Handmaid's Tale. You should finish the novel of your choice early during
Unit 5.
Lectures
Paraphrasing
Though instructors
want students to use outside material as support and proof, students often make
the mistake of quoting too much. When you quote too much, your own ideas
get lost, and the paper becomes a sea of quotations. How can you use
outside evidence and avoid over-quoting? The answer lies in paraphrasing,
presenting outside ideas in your own words.
If you have a point
to make about your source's exact words, or if the source is phrased in a
particularly good way, by all means, quote directly. But if not, consider
paraphrasing.
Be aware though,
that paraphrasing is hard. It is not enough to substitute a few words
here and there with similar ones or to shuffle the order of phrases
around. You must completely rewrite the original so that it is almost
impossible to see its resemblance. Often, students make too few
modifications to their original sources, and that is a form of
plagiarism.
Read this electronic
handout from the University of Texas, Austin about paraphrasing as well as Purdue's
excellent advice on how to paraphrase.
Working with
Quotations
Students often have
difficulty with a number of issues pertaining to the use of quotes: 1) when to
quote, 2) how to connect the quote to the rest of the essay, 3) how to use
punctuation with the quote. Read the guidelines on these
matters from the University of Toronto.
Exercises
The following exercises are required: #65,
#249,
#689,
#743
and #767.
Discussion Forum
Posting Discussion Messages (Required)
Questions for Discussion Forum 4
The discussion messages for
this Unit will help prepare for the essay. You should choose one of the two
following options:
1. Post a message in which you select any of the cases
from our assigned reading and present an argument for one side. As the textbook
teaches you, arguments are only worth anything if they refer to the criteria
set out in the law, so make sure that your post constantly refers to the
excerpts of the law given in the book as you make your case. Be sure to give
your post a subject line that names the case you wrote about.
OR
2. Post a message in which you describe the facts of a
case you find through research that is fundamentally similar to one of the
cases in our assigned readings. Describe the details and outline of the case,
and point out important similarities and/or differences to one of the cases in
our readings. Give your post a subject line according to the following example:
if you found a case that’s similar to the teenage sniper case, the subject line
should be “Teenage sniper (similar case)”
Posting an Outline (Optional)
You have the option to post an outline for the
essay that you'll be writing so that I can give you feedback before you get too
far into the writing process. Like anything else posted to the forum, it must
be posted during the Green Zone. I will respond as quickly as possible, but you
should expect that it may take me a couple of days. Just as importantly, I will
only respond to Outlines that follow the directions given in all previous
Units.
Click here
now to go to the Discussion Forum.
Essay
Your essay for Unit 4 is to select any case assigned from the
textbook and write an argument for
one side OR the other by COMPARING AND CONTRASTING the case with at least one
other similar case. As explained in our textbook, your strategy may be
to find a case that had an outcome favoring your side and show how similar it
is to your case, or you may find a case that had an undesirable outcome and
argue that it is quite different from your case. Or you may find one of each.
When selecting the case for comparison, you are allowed to use
those found in our textbook, but you'll have to find out which side won by
researching through Google (it won't be too hard to find out) since our
textbook doesn't tell you. Alternatively, you can research other cases, using
Google or other methods. http://www.lexisnexis.com/clients/CACourts/ is a
website that allows you to search for actual judicial rulings on subjects you
identify (these are often hard to read due to legal jargon). A librarian could
also guide you to resources that will help you find similar cases.
Once you have found reasonably similar cases, develop your
essay as a comparison-contrast as explained on pages 180-188 of our textbook,
arguing for the similarity or difference of each case as fits the interest of
your client. Adopt the role of the client's attorney, arguing as forcefully and
clearly as you can. Remember, if the
side similar to your client won, you want to show that the circumstances of the
case are similar and explain away the differences. If the side similar to your
client lost, you want to do the opposite. For example, if you want to argue
on the side of the party that is suing the teenage sniper’s parents, you need
to find a similar case where the suing party wins and argue that the cases are
very similar, or find a similar case where the suing party loses and argue that
the cases are significantly different (despite seeming similar on the surface).
Or you can find one of each.
To submit the essay, visit the Homework Submission Page and follow the same procedure that
you did for Essay 1. As always, if problems arise, let me know.
Remember that if you realistically expect
your grades and writing to improve, you must turn your essays in during the
Green Zone so that you can benefit from extensive feedback. Waiting for the Red
Zone and obtaining no feedback at all, in contrast, drastically decreases your
probability of passing the course.