<p>I'm having trouble writing synthesis and persuasive essays. I'm fine with the rhetorical analysis; I have no trouble picking out rhetorical devices and writing about their effects. </p>
<p>I'm mainly having trouble with the synthesis and persuasive essays because I have trouble coming up with cogent arguments. What can I do?!</p>
<p>I also don't understand the synthesis essay. Do you just make an argument and cherry-pick sources to support your argument?</p>
<p>The most important thing to remember about those two essays is that The central argument.</p>
<p>COMES FROM YOU <----</p>
<p>you could write that incentive charity work is bad because… penguins would make better use of the incentives. </p>
<p>As long as the argument comes from you and your observations and is strongly supported you should be fine. </p>
<p>For the Synthesis essay… you should be able to come up with a thesis without the documents. Most essays are really pro/con so your thesis should divide the sources pro/con.</p>
<p>Make the synthesis… just like the 3rd essay. but oh wow source C! cool (source C) at the end of a statement in the essay correlating with that source. Just don’t jump source to source going Source A says… Source B says…</p>
<p>So let’s say I’m writing a synthesis essay on locavores.</p>
<p>Thesis: Being a locavore allows one to enjoy a multitude of benefits. One, the experience of shopping in the local farmer’s market. Two, the fresher food and tastier food. Three, the environmental impact. </p>
<p>Paragraph 1: personal anecdote about shopping at the local farmers’ market vs. shopping at Wal-mart, and vividly depict how intimate shopping at the farmers’ market is - you know all the people … the sellers allow you to bite into their fruits … and oh … it tastes so good!!! (segue into second paragraph about taste and freshness …) </p>
<p>Paragraph 2: Man, those fruits from the market taste better than those from Wal-Mart. Hey look! Source A and Source B both corroborate my findings! Source A says that the fruits are fresher because they are not in transit for a couple of weeks. Source B says that the fruits are fresher because large-scale agriculture puts no focus on how fresh the fruits taste … rather, large scale agriculture only puts the focus on getting the fruits to market before they spoil, and that means picking fruits before they are ripe, and as a result, fruits ripen in transit - but that is suboptimal vs. ripening on the branch, in accordance with Nature. </p>
<p>Paragraph 3: Taste alone should convince you to be a locavore. Again, there is nothing as delectable as biting into a crisp, fresh, orange from the farmer’s market where the seller smiles at you and tips his hat at you after each sale. The personal experience is great. The taste is great. But apparently, according to Sources D and F, locavores harm the environment less!!! Source D says that locavores release up to 500 tons less CO2 a year versus non-locavores!! (Insert other random statistics from sources). </p>
<p>Is that how you write a synthesis essay?</p>
<p>Subtly, subtly, subtly… i read what you were writing and went AHHHHH back off lmao</p>
<p>You said how you went to a farmer’s market and had a great experience and your dinner was awesome. (end of sentence) (source A) (source A discusses this you don’t need to elaborate on the source itself) Source B also discusses this. </p>
<p>THIS IS YOUR ARGUMENT <— if the sources weren’t there i still should be able to understand. </p>
<p>Never go “Source A says this” I could sense dramatic irony in the way you were writing there… but just to be sure that’s not how you are really planning to write it? </p>
<p>"Source A and Source B both corroborate my findings! Source A says that the fruits are fresher because they are not in transit for a couple of weeks. Source B says that the fruits are fresher because large-scale agriculture puts no focus on how fresh the fruits taste … rather, large scale agriculture only puts the focus on getting the fruits to market before they spoil, and that means picking fruits before they are ripe, and as a result, fruits ripen in transit - but that is suboptimal vs. ripening on the branch, in accordance with Nature. "</p>
<p>Write about this topic ^^^ any way you wish. Process Analyze… anecdote… analogy.</p>
<p>Then when you’re finished discussing this (source A) (source B) </p>
<p>AP Lang isn’t as pressuring to use most/all the sources as the AP histories are. </p>
<p>However,… what you did here was correct for the most part.</p>
<p>Try to be more subtle with it but incorporating facts and statistics into your argument. </p>
<p>“But apparently, according to Sources D and F” <— no no no, </p>
<p>Locavores harm the environment less because they release 500 tons of CO2 less than farm manufacturers. ( source X)</p>
<p>I write it like an SAT essay, but longer and with more facts. My AP Lang teacher suggests the following:
SYNTHESIS
Use 3 sources, 4 if you’d like. (I recently used 5 in one essay, and she said 5 is the absolute max!)
Standard Intro (with thesis) + 3 body + Conclusion
Pull info from sources, but you can also use your own observations and examples</p>
<p>ARGUMENTATIVE
these prompts are getting harder and harder since they won’t always flat out TELL YOU the question. Some will give you a couple of paragraphs and you have to pluck out points you agree/disagree with. Take three of those and use them for your three main points/body paragraphs.
take a position that is 80/20. That is, 80% one side and 20% acknowledging the other while also supporting the 80 side. try to use COUNTERARGUMENTS for this.
use examples from LITERATURE and HISTORY (like the SAT, they’re more convincing than personal experiences.)</p>
<p>@div301 - your post was more helpful than a year’s worth of instruction in AP Lang class. Thanks SO MUCH FOR YOUR ADVICES. Now I know not to ever mention the source. Just use parentheses after citing information from a source. Thanks! </p>
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<p>The hard part is coming up with good examples to support an argument, lol. I guess that’s part of the challenge, especially since the AP essays are no-where as open-ended as the SAT essays. </p>
<p>Nor are the AP essays as predictable as the SAT essays - all the SAT essays fit into categories such as “leadership” or “courage” or something cliched like that. </p>
<p>APs will throw at you random stuff like “does photography limit our understanding of the world” … uh … could you repeat that?</p>