Sample Summary-and-Response Essays

We talked about the difference between informal and formal writing. This difference is important in taking an article write-up and developing it into a summary-and-response essay. So let's take a look at some examples, to illustrate what you might need to do in your own work.

Here's a former student's article write up:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B59oU02C12STVGNyZWExMGZXaXM/edit.

Now here's this student's summary-and-response essay, based on the same article:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B59oU02C12STaS0yZ1hJel8xamc/edit.

Take a moment to read through these two sample assignments. What do you notice with regards to the differences between them? What has this student done to her informal article write-up to make it into a formal summary-and-response essay? What has this student done well here? And what has she done not-so-well? What lessons can we learn from this student's efforts?

Now, here's another student's summary-and-response essay, based on a different article:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B59oU02C12STNjhqamZaWWZ2M2M/edit.

Take a moment to look at this summary-and-response essay, too. What do you think makes this essay work? Does it seem to be successful in appealing to a possible audience? What does this essay do well in appealing to an audience? What does this essay do not-so-well? What can you learn from this student's work about making your own summary-and-response essay convincing?