Writing 100 -- Writing Proficiency Examination (WPE)
Part B: writing a paraphrase, summary, précis, or abstract
Definitions and purposes of dealing with a prose passage in Part B will vary, but the exercise, in this example, is to provide a summary which reduces the original prose passage to 1/3 its original length.
EXAMPLE:
The original document (not reprinted here) has 179 words:
"Editorial Column," The Writing Centre Newsletter. London, Ontario: Western Effective Writing Program, 24 mar 1997: 2.
Examine the rewriting involved in achieving the final version.
Version 1 is reduced from the original 179 words to 110 words:
The Writing Centre Newsletter (24 Mar 97) offers Marilyn Cooper's ecological model of writing (see Writing as Social Action) which is determined by and determines the words of others within a specific (in this case, academic) environment. Ecological writing results from collaborating with those who practice the discourse you seek to imitate and understanding the nature of such writing as a social process. The ecological writer becomes a dialogic participant in a chosen discourse community, replacing the cognitive model of the "writer who produces his text by communing with his own mind, reads his text to himself, and then 'abandons the text to the world' (Cooper 4)" ("Editorial Column" 2).
Version 2 reduces the 110 words of version 1 to 68 words (goal 60 words--1/3 the original):
The Writing Centre Newsletter (24 Mar 97) offers Marilyn Cooper's ecological writing model (see Writing as Social Action) which reflects and influences those in a discourse community you seek to imitate. The ecological writer there participates in a dialogic social process, ceasing to be a merely cognitive writer who communes only with himself, produces text, reads it, and "abandons" it "to the world" (Cooper 4)" ("Editorial Column" 2).
Version 3, the final version, achieves the intended goal of 60 words and includes revisions for style:
The Writing Centre Newsletter editorial (24 Mar 97) highlights Marilyn Cooper's ecological writing model (in Writing as Social Action). She prefers the ecological writer who imitates, reflects and influences others, socially and dialogically, in a discourse community over the writer using the traditional cognitive model of merely communing, producing text, reading it, and abandoning it "to the world" (Cooper 4)"
Works Cited
"Editorial Column," The Writing Centre Newsletter. London, Ontario: Western Effective Writing Program, 24 Mar 1997: 2.
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