For your first essay assignment, I’d like you to take an object: something you see so often yet don’t really see. Dig deep to uncover the significance of it, to “see what the specialist sees.” Here are some brainstorming ideas to help you begin:

1. DEFINE
   1. What is the object?
   2. Why did you choose it?
   3. Where do you encounter it?
   4. Why is it a fitting topic for this assignment?
2. DESCRIBE
   1. What makes up its physical and sensory details?
3. RESEARCH
   1. What is its history?
   2. What are its origins?
   3. What might we not know about it?
   4. What surprising or interesting things can you find out about this object that demonstrate its “extraordinary” nature? 
4. EXPLAIN
   1. How does it shape or define who we are in some meaningful way?
   2. What might this reflect about our culture, our world?
   This essay will be three pages long (four including the works cited) and will include the following research:

References from at last two different model cities theorists

Two other references from the research I have provided or from your own research