OVERVIEW: S. A. R. Assignment

1. OVERVIEW: Summary, Analysis, and Response Assignment
2. PURPOSE: Summary, Analysis, and Response Assignment
• Step 1: Summarize the Source [Purpose, Audience, and Context]
• Step 2: Analyze the Source
• Step 3: Respond to the Source

How to Develop a Summary, Analysis, and Response Writing

OVERVIEW: 

Summary, Analysis, and Response Writing

A Summary, Analysis, and Response (S.A.R.) Assignment is something most professors assign early in a course.  This type of assignment is designed to get students used to 

• narrowing down an author’s purpose and points, 
• analyzing how well the author did in being persuasive with those points, and then 
• arguing a response to how well the article, video, advertisement, essay, or general writing did in 
• structuring the argument, 
• supporting it, and 
• persuading a reader that this view was the correct one to defend.

In the classes I teach, this is assigned as a Discussion Board, multi-step assignment.  Therefore, my students can learn to grasp the concepts of summary, analysis, and argument response without being required to write a fully-fleshed-out essay.  Afterall, full essays are often intimidating to students…so let’s not start the class, the first week, with a full-blown essay, right!?!

You will always need to write—in academic writing—in the 3-part layout.  

• What is 3-part layout?  
• Basically, it means that you are writing with a clear INTRODUCTION, BODY, and a CONCLUSION section—at least 3 paragraphs.  
• Whether you are writing an email, discussion board post, or an essay, all academically focused writing will have a clear INTRODUCTION, BODY, and a CONCLUSION section.

For more details, click HERE to go directly to the 3-part layout handout.

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