When you receive an assignment, your first job is to be sure you understand what that assignment is asking you to do. Some assignments may be as vague as “Write a five-page essay on one aspect of the Civil War” or “Write an analysis of the group dynamics at play in your recent collaborative project for this course.” Others may be fairly specific: “Collect, summarize, and interpret data drawn from a sample of letters to the editor published in two newspapers, one in a small rural community and one in an urban community, over a period of three months.” Whatever the assignment, use the questions in the Checklist on p. 68 (and the information in Chapter 4) to analyze it.