Throughout Rewriting, Harris details four essential moves critical writers make in academic writing. From defining the project to forwarding, countering, and revising, most academic writers are able to lay the foundation for a successful and profound piece. However, in order to ‘re-write’ with due diligence, one must synthesize and blend sources to really sculpt and mold the fragments of what others have previously said. Along with that use, blending can also enable writers to see their project more clearly.
Synthesis, the critical reading, followed by blending, the critical writing, are inherently difficult for students as they often come into research lacking the ability to set apart ideas in a text from the single work itself. Thus, to appropriately fit the synthesis and blending in the right place, one may begin with the four moves detailed in Rewriting.
For example, a student has been assigned to write on a current issue in the U.S., however, the assignment specifies to “respond to prior views in order to move the conversation in a new direction.” He visits several reliable databases and news articles to first really understand the debate on the ground level. Focusing on public bathroom usage and transgenders, he is able to clearly identify the debate. A database article is useful in providing background on the history of the controversy; however, in order to really begin and use the other sources, the student must “come to terms” with this project. After reading a second article, the student comes across an entire section devoted to the cost of jobs and challenges of business to recruit workers based on the recent developments in North Carolina.
This very quote leads the student to come to terms and really define their project as their new direction will be looking at the repercussions of the transgender bathroom laws. As they begin to forward mainly through illustrating and authorizing, they return back to the database articles to delightfully realize that certain fragments of the foundational information blend smoothly with information from the sources which helped them originally understand the topic. After scrutinizing the database article, the student comes to find similar evidence about the effect of the law on public schools. This now fuels a transition from not only discussing the bathroom laws but the cause and effect relationship to his own school and the correlation to government funding.
As the student finds points which counter, he draws on these to allow him to push the idea even further then leading to taking his own approach, which he decides will be an essay that looks through the lens of cisgender person with just as much if not more to lose as the transgender who just wants the bathroom of identification. From here, not to oversimplify, the text goes to revising and is eventually submitted.
Overall, the move of blending enabled this student to not only achieve a framework for this project, but it gave him a better sense of the relationship between the sources, while also providing a clear definition of the project he wanted to pursue. Thus, students can develop their own assertions and organize their findings so that their own ideas are still the impetus for the paper.
E688: Seminar in Teaching Composition 
Your description of the research process clarifies that research generates more research because students evaluate and learn as they go, which pushes them into new directions. The hard part is convincing the student to find articles that counter and shift the conversation in ways the student had not expected. Students need to suspend preconceived ideas and search what others have to say. Letting go of one’s own ideas can be hard. But if students do find the countering articles and question how these articles clarify these other facets of the conversation, then they are on their way to good papers. Writing what one believes is easy. (Not that first drafts don’t require editing and then some, but the flow of ideas in their most natural order will come forth.) Thinking about the research and developing one’s argument while doing the research will make the writing flow much more easily. A focus will have been established, and if researched well, even a little excitement to write the argument.
I agree with your assessment that synthesis and blending are essential steps leading to a well-written research paper. You are absolutely right that blending is a difficult step for students. Their tendency is to list quotes and data to support their argument, but there is an art to blending ideas and sources that needs to be taught and fine tuned. Developing this skill is a challenge, and you show great insight as you highlight this step.