Reaction Essays:

To achieve success in research, you must be able to read, understand, and critique articles from the primary scientific literature. Very little scientific progress is made without considering what others have done before. Only by reviewing the literature critically can a student begin to find areas in the field that are ripe for additional work. Thus, to demonstrate your understanding, and to practice your technical writing ability, I assign reaction essays for selected readings.

These papers may be somewhat informal, buy they must be a well-written and well-organized essay presenting your ideas. They may be no longer than two pages, at 12 point font, and with good-sized margins please! Generally, they should not have citations, and should not require any additional reading beyond the course assignments.

I call these reaction essays because I want to hear your reaction to the reading material. Generally speaking, I will not grade these based on the content of your reactions (ideas and reactions aren't simply right or wrong), but rather on the strength of your line of argument. That is, I am primarily grading your written communication skills, and only secondarily the originality or relevance of your ideas with respect to the reading material. Therefore, like all good essays, your essays should include an introductory paragraph stating your main premise, a body where your detail your ideas, and a brief concluding paragraph. Although the reaction paper should not summarize the entire article, it should include enough information about the article to make your ideas or criticisms well-grounded and connected to the material. Assume your readers have also read the article, but that they need reminded about any details you wish to discuss.

Given the space limit, your reaction essay should not include a complete summary of the reading material. You may also need to limit the number of reactions or ideas you may have to one or two. Your ideas could have a number of forms: (a) You may compare the work to related material including the textbook or other readings; (b) You may hypothesize about ways in which the work could have been improved; (c) You may think about ways to expand on the work, or extend it to cover new domains; or (d) You may argue against the work, questioning its assumptions, or value.

Although all writing rules are subjective and heuristic, here are a few editing pet-peeves of mine:

Good luck, and remember that there are severe penalties for late reaction essays; usually an on-time medium essay is better than a late, great essay.