RTW SUMMARY PARAGRAPH

CARROLL or RYAN/WOLKERSTORFER

In this unit you read two historical selections from The Catherine CORE Reader about the early years of the college and one particularly influential woman, Sister Antonia McHugh. For this writing assignment you will choose either the Carroll (p. 15) or Ryan/Wolkerstorfer (p. 33) essay and write a one-paragraph summary in the RTW format. Complete this worksheet in preparation for writing your paragraph. Deposit both in the Dropbox by the due date.

STEP 1: Select the reading you will summarize and review the annotations or text notes that you wrote while reading it. What were some of the big ideas or impressions that struck you while you read? Did anything surprise you about these early years? How did the early leaders set the tone for what was to come? Jot down 8-10 observations about the reading in the space below:

STEP 2: Look over your list of ideas and prioritize them. Which 3 of these ideas are the most important, compelling or interesting? State each of these ideas in a short phrase below:

STEP 3: Write a Topic Sentence that will introduce your reader to the big ideas you’ll present in your paragraph. To begin your topic sentence, you may want to use a subordinating conjunction from the RTW Essay Writing Checklist. For example: Due to Sister Antonia McHugh’s strong leadership, the College of St. Catherine became known for X, Y and Z.

STEP 4: Each of your 3 big ideas, “X, Y and Z,” will become a Claim. For example, maybe one of my big ideas is about beauty. I would write a complete sentence about this: First, St. Catherine has always been known for the beauty of its St. Paul campus. Next, each claim needs Evidence to back it up. Use a direct quotation from the book to illustrate the truth of your claim. For the claim about beauty I could find a sentence that talks about the architectural beauty of the chapel building, or the attention that is paid to the landscaping of the pond and flowers. Put the sentence in quotation marks followed by the page number in parentheses, followed by a period to end that sentence. You can use a signal phrase to introduce the quotation: According to Carroll, “Blah blahblah” (p. 17). Finally, each claim also needs a Rationale sentence, which follows the quote. Why is this information important? What is significant about it? The rationale sentence is where you get to interpret/expand/connect the information. My rationale for this example might be how this attention to beauty sends a message about excellence or high standards to anyone who comes to campus. Your rationale connects directly to the claim and evidence for the CER (Claim—Evidence—Rationale) set. Use this process for all 3 of your big ideas.

Claim 1
Evidence 1
Rationale 1
Claim 2
Evidence 2
Rationale 2
Claim 3
Evidence 3
Rationale 3

STEP 5: Now you need a Concluding Sentence to wrap up the paragraph. Briefly acknowledge the big ideas that you discussed in the paragraph, but say it in a slightly new way. It will be an echo of the Topic Sentence, and puts a nice finishing touch on your paragraph.

Concluding Sentence

STEP 6: Now you are ready to pull all of these sentences into your RTW paragraph. There will be 11 sentences: Topic Sentence + 3 CER sets + Concluding Sentence. It helps your reader to include transition words before each claim; it calls attention to the movement from one big idea to the next. You can use simple transitions like “first, second, third” – or you can provide more variety. “The next defining characteristic of Sister Antonia’s leadership is . . . “

STEP 7: You must include a Reference for the quoted material. This will include the author and title of the selection, along with the full citation for The Catherine CORE Reader book. You can use either APA or MLA citation style, whichever is preferred by your academic program. Most of the programs at St. Kate’s Minneapolis campus use APA. Information on how to cite sources using either format is located under the Resources Module.