Discussion Questions

juvenile? perhaps, but this is one of the hottest series around!

welcome

You have, no doubt, noticed that much of your work in this class involves reading and discussing those readings. Discussion questions make up a sizeable portion of your grade, so you really want to do well on them; it can make the difference between a low grade, a passable grade, an excellent grade in the class.

The purpose of this page is to give you both a quick overview of how the discussoins work and also the information you need to get as high a score as possible for each discussion.

how it all works

Discussions take place on a threaded message board (which you will visit in a minute). "Threaded" means that you will see someone's posting followed by response underneath it; these responses are indented, so that it's easy to see what responses fit under which postings. Also, if there is a response to a response (and so on, and there usually should be several levels of responses), than that response will appear indented underneath the item it is responding to.

You can expand and collapse the board to either keep the clutter on your screen down or to see all items in all threads. You'll notice the items you've not yet opened are blue; items you've read already are purple.

Tip: I recommend you look at the board every day to see what's new. I typically visit the boards every day to read what's new; I also comment on several (not all) of the items as they appear.

now visit the board

Tip: Try the message board as soon as possible; there is no need to wait until the first day of class; it's a bood idea to bookmark the message board page; you will be visiting it often.

getting maximum points

1/2 of your discussion points are based on the answer you post on the message board. The other 1/2 of the points are based on actual discussion (the responses you have to OTHER students' postings and responses).

So if you post a great answer but fail to respond to anyone else, you'll get 10/20. You need to put up a minimum of five responses for each discussion to try to get full points.

A weak posting and/or weak responses will get partial points. Editing and proofreading and clarity do count.

To get a full 20/20, your initial answer to the discussion question must be clear and thoughtful and well developed, about two meaty paragraphs, though some will be longer, with examples from the texts (which you quote and document), from personal experience, from outside sources to back up your observations). Your responses need to be thoughtful; they responses further the discussion; they give additional examples or present a different point of view backed up by examples or introduce a relevant tangent to the discussion.

An important note

Late postings receive no points; I do, however, give you a couple of days to keep responding to new items on the board, so even if you miss your posting, you can keep putting up your five or more responses and try to get at least 10/20 for that discussion. You will typically have about two days to keep responding.

NOTE: all due dates are listed on the course Schedule page.

Some samples to give you some ideas of what will earn you lots of points
note: this is not a topic you will be discussing

DQ0 - Sample of an excellent posting
(it would earn a full 10/10 points; remember that postings are worth 10 points; the other 10 points for each discussion are based on your five OR MORE responses):

When I first read Stephen King's claim that "we are all crazy" (93), I was angry. He can speak for himself, but how dare he say that I'm crazy. He punctuated this section with talk about alligators and dead baby jokes, and his argument seemed weaker and weaker. And in a time when terrorism is at the front of the media in the U.S., his stating that there "lurks inside us all an urge to hurl a bomb" (93) seemed highly inappropriate. It was the comparison between humans and hungry alligators kept quiet with food, though, that finally made sense. Many things make me angry. On the way home from work yesterday I was cut off by an Audi on the 110 freeway, and I was furious; the fool nearly caused me to swerve and get into an accident. Driving the freeways in Los Angeles is frustrating enough without people making it more dangerous still. I wanted to flip him off, to blow him up ("hurl a bomb"), but I'm civilized. Thank goodness we don't all carry weapons in our cars and just blast away when someone frustrates us; instead, we (well, I, at least) suppress the urge, push it down. But when enough frustrating things happen in a day that I feel like I just want to explode, I don't. I don't yell at the kids (though some people do) or lash out and get into fights (though some do). Instead, I turn on ESPN and watch football or basketball and YELL AT THE SCREEN! Of course the screen can't hear me, but I get out some aggression safely, without hurting anyone, without hurling the bomb. This is my form of release, what the ancient Greeks called catharsis; King is saying that for some, watching the monster tear down the city offers catharsis for some the way sports does for me.

NOTE: not only is this very specific, but it also offers concrete examples from the reading (documented and quoted) and from the student's personal experiences; it demonstrates the student really thought about the reading and demonstrated what the author was getting at; it is also clear and direct and carefully edited, and it invites further comment/examples from other students.

DQ0 - Sample of a weak posting
(the following posting would earn no points):

I agree with Stephen King. I love hore movies. U can't go to a movie theater ever without finding several hore movies and they are really good. Everyone loves 2 C a great explosion or a monster get his.

NOTE: this is far too short and has some editing errors (do not use texting/chat abbreviations, for example). It also does not demonstrate the student even read the article. There are no direct references (documented and quoted) from the article), and it is filled with overgeneralizations and unsupported personal opinions. "I agree" and "I love" and "really good" and "great"-these are all just opinion statements.

DQ0 - Sample of an excellent response
(this response would earn full points):

Although I am not a huge fan of horror movies, I have seen a few that fit this article. In George Romero's DAWN OF THE DEAD the zombies in the shopping mall are made up of different types of people that we come in contact with, and the ability to chop off the head of a telemarketer or blast away with a shotgun an inefficient clerk is something people may not want to admit, but it's something that I've felt after being put on hold by Time Warner Cable customer support for half an hour. Thankfully, most people suppress the urge to take a car and smash into someone who's just cut them off, but we can sit safely in the audience watching DEATH RACE 2000 and watch it happen FOR us with actors and props and sets. This same safety valve, what King calls "feeding the alligators" (94), probably accounts for many popular video games such as GEARS OF WAR for the X-Box 360. Blasting away aliens with an array of massively-powerful weapons allows some players to burn off stress and aggression vicariously.

NOTE: this response is fully developed, clearly written, supported with specific examples both from the reading and from outside the reading. It also opens the discussion by introducing a related topic (violence in video games), and it is not weakened by simple personal opinions; it is an attempt to understand the article the class read.

DQ0 - Sample of a weak response
(this response will earn very little):

Yeah, I agree with you. This is one of the best things I've read on the board. I too feel that horror movies are a kind of release valve.

NOTE: this response is very short and offers nothing new; it does not refer to the reading; it does not incorporate any specific examples; it uses "I agree" and "I feel" statements (neither is permitted).