You’ve learned about NewView here on my blog and you’re interested in learning how to write better or how to teach your students to write better. But because the 5 NewView Options — reverse add subtract substitute rearrange —work with EVERYthing written or spoken, it seems that you, like many people, just aren’t quite sure [...]
[[[THIS CONTINUES THE DISCUSSION I BEGAN LAST WEDNESDAY AND CONTINUED THURSDAY BUT HAVEN'T GOTTEN BACK TO UNTIL NOW. THIS PART OF THE DISCUSSION IS ALSO TAKEN FROM MY NEW BOOK, THE SECRET DNA OF ANALYZING NOVELS, WHICH SHOULD BE PUBLISHED NEXT WEEK AND WILL BE AVAILABLE HERE AND AT AMAZON.COM.]]] Rule #3. Locate major characters [...]
[[[THIS CONTINUES THE DISCUSSION I BEGAN YESTERDAY. THIS PART OF THE DISCUSSION IS TAKEN FROM MY NEW BOOK, THE SECRET DNA OF ANALYZING NOVELS, WHICH SHOULD BE PUBLISHED NEXT WEEK AND WILL BE AVAILABLE HERE AND AT AMAZON.COM.]]] The theme of a story is what the author is trying to communicate to readers, the main [...]
When you’re writing a lit analysis essay on a novel, you’ll want to be sure to get the theme right because everything else in the story should relate to the theme. Oh–you’d like a good definition of theme? The theme of a story is what the author is trying to communicate to readers, the main [...]
There can be no doubt about it: in writing essays or in any other form of communication, you have to use NewView and use it wisely. To back that up one more time–for writing essays, at least–here’s a quote from page 18 of Walter Dill Scott’s landmark book, The Psychology of Advertising: The fourth principle [...]
The idea of newness isn’t important just in writing essays, or just in how to write, generally. The idea of the vital importance of newness goes far beyond writing essays and how to write—newness has been creeping into the theories of many modern professional disciplines. For instance, key theorists in Information Science have had some [...]
What have scholars and teachers been doing to improve writing and the teaching of writing in American schools for the last one hundred and sixty years–especially the writing of essays? The answer to that gives us a fascinating historical perspective of the teaching of writing in America—— In 1994, composition scholar Robert J. Connors (scroll [...]
Wouldn’t it be great if you had a nickel for every time you’ve seen a commercial or advertisement touting new this or new and improved that? These terms may get overused, but they certainly draw consumers’ attention. The problem is, just what does new mean? Newness applies so differently to so many things that it [...]
(This article resumes and finishes the discussion about using solid reasoning when writing essays, which I began in the previous post, here.) As an outstanding example of writing essays, in “The Eureka Phenomenon” famous author Isaac Asimov employs a clever twist to his NewView thesis—he presents it in stages. After almost a page of discussion [...]
Reasoning satisfies our human need for justification and a sense of ‘rightness’ that all intelligent communication needs, especially when writing essays. What is “reasoning,” anyway? When talking about the meaning of reasoning in writing essays, we can get into confusing philosophical issues much too quickly. So let’s start with a down-to-earth definition of reasoning as [...]
When you come up with a good NewView thesis for your essay, you should give it credibility by supporting it with— stories examples reasoning You see, it doesn’t matter whether you’ve got a good NewView thesis if you’ve got only weak support for it in the form of half-developed stories, poor examples, and barely understood [...]
While you’re writing essays with great NewView theses in them, give your essays substance and credibility by supporting those thesis statements thoroughly with outstanding– stories examples reasoning Why so concerned about supporting the thesis when writing essays? Because if you’ve got lousy support for your fantastic NewView thesis with weak stories, poor examples, and limp [...]
Students who are assigned to write essays will usually be asked to write an essay, not just a report, on a piece of literature, such as a novel. The following discussion should help everyone to write essays about novels, generally, and about Harper Lee’s extraordinary novel, To Kill A Mockingbird, in particular. Every story, whether [...]
The creative NewView method of writing essays is not confined just to writing essays but applies equally to all writing. And it all goes back to the Greeks, as many things do—– For instance, Robert Pirsig, in his international bestseller, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, said that Aristotle’s book Rhetoric “killed the creative [...]
Let’s not beat around the bush when we talk about writing essays. Students aren’t writing essays well enough to do college work for two reasons: Colleges and universities don’t train writing instructors well. No one has discovered a main principle that organizes all the many rules of writing. #1. Who says that ‘higher education’ doesn’t [...]
Mark Twain’s short story, The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County, was his first great success as a writer when it was published November 18, 1865, in the New York weekly, The Saturday Press. SUMMARY ANALYSIS 1-OldView strong value statement, early on “. . . he [Jim Smiley] was the curiousest man about always betting [...]
(William Sydney Porter) O. Henry’s short story, The Ransom of Red Chief, is a classic comedic short story, with the author’s trademark twist at the end. A twist? Could that possibly mean a NewView? Could that mean our OldView expectations of a value were Reversed, or Added to, or Subtracted from, or Substituted, or Rearranged? [...]
Katherine Mansfield’s short story, The Stranger, has the least obvious, most subtle OldView of all the short stories I discuss here in my other blog posts on writing essays of lit analysis. However, the story’s NewView presented in the very last sentence is probably the strongest NewView of all the short stories, though, perhaps, not [...]
As you most probably know, I’ve been selling several books that use my NewView approach to writing essays and lit analysis. And, in addition to The Secret DNA of Writing Essays–And Everything Else, The Secret DNA of Topic Sentences That Entice Readers, The Secret DNA of Analyzing Published Essays, and The Secret DNA of Thesis [...]
Still interested in writing essays about literature, short stories in particular? Anton Chekov’s short story, The Bet, is yet another fine example of a straightforward OldView – to – NewView relationship in a story, another instance that illustrates the universal truth that a story must change by the end and that end is always a [...]
Bret Harte’s short story, The Outcasts of Poker Flat, is somewhat subtle, but it is popular and has been made into a successful movie at least five times, 1952 being the most recent film. Summary Analysis 1-OldView strong value statement, early on Mr. Oakhurst received his sentence with philosophic calmness . . . he was [...]
Edgar Allen Poe’s short story, The Cask of Amontillado, is very well-known and is frequently included in high school and college texts with all the best short stories. For writing essays on literary analysis, this is a rich selection. SUMMARY ANALYSIS 1-OldView strong value statement, early on “I continued as was my wont, to smile [...]
There are all sorts of forms of writing, but writing essays and articles are the most common forms of writing. And in every published essay and article, you’ll find they all have one thing in common: They all say something new to the reader. Yet when teachers and textbooks talk about writing essays and articles, [...]
Richard Connell’s entertaining short story, The Most Dangerous Game, has an interesting variation of the OldView-NewView relationship, a variation that should make writing your essays about it doubly interesting. Early on, the OldView is plainly stated by Rainsford aboard the yacht, which is a good start for writing essays, even though you might miss it [...]
Frodo & Gandalf – The differences between the two are readily apparent in descriptive writing: Frodo is weak and not very wise, while Gandalf is both very powerful and very, very wise. Near the beginning of the story, Frodo asks Gandalf to take the ring because of his superior power and wisdom, but Gandalf declines [...]
Occasionally, students of writing get assigned to write essays about literature. And one of the most time-consuming of those literature assignments is when they have to write essays about really long stories, or novels. Here’s a powerful idea that will save you mountains of time in analyzing novels AND keep you out of the fire [...]
NV NOVEL PRINCIPLE #3 Within the last ten to twenty pages of a novel, a NewView Reverse of the OldView is usually revealed. In the closing scene, Paul captures and is publicly conversing with and threatening the Galactic Emperor and all his court, including the same “Bene Gesserit witch” who tested him with the Gom [...]
Although my last eight posts have dealt with the NewView concept working in short stories, in this post I will once again show NewView working in a novel. (In the past, I have already thoroughly discussed how NewView works in Jane Austen’s novel, Pride and Prejudice, and in J.R.R. Tolkien’s novel, The Lord of the [...]
With this post, I am completing the last post, which shows the first two steps of how to use the NewView Analysis method to analyze Jacob Bronowski’s essay, “The Nature of Scientific Revolutions.” Here I’ll explain the third and final step of analysis, which will aid you in writing essays about professionally published essays. NOTE: [...]
With this blog, I am extending to eight posts the six-post series for helping students in analyzing and writing essays about published essays. For writing teachers, these posts are also excellent material for teaching writing, as I’ve noted before. Depending on how you use it, this material can cover more than one teaching or classroom [...]
With this post, I am completing the post I began yesterday, which shows the first two steps of how to use the NewView Analysis method to analyze Isaac Asimov’s essay, “The Eureka Phenomena.” Here I’ll explain the third and final step of analysis, which will aid you in writing essays about professionally published essays. NOTE: [...]
Through this blog, I am providing the fifth in a series of six posts to help students in writing essays about published essays. These blog posts also provide excellent material for teaching writing. This material can be used to cover several teaching sessions on writing essays. Isaac Asimov (1920-1992) was a truly prolific writer of [...]
With this post, I am completing the post I began yesterday, which shows the first two steps of how to use the NewView Analysis method to analyze Carl Sagan’s essay, “The Abstraction of Beasts.” Here I’ll explain the third and final step of analysis, which will aid you in writing essays about professionally published essays. [...]
With this blog, I am continuing with the third post of a series of six posts that help students in writing essays about published essays. For writing teachers, these posts are also excellent material for teaching writing. This material can cover more than one teaching session on writing essays. Carl Sagan–American astronomer, astrophysicist, cosmologist, author [...]
NEWVIEW ESSAY PRINCIPLE #3 The conclusion should briefly restate the NewView Thesis, summarize the thesis support from body paragraphs, and look to some future aspect of the NewView. The concluding paragraph does refer to the general NewView Thesis theme that– “the present political chaos is connected with the decay of language, and that one can [...]
With this post, I begin a series of six posts that are meant to help students in writing essays about published essays. These posts are also excellent material for teachers who are involved in teaching writing, providing material that can cover more than one teaching session on writing essays. More famous for his books Nineteen [...]
Willa Cather’s short story, Paul’s Case, is more than twice as long as Faulkner’s A Rose for Emily and more than three times as long as Joyce’s Clay. Thus, as we would expect, the length of the story provides many opportunities for richness of detail and some looseness involving the use of the strong OldView [...]
To help you write essays about literature (and to show off NewView ), I’ve come up with an analysis of William Faulkner’s highly acclaimed short story, “A Rose for Emily. Every story — whether it’s a short story or a longer story, such as a novel — has to have some significant change by the [...]
Writing essays on literature begins–or can begin for you–with analyzing James Joyce’s famous short story, “Clay,” which was published in 1914 in his collection of short stories titled, Dubliners. Like literally every other short story ever published, “Clay” makes a strong OldView value statement early on and then shows a NewView Reversal of that OldView [...]
Write essays–that’s what writing teachers are supposed to teach: How to write essays. And that’s what the National Writing Project’s (NWP) last and 30th idea in its list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing is supposed to do. But it has positives and negatives. Click the following link to get access to the NWP’s 30th [...]
Write essays–that’s what writing teachers are supposed to teach: how to write essays with high quality, among other writings, true, but essays are number one on the list. The National Writing Project’s (NWP) 29th idea in its list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing is supposed to help with that. But it has good points [...]
As I have mentioned elsewhere (and as prominently noted in public media, such as Newsweek), teachers of writing are not well-trained in teaching students how to write (even though those teachers are usually quite intelligent and very dedicated professionals). The underlying problem is that universities and colleges don’t know how to teach the teaching of [...]
Teaching writing–the 28th idea in the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing has some pluses and some minuses. Click the following link to get access to the NWP’s 28th idea for teaching writing: Allow classroom writing to take a page from yearbook writing. The NWP’s summary referenced above, here, provides [...]
Teaching writing–here are my comments on the 27th idea in the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. Idea #27 has some obvious good points and some not so obvious bad points. Click the following link to get access to the NWP’s 27th idea for teaching writing: Think like a football [...]
Writing essays and how to teach such writing–let’s discuss the 26th idea in the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. Idea #26 has some strong points and some weak points. Click the following link to get access to the NWP’s 26th idea for teaching the writing of essays: Use real [...]
Here’s the outstanding Amazon.com review of The Secret DNA of Analyzing Short Stories, verbatim (you can see it on Amazon.com by clicking here): “I had heard about this through an acquaintance and bought it because I love short stories but have never been able to write one I really liked. Understanding the underlying systemic structure [...]
Writing essays–that’s discussed in the 25th idea in the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. Idea #25 needs to be commented on, which I’ll do, here. Idea #25 has some problems and some good points. Click the following link to see the NWP’s 25th idea in full for teaching the [...]
How to write–that’s discussed in Idea #24 in the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. Idea #24 deserves to be commented upon, which I’ll do here, because Idea #24 has good points and some problems. Click the following link to see in full the NWP’s 24th idea for teaching how [...]
How to write–the 23rd idea in the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing provides good points and some problems. I’ll discuss each of those. Click the following link to see the NWP’s 23rd idea in detail about how to write, especially essays: Require students to make a persuasive written argument [...]
Write essays–the 22nd idea in the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing has some good points as well as problems about how to write essays. Check out the NWP’s 22nd idea in detail by clicking the following link to learn another idea about how to write essays: Challenge students to [...]
Write essays — the 21st idea in the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing should help students write essays. Idea #21 has good points as well as problems, both of which I discuss here. Look up the NWP’s 21st idea in detail by clicking the following link to see for [...]
The 20th idea on the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing has good points as well as problems, both of which I discuss here. You can look up the NWP’s 20th idea in detail by clicking the following link: Ask students to experiment with student length. The article referenced above [...]
Idea #19 of the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing has problems and good points, both of which I shall discuss. You can see the NWP’s #19 idea in detail by using the following link: Make grammar instruction dynamic. The article above contains a link to the journal article, “It [...]
Idea #18 of the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing has problems and good points, both of which I shall discuss. You can see the NWP’s #18 idea in detail by using the following link: Make writing reflection tangible. The article above contains a link to another article, “I was [...]
Here I will discuss both the problems and the good points of Idea #17, as listed in the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. You can see the NWP’s #17 idea in detail by using the following link: Require written response to peers’ writing. The article discussed in the article [...]
Here are my comments on the sixteenth idea listed in the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. I will discuss both the problems and the good points of Idea #16. You can see the NWP’s #16 idea in detail by using the following link: Encourage descriptive writing by focusing on [...]
My comments, here, are on the fifteenth idea listed in the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. I will discuss both the problems and the good points of Idea #15. You can see the NWP’s #15 idea in detail by using the following link: Teach “tension” to move students beyond [...]
Here are my comments on the fourteenth idea listed in the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. I’ll discuss the problems, as well as the good points, of Idea #14. You can see the NWP’s #14 idea in detail by using the following link: Pair students with adult reading/writing buddies. [...]
The thirteenth idea listed in the National Writing Project’s (NWP) list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing has problems. I’ll discuss those problems, as well as the good points, of Idea #13. You can see the NWP’s #13 idea in detail by using the following link: Practice and play with revision techniques. The article referenced [...]
Here’s my critical commentary on the twelfth listed idea in the National Writing Project’s list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. I’ll discuss the good points and the bad points of their Idea #12. You can see their #12 idea in detail by using the following link: Give students a chance to write to an [...]
In this eleventh critical commentary of mine on the National Writing Project’s list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing, I discuss the good points and the bad points of their Idea #11. You can see their #11 idea in detail by using the following link: Use casual talk about students’ lives to generate writing. In [...]
This tenth critical commentary of mine is on Idea #9 in the National Writing Project’s list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. You can see their #10 idea in detail by using the following link: Get students to focus on their writing by holding off on grading. In the article referenced within the link above, [...]
Okay, so here’s my ninth critical commentary, this time on Idea #9 in the National Writing Project’s list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. You can see their #9 idea in detail by using the following link: Ease into writing workshops by presenting yourself as a model. In the article referenced in the link above, [...]
Okay, so here’s my eighth critical commentary, this time on Idea #8 in the National Writing Project’s list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. You can see their #8 idea in detail by using the following link: Ask students to reflect on and write about their writing. In the article referenced in the link above, [...]
Here’s my seventh critical commentary, this time on Idea #7 in the National Writing Project’s list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. You can see their #7 idea — the best we’ve discussed so far — in detail by using the following link: Spotlight language and use group brainstorming to help students create poetry. In [...]
This sixth comment of mine is on Idea #6 in the National Writing Project’s list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. You can see their #6 idea in detail at the following link: Help students analyze text by asking them to imagine dialogue between authors. In the article referenced in the link above, the class [...]
My fifth comment is on Idea #5 in the National Writing Project’s list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing. You can see their #5 idea in detail at the following link: Work with words relevant to students’ lives to help them build vocabulary. In the article referenced in the link above, the following paragraph expresses [...]
Here’s my fourth comment on the National Writing Project’s list of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing, and I’m commenting on their #4 idea. You can see their #4 idea in detail at the following link: Help student writers draw rich chunks of writing from endless sprawl In the article reference at the link above, here [...]
This third comment of mine on the National Writing Project’s 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing deals with their #3 Idea, which can be seen in detail at the following link: Use Writing to Improve Relations Among Students This one hardly even needs to be discussed. It doesn’t even pretend to teach writing! It talks only [...]
This second comment of mine on the National Writing Project’s 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing deals with their #2 Idea, which can be seen in detail at the following link: Establish an email dialogue between students from different schools who are reading the same book. What can any reasonably intelligent adult predict from such an [...]
As I promised in my previous post, here I’ll begin showing the problems with the first of 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing offered offered by the National Writing Project. The first of their 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing is the following: Use the shared events of students’ lives to inspire writing. If you’ll click on [...]
Over the next several days, I’m going to comment on several of the following 30 ideas that the National Writing Project puts out on its website at http://www.nwp.org/cs/public/print/resource/922#One. I’m providing you this list so you can get the overall idea before I get into the particulars. My discussions will demonstrate how these 30 ideas would [...]
So you don’t believe the title of this article, eh? You’d like to think that the authorities of Rhetoric and writing in colleges and universities across the land actually know what they’re talking about, right? Got an open mind? Willing to look at some solid evidence? Let me share some with you— Here are some [...]
Teaching writing is hard enough without messing things up by focusing just on forms and that oh-so supercilious term, “genre”–which is just a high-falutin’ way of saying “form.” That form-centric discipline called Rhetoric and those who teach it are muddling the natural abilities of students who try to write essays even though the instruction is [...]
There’s little consensus on how to go about teaching students how to write. Data gathered from an ambitious survey of college freshman writing courses several decades ago defied generalizations, and the picture hasn’t changed much at all since then. Theoretical approaches or “fads” for teaching writing come and go—I’ve witnessed several such fads in my [...]
Bill Drew’s new e-book, The Secret DNA of Writing Essays—And Everything Else, completely resets the Rules for Writing. At the core of Bill’s e-book, there’s a powerful revolutionary principle—NewView! What does it do? NewView generates content & ideas. Of course, that’s the reverse of what’s been taught in classrooms for over two thousand years—form, nothing [...]
The Secret DNA of Writing Essays gets right to the heart of successful writing. Bill Drew’s original but simple approach to writing pinpoints exactly what good essays do and why. (A delightful side benefit is that it also provides a thought-provoking insight into analyzing fiction.) His NewView method provides a new way for thinking about [...]
The Baker-Ready Solution As I pursued my Independent Reading courses in my English Masters program, I came across Sheridan Baker’s textbook, The Practical Stylist, third edition (New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1973). Baker promoted the idea of creating an argumentative edge to provide content for writing essays (pp. 2-3): The about-ness puts an argumentative edge [...]
In 1911, the National Council of the Teachers of English (NCTE) was formed and held its first meeting. The Chairman of the Composition Committee presented a paper, “The Need of Improvement in the Conditions Surrounding the Teaching of Composition,” which took to task the teaching of writing in both high schools and colleges. Here is [...]
Graduate school can be outrageous—but you learn unexpected and fascinating things as a graduate student. When I was a married graduate student and holding down a more-than-full-time job as a Graduate Instructor, a friend from church came over to our apartment and asked me to look at a paper he had written. The paper was [...]
Why is it so doggone hard to talk sensibly about essays and to teach how to write them? Definition Problem & Assumption The difficulty is reflected admirably in a statement within Wikipedia’s coverage on the subject of Essays: The definition of an essay is vague, overlapping with those of an article and a short story. [...]
Writing and teaching writing may not be as complicated as modern physics, but all who are interested in and concerned about writing should take this incredible statement by an eminent modern scientist into serious consideration: David Bohm, Professor of Physics at Birkbeck College, University of London, proposes that quantum physics is, in fact, based upon [...]
I think we can all agree that, whether it’s a short story or a novel or something in-between, THE most important thing about any story is this: Something has to change by the end—or there’s no story. Whether or not you’ve ever seen that statement in a book or in an article, you know intuitively [...]
What got me thinking about the “writing is communicating is teaching is writing” cycle was an online incident I experienced a few years ago when I was taking a Master’s Course in Special Education. Every week, the ‘mentor’ for the online class put out 3-5 questions for the students to respond to. Our assignment also [...]
According to the last three announcements of national testing scores by the National Center for Education Statistics in 1998, 2002, and 2007, only one in four or five high school seniors (depending on how you look at the figures) can write well enough—”Proficiently” or better—to succeed in college. NCW’s Call for a Writing Revolution Because [...]
NewView Options believes there is a famine in the land, in terms of good instruction for writing topic sentences. That’s why they wrote and published their third book on writing, The Secret DNA of Topic Sentences That Entice Readers. Provo, UT – October 16, 2010 (via PressReleasePivot.com) — NewView Options, an educational company, announced today [...]
NewView Options announced today a new video on YouTube that introduces its essay-writing software, NewView Essay Services. Also, NewView Options announced 100 free trial runs or free logins of that software, for a limited time. Provo, UT – September 23, 2010 (PressReleasePivot) – So, Mr. Drew, when you said you have finally loaded a solid [...]
Let me tell you, up front, the most important thing in writing: What’s new to the reader. “Big deal!” you may say. “My English teacher tells me that kind of stuff all the time! She’s constantly saying, ‘Tell me something NEW and INTERESTING! Show me that you’re thinking for yourself!’ “Oh, yeah—–she also says, ‘And [...]
In every published essay, you’ll find they all have one thing in common: They all say something new to the reader. But when critics and teachers talk about essays, they almost always overlook or ignore that fact. I know — at first blush, that seems hard to believe, but it’s true. You see, critics and [...]
When you outline your essay’s topic sentences in the special way I’ll teach you, here, the idea level of your essay will not only be clearly organized, but it will also entice your readers into reading the body paragraphs of your essay, as well. Here’s the deal—The key ingredients for topic sentences are keywords, and [...]
The first time I taught VALUES in a writing class, I told my students to go home and write down as many strong experiences as they could think of in their lives. Next to each, they were to write out a strong reversal that was closely related to each strongly positive or strongly negative experience [...]
Rhetoric is taught with academic pride and flourish at major universities around the world, and it’s closely associated with the prestigious, ancient name of Aristotle, one of the greatest thinkers that Western Civilization has ever produced. Yet — though most people don’t know it, including many teachers of writing — Rhetoric has historically been surrounded [...]
On the Internet, when you search for deceptive rhetoric or rhetoric hoax, you’ll get more than two million hits for either one. That volume of hits is an echo of what we’ve heard all our lives—that Rhetoric is associated with deception and trickery, even though the college experts try to reassure us that the discipline [...]
“Oh no! Not another essay to write on literature!” If you’ve ever been in a class where essay writing on literature is taught, you’ve probably said those words yourself or heard someone else say something close to that. It wouldn’t have anything to do with the fact that you have to pick a literary device—such [...]
On December 8, 1975, Newsweek magazine ran a front-cover story titled, “Why Johnny Can’t Write.” It raised national concerns about the quality of writing that students produce in American K-12 schools. And it caused a 30-year flood of thousands of protest articles with the same title. Furthermore, in 1998, 2002, and 2007, national tests continued [...]
Since the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) was formed in 1911, several of its presidents have recommended deleting writing from college Freshman English courses. And in 2003, the National Commission on Writing (NCW) called a press conference and demanded a writing revolution because it recognized a crisis—national testing showed that most high school [...]
An effective new analytic method greatly simplifies literary analysis and cuts to the heart of every story told in fiction, especially short stories. The NewView Analysis method is used on ten short stories that are classics. The book also shows how to add literary devices to the analysis through one hundred (100) suggested thesis sentences [...]
Here’s the secret–All authors intuitively provide an OldView at the beginning of their short stories. Why? Well, good writers always have a sense that they must provide, early on, something that will change by the end of the story. BLUNTLY: If there’s no change by the end, there’s no story. So there’s gotta be something [...]
Once again, the title for this post says it all! After hitting #1 on four other days in the previous seven days, today at 10:35 PM (MST), my e-book, The Secret DNA of Writing Essays–And Everything Else, had rankings on Amazon Kindle store as follows —– #1 in Study Skills #2 in Rhetoric #4 in [...]
Rhetoric focuses on forms and facts, not fiction. NewView, on the other hand, a system for analyzing and writing essays, can also be used to analyze and create any sort of fiction, such as short stories and novels. Provo, UT – April 15, 2010 (PressReleasePivot) – Rhetoric is based solely on established forms and can’t [...]
The author of a new e-book claims only the forms of reading and writing are taught in schools, not newness of content. The NewView Options company offers its new book and new software to help students read and write far better than schools can teach. Provo, UT – April 1, 2010 (PressReleasePivot) — The head [...]
George A. Kennedy’s book, On Rhetoric, reveals flaws in Aristotle’s Rhetoric. But all that has been – and still is – ignored by the community of Rhetoric scholars. Further, Rhetoric focuses merely on forms, says expert, while ‘NewView’ principle adds needed content to form. Provo, UT – March 21, 2010 (PressReleasePivot) — A recent book, [...]
Those who promote Rhetoric as the system to follow in teaching writing have ignored major scholarship advances on Rhetoric in the Twentieth Century. And historical evidence shows Rhetoric blocked progress in the Roman Empire and was a major part of its fall. Provo, UT – March 6, 2010 (PressReleasePivot) — Bill Drew, the CEO of [...]
Neither modern nor ancient teachers of Rhetoric have ever provided a specific process for creating newness in writing. A new e-book, ‘The Secret DNA of Writing Essays – And Everything Else’, claims to supply such a process for creating new ideas, a system called NewView. Provo, UT – February 23, 2010 (PressReleasePivot) — The CEO [...]
Rhetoric – originally contrived as a set of forms for making speeches to large juries and audiences in ancient Greece – focuses on facts and persuading, not fiction and entertaining. NewView, on the other hand, a system for analyzing and writing essays, can also be used to analyze and write any sort of fiction, including [...]
Aristotle’s Rhetoric was based on weak premises, and it is not even the Rhetoric historically taught in classrooms. Writing is creative, and Rhetoric makes no provision for creativity. On the other hand, the NewView system provided by NewView Options does offer a strong framework for creativity. Provo, UT – February 6, 2010 (PressReleasePivot) — Bill [...]
Many major scholars of Rhetoric have been calling for a New Rhetoric for years because Rhetoric hasn’t panned out well, especially as applied to writing. NewView Options claims to have created an effective Rhetoric of Newness to replace the old, ineffective Rhetoric of forms handed down from ancient Greece. Provo, UT – January 26, 2010 [...]
Rhetoric has never provided the feature of creativity, only supplying an endless array of forms and genres, as taught in schools. A new e-book, The Secret DNA of Writing Essays – And Everything Else, claims to provide a better alternative for creating new ideas, a system called NewView. Provo, UT – January 21, 2010 (PressReleasePivot) [...]
Most high school and college freshman teachers of writing are completely ignorant of the tradition of corruption that has surrounded Rhetoric for centuries. A new e-book, The Secret DNA of Writing Essays – And Everything Else, claims to provide a better alternative. Provo, UT – January 18, 2010 (PressReleasePivot) – Bill Drew, CEO of NewView [...]
Once again, the title for this post says it all! Today at 6:05 PM (MST), my e-book, The Secret DNA of Writing Essays–And Everything Else, had rankings on Amazon Kindle store as follows —– #1 in Rhetoric #2 in Study Skills #2 in Pedagogy And the overall number of the ranking was ——- 10,089th of [...]
Well, the title for this post just about says it all. As you may know, I’ve been selling my e-book, The Secret DNA of Writing Essays–And Everything Else, for two weeks, as of today, on Amazon.com. And the ranking, as of today, is as follows —– #4 in Study Skills #7 in Rhetoric #7 in [...]
There’s a crisis in US public school writing because Rhetoric emphasizes parts, not the whole, says author Bill Drew. Instead of paying attention to Rhetoric, modern writing teachers should have paid attention to Michel de Montaigne, the Father of the Essay. Provo, UT – January 14, 2010 (PressReleasePivot) — Bill Drew, author of a successful [...]
New e-book claims that only forms of writing are now taught in schools, not the importance of newness of content. NewView Options offers its new book and new software to help students write far better. Provo, UT – January 12, 2010 (PressReleasePivot) – The head of NewView Options, Bill Drew, makes a rather disturbing claim. [...]
The College Board says there’s a crisis in teaching writing to high school students. NewView Options offers its new book and its new software to help students write better than ever before. Provo, UT – December 31, 2009 (PressReleasePivot) — The College Board says there’s a crisis in teaching writing to high school students. To [...]
In the teaching of writing, what’s truly amazing is that no one seems to have noticed that the acknowledged Father of the Modern Essay, Michel Eyquem de Montaigne, clearly talked about the main principle of NewView, which is this: Everything depends on ‘What’s new to the reader.’ For example, Montaigne made the following general statement [...]
The truth is, the idea of new has always been a problem in any kind of essay writing or communication because it’s so vague. New has simply been a big, black, mysterious box that could hold just about anything and everything in it—and did!—because, up to now, we’ve never had a way of distinguishing one [...]
The “What If” Test In evaluations, there’s a “What If” test that can reveal the quality or the problems with something. So let’s try such a test on an imagined piece of writing. Now, what if all the ‘writing experts’ agree that a specific piece of writing—such as an article or an essay—has all the [...]
Visualize a wall of water 250 feet high, light green, frothing at the top, speeding right at you. That’s what struck on December 26, 2004, when a series of deadly tsunamis hit Southeast Asia, killing 225,000 people in eleven countries. But one nation of people in the direct path of the tsunamis weren’t harmed at [...]
