What’s in LaunchPad for Patterns for College Writing?

LaunchPad for Patterns for College Writing is packed with digital content that works with your textbook to help you sharpen your ability to read analytically and write successfully in first-year composition and in your coursework across campus. Whether your instructor assigns the resources in LaunchPad or encourages you to work with the material at your own pace, we’re confident that LaunchPad will help you develop the skills you need to succeed in college and beyond. For help using LaunchPad, please see the Student Knowledge Base, or contact Tech Support. You can find Tech Support contact information by clicking “Help” in the upper right corner of your screen.

E-book

In the e-book you’ll find all the great content and activities from the printed book, including:

A diverse and popular selection of readings chosen by authors who know what works in the classroom. Offering a variety of subjects, styles, and cultural perspectives, the 68 professional readings provide outstanding models for student writing. Instructors can choose from a mix of essays by classic writers (such as George Orwell, Jessica Mitford, E. B. White, Martin Luther King Jr.) and newer voices (Bich Minh Nguyen, Zeynep Tufekci, Marina Keegan) so that instructors have a broad range of readings to choose from. More than a dozen visual texts give students practice in reading and interpreting photographs, fine art, comic book panels, and more.

Comprehensive coverage of the writing process, the patterns of development, and research. With helpful explanations, examples, and exercises, Part One, "The Writing Process," offers students essential advice on planning, drafting, revising, and editing an essay in five short chapters that form a brief rhetoric. Part Two, "Readings for Writers," provides detailed introductions to each chapter's rhetorical pattern, with plenty of examples of student writing, clear explanations of writing strategies, and accessible discussions of how the patterns can help organize ideas. Part Three, "Working with Sources," covers finding, evaluating, and integrating sources; avoiding plagiarism; and documenting sources in the current MLA style. An appendix provides coverage of documenting sources in APA style.

Step-by-step examples of student writing and support for student writers. Reflecting Kirszner and Mandell's commitment to students, Patterns for College Writing includes 18 annotated student essays that provide students with realistic models for improving their own writing. In addition, grammar-in-context boxes, checklists, and editing worksheets offer specific advice on how to identify and correct the problems that students find most challenging.

Cultural and historical context for all readings. Each reading is prefaced by essential cultural and historical background information—updated and revised for this edition—to help students better understand the context in which the essay was written.

An argument chapter updated with the issues that matter to students. The most thorough argument chapter in any rhetorical reader has been updated with lively, current selections. Two new debates ask, "Should Public Colleges Be Free?” and “Does It Pay to Study the Humanities?” One new casebook raises the question “Do College Students Need Trigger Warnings?”

Interactive content and tutorials

Downloadable Peer-Editing Worksheets

Downloadable Peer-Editing Worksheets allow students to complete their peer-reviews digitally and submit them easily to instructors and fellow students.

In addition, you’ll find helpful tutorials on topics such as reading critically, working with and citing sources, and using digital writing tools.

LearningCurve

Developed in light of the latest advances in learning research, LearningCurve is a game-like adaptive quizzing program that covers topics from grammar and usage to reading critically and argument. The less you know about a topic, the more LearningCurve focuses on it, and the better you do, the more challenging the questions become, helping you concentrate on exactly what you need to learn.