Assignment

Read the New Yorker article "Why Facts Don't Change Our Minds" written by Elizabeth Kolbert and take part in the experiment described in the previous lesson, and then respond to the prompts listed below:

1. Beneath each question listed below, explain how your answers differed between the two different ways of reading.

• What is the main idea or point of the article?

• Who is the audience that Kolbert is addressing? How do you know? (Describe things you noticed about the publication, the New Yorker,where the article appeared, that gave you this idea.)

• What might be an alternative way to explain her conclusions?

2. Why do you think Kolbert wrote this article? Does she want readers to behave in a different way? Think about something differently? Or, something else?

3. Think about where and how YOU read. Do you read on a Kindle or other type of eReader? Do you read books? Do you read articles? Do you read web pages? Do you read in another format? Be specific.

4. What do the visual elements of the text reveal? In other words, what point do the visuals make? How do the visuals support Kolbert's main claim?

5. Do you agree with Kolbert's claims in this article? Why or why not?

6. Finally, did any of the strategies you used from this week's lessons affect your understanding of the article? Which ones were the most helpful to you and why? Be specific. Have you used any of these strategies before you started this week's lessons? If so, which ones?

Respond to other students' postings in which the answers differ substantially from your own, and see if you can discover why. Probe the postings for ideas that you think miss an important point or two, and ask questions to take your understanding of the article and other students' understanding to a deeper level. Revisit the article and the website where it is posted as you consider other students' answers to confirm or reject new information you are recieving from their postings.