Based on your reading of “What Cocktail Parties Teach Us : The Brain Is Wired to Focus on Just One Thing; Which Tasks Are Easier to Combine”Preview the document by Melinda Beck and your viewing of the Frontline episode “Digital Nation”, discuss your experience with multitasking and state your position on the claims made in the reading and video.
ACTIVITY OBJECTIVES/LEARNING OUTCOMES
Identify and share how opinions and evidence come together in critical thinking and analysis.
Examine unstated premises and hidden assumptions that arise from the social, historical, moral, cultural, psychological, or aesthetic contexts in which the primary texts and critical analysis of those texts exist.
Analyze contexts of a text (fiction and/or non-fiction) and their impact on the argument presented.
Synthesize, paraphrase, and/or quote from primary and secondary sources while adhering to most recent MLA documentation guidelines.
INSTRUCTIONS
Read the article “What Cocktail Parties Teach Us : The Brain Is Wired to Focus on Just One Thing; Which Tasks Are Easier to Combine” by Melinda Beck AND watch “Digital Nation”. Use both the reading and the video to support your response to the following prompt.
Write a response in which you provide a self-reflection about your experience with multi-tasking. When and why have you had to multitask? This could be work, school, home, etc. Do you think you are an effective multitasker? (according the article only 2.5% of people can multitask efficiently) If so, explain what makes you an efficient multitasker; if not explain why you think you are not.
For the second part of your response, write whether you agree with the argument that, “…people aren’t very good at multitasking—our brains are wired for ‘selective attention’ and can focus on only one thing at a time” (Beck 1). Be sure to provide reasons and evidence from the text and/or video to support your position on this argument.
Text component (typed draft) should be 2 full pages (independent of Works Cited page – that will be your page 3), but no more than 4 in MLA format. Attach as a Word document (.doc, .docx, Google doc, or PDF)
You must integrate at least 4 direct source material (quotes, data, paraphrased information/facts, analysis) from the reading or video. For the video you can use a timestamp when you incorporate the source; your citation would look like this: (Goodman 1:21) – this notes that the quote or summary/paraphrase of the source is from the 1 hour and 21-second mark. You do not have to put an end time on the citation.
This essay allows for first-person use (I, me, etc.), which we normally try to avoid in essay drafts. Because part of this is a self-reflection, it is expected that you will use first-person in your essay draft.
Create a Works Cited page for the source/reading provided. I have included all the necessary bibliographic here for your Works Cited page, excluding the optional sources you find to support your response. Be sure to properly format your Works Cited page in MLA.
Beck, Melinda. “What Cocktail Parties Teach Us : The Brain Is Wired to Focus on Just One Thing; Which Tasks Are Easier to Combine.” The Wall Street Journal, 23 Apr. 2012, WSJ.com.
Goodman, Rachel Dretzin., et al. Digital Nation . Widescreen version., WGBH Educational Foundation, 2010.
Total pages 3 with the Works Cited page.