"Reading Critically, Writing Well by Axelrod etc
A Classic College Rhetoric and Reader Reviewed
Mar 28, 2009 Megge Hill Fitz-Randolph
When choosing among the hundreds of college writing textbooks one needs to evaluate how you as a teacher work and how you presume your students work. There is a lot of variation in college books on rhetoric so it’s worthwhile to spend time investigating which suits your students as well as yourself.
Guide to Reading/Guide to Reading w/ Each Chapter
Reading Critically, Writing Well by Rise Axelrod, Charles Cooper, and Alison Warriner is a highly comprehensive as well as directive book. Divided into chapters addressing the various types or modes of commonly taught essays, each chapter begins with a Guide To Reading this particular mode and concludes with a Guide to Writing this particular type of essay. In between are the selected essays for that section, each followed by questions. The questions themselves are divided into those that address content, as in Reading for Meaning, and those that address style, as in Reading Like a Writer.
Sample Sub-Section
Under the Reading Like a Writer section there are four sections, each with its own questions and instructions like so:
- Organizing the Observations
- Engaging and Informing Readers
- Describing Places and People
- Conveying a Impression of the Subject
Each of these sub-sections has its own questions and writing exercise. The chapter concludes with two paired essays and questions to draw out the comparison analysis.
Comprehensive to a Fault
This is the overall layout for each chapter of the text. It is comprehensive to a fault. Some students as well as teachers might find the sheer copiousness of the directions overwhelming. What works well in this text is that anybody can navigate a course in college writing using this textbook. Every aspect of teaching writing and critical thinking has been broken down and is easy to follow for both teacher and student. What might not work so well for some teachers as well as students is that it can feel at times cumbersome and overly directive. There is little room here for innovation or discovery because each step is highly orchestrated.
Who Would Find This Useful
The thoroughness is what make it a brilliant and comprehensive book, but it may feel too restrictive to the more inventive and experienced teacher. The essays are well selected with a great deal of variety in content and tone and of topics interesting to most students.
Which Type of Teacher and Student Work Best
The types of people who work best with this books seems to be both teachers who appreciate the thoroughness of strategies for both reading and writing and students who like a lot of direction and step by step guidance in both reading and analyzing and in writing a particular style of essay.
Chapter Headings
- Autobiography
- Observation
- Reflection
- Explaining Concepts
- Evaluation
- Speculating Cause and Effect
- Proposal to Solve a Problem
- Position Paper
A Sampling of Essays
- Luis Rodriquez Always Running
- Amy Wu, A Different Kind of Mother
- John McPhee, The New York Pickpocket Academy
- David Brooks, The Merits of Meritocracy
- Deborah Tannen, Marked Women
- Stephen King, Why We Crave Horror Movies
- Jonathan Kozol, The Human Cost of an Illiterate Society
Useful Extra’s
- Appendix 1 A Catalog of Critical Reading Strategies
- Appendix 2: Strategies for Research and Documentation
- Paired Readings: Each chapter includes two readings that invite a compare and contrast
Overall Strengths
Superbly organized for the most thorough presentation of each writing mode and strategies for writing the paper. It's all broken down into small parts so it almost teaches itself.
Overall Weaknesses
Some teachers and students might find this textbook too cumbersome with every step laid out. Some might wish for a book that allowed students as well as teacher more room for discovery and experimentation.
For more articles on college writing textbooks see my reviews on Reading Critically, Writing Well and Dreams and Inward Journeys. Another Suite article you might find helpful in the college writing class is New Rules for Free Writing.
Reading Critically, Writing Well by Axelrod, Cooper, and Warriner (2005) from Bedford/St.Martin's.
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