Where and how to cut your losses

Half the skill in getting ahead on the career front is knowing when to move on. In everyone's life there comes a moment when they should make the break - the world is full of has-beens who, perhaps, just didn't have the courage to take a chance when that chance came. It pays to constantly reassess where you stand. A good stock question to ask yourself is "Where am I going to be, this time next year, if I stay in the same job?" Each career has a different kind of time-scale. The sales scene moves fast - you tend to make your money in the early years, then move on to management before you are too old and too tired to continue with the foot-in-the-door technique and the patter. The same thing goes, to a certain extent, for advertising. But other careers move at a different pace - to become head curator in a museum, for instance, or head librarian, may take years.

Exercise 5

Read the following text: (Flower, 1990. p. v)

The study presented here takes an unusually comprehensive look at one critical point of entry into academic performance. It shows a group of freshmen in the transition into the academic discourse of college, looking at the ways in which they interpret and negotiate an assignment that calls for reading-to-write. On such tasks, students are reading to create a text of their own, trying to integrate information from sources with ideas of their own, and attempting to do so under the guidance of a purpose they must themselves create. Because these reading-to-write tasks ask students to integrate reading, writing, and rhetorical purpose, they open a door to critical literacy. Yet this same interaction often makes reading-to-write a difficult process for students to learn and to manage.

 

The task: The texts given below have used Flower's ideas and words. Which of them do you consider to be acceptable?

A

On such tasks, students are reading to create a text of their own, trying to integrate information from sources with ideas of their own, and attempting to do so under the guidance of a purpose they must themselves create. Because these reading-to-write tasks ask students to integrate reading, writing, and rhetorical purpose, they open a door to critical literacy. Yet this same interaction often makes reading-to-write a difficult process for students to learn and to manage.

B

The study presented here (Flower, 1990) takes an unusually comprehensive look at one critical point of entry into academic performance. It shows a group of freshmen in the transition into the academic discourse of college, looking at the ways in which they interpret and negotiate an assignment that calls for reading-to-write. On such tasks, students are reading to create a text of their own, trying to integrate information from sources with ideas of their own, and attempting to do so under the guidance of a purpose they must themselves create. Because these reading-to-write tasks ask students to integrate reading, writing, and rhetorical purpose, they open a door to critical literacy. Yet this same interaction often makes reading-to-write a difficult process for students to learn and to manage.

C

According to Flower (1990), on such tasks, students are reading to create a text of their own, trying to integrate information from sources with ideas of their own, and attempting to do so under the guidance of a purpose they must themselves create. Because these reading-to-write tasks ask students to integrate reading, writing, and rhetorical purpose, they open a door to critical literacy. Yet this same interaction often makes reading-to-write a difficult process for students to learn and to manage.

D

In English, an essay is a piece of argumentative writing several paragraphs long written about one topic, usually based on your reading. The purpose of an essay is for you to say something for yourself using the ideas of the subject, for you to create a text of your own by integrating information from sources with ideas of your own. The emphasis should be on working with other people's ideas, rather than reproducing their words, but your own voice should show clearly. The ideas and people that you refer to need to made explicit by a system of referencing.

E

In English, an essay is a piece of argumentative writing several paragraphs long written about one topic, usually based on your reading. The purpose of an essay is for you to say something for yourself using the ideas of the subject, for you to create a text of your own by integrating information from sources with ideas of your own (Flower, 1990). The emphasis should be on working with other people's ideas, rather than reproducing their words, but your own voice should show clearly. The ideas and people that you refer to need to made explicit by a system of referencing.

F

On these tasks, students are reading in order to make a text of their own, trying to integrate facts from texts with their own ideas, and trying to do this with a purpose they must make themselves. As these reading-to-write tasks require students to combine reading, writing, and purpose, they provide a route to critical literacy. However, this same combination can make reading-to-write a complicated process for students to learn and to carry out.

G

In English, an essay is a piece of argumentative writing several paragraphs long written about one topic, usually based on the student's reading. The purpose of an essay is for the student to say something for themselves using the ideas of the subject, for them to present ideas they have learned in their own way. The emphasis should be on working with other people's ideas, rather than reproducing their words, but the student's own voice should show clearly. This is a very difficult task for students in the transition into the academic discourse of college.

H

When students start higher education, they have a great deal to learn about academic writing. In school academic writing usually consists of writing about things they have already learned about with no reference to how this was learned. In higher education, however, students will need to learn to negotiate an assignment that calls for reading-to-write. This involves reading sources and then trying to understand information from them. They then need to create their own texts by integrating this information with ideas of their own. All this must be done under the guidance of a purpose they must themselves create.

I

In English, an essay is a piece of argumentative writing several paragraphs long written about one topic, usually based on the student's reading. The purpose of an essay is for the student to say something for themselves using the ideas of the subject, for them to present ideas they have learned in their own way. The emphasis should be on working with other people's ideas, rather than reproducing their words, but the student's own voice should show clearly. Students should be, as Flower (1990, p. v) points out: "reading to create a text of their own, trying to integrate information from sources with ideas of their own, and attempting to do so under the guidance of a purpose they must themselves create."

J

When students start higher education, they have a great deal to learn about academic writing. In school academic writing usually consists of writing about aspects they have already learned about with no reference to how this was obtained. In higher education, however, students will need to learn to read and explicitly use the results of their reading to carry out the writing task. They will need to "negotiate an assignment that calls for reading-to-write" (Flower, 1990, p. v). This involves reading sources and trying to understand information from them, and then, according to Flower (1990, p. v) "create a text of their own" by "integrating information... with ideas of their own."

K

According to Flower (1990, p. v) "On such tasks, students are reading to create a text of their own, trying to integrate information from sources with ideas of their own, and attempting to do so under the guidance of a purpose they must themselves create. Because these reading-to-write tasks ask students to integrate reading, writing, and rhetorical purpose, they open a door to critical literacy. Yet this same interaction often makes reading-to-write a difficult process for students to learn and to manage."

Exercise 6