Class blog

Evidence should be used to support claims, and to test and refine the idea of claims. Evidence from both sides should be examined to qualify claims and make it more accurate and specific instead of too general.
It's important because if you only find evidence that support the claim and dismiss others which don't fit into the claim, you'll narrow your thinking and shut more refined, accurate ideas out. If you just put all the evidence together and don't explain explicitly in what way do they support your claims, you're letting the evidence speak for themselves, but often times evidence can be interpreted in many ways and their relationships to claims are rarely self-evident, so leaving the evidence speak for themselves will make your claim not persuasive and substantiate.
When apply secondary sources in writing, it's important to find not only evidence that support your claim but to find evidence from both side, in this way claims will be more specific and qualified. Meanwhile, you should explain explicitly why you think the evidence support your claims, and you should present your thinking process to connect evidence to claims. Use 10 on 1 to analyse a specific resource instead of making a over generalized claim for several evidence. Don't just pile up evidence without making them support your claims, since otherwise they'll become pointless evidence and decrease the persuasiveness of your writing.