ESSAY WRITING 1

Topic Sentence Vs. Thesis Statement

Topic Sentence

• Applies to paragraph

• Gives overview of what the paragraph is about

• Has topic and controlling idea

• Every paragraph has one

Thesis Statement

• Applies to Essay• States the main

point or argument of an essay

• Has topic and controlling idea

• Every essay has one in the Introduction

What is an Essay Introduction? What do you think?

Writing the Introduction to an Essay

Introductions Must contain a thesis statement Are at the beginning of an essay Give overview of essay topic Capture the interest of the reader

Types of Introductions

Funnel – from general to specific Dramatic, Interesting or Funny Story Surprising Statistics or Facts Historical Background

The Hook

Hook: explanation

It’s important to capture the reader’s attention. Using one of these introduction strategies will help you “hook” your reader in.

Consider: Who is your audience? What do you think they would find interesting? How will you capture and hold their interest?

Rather than simply writing your paper as an assignment to be graded, it’s useful to think of it as something that might be published. How does this change how you write?

Funnel

Start with a broad topic sentence and narrow down the topic sentence-by-sentence until the end of the introductory paragraph. 

By starting with a broad topic sentence, the writer starts with what the reader should already know and moves toward what the reader doesn’t know, but should after reading the paper. 

Paragraph should end with the thesis statement for the research project. 

Writing a Funnel

Broad topic: Moving to a new country Start the paragraph with something the

reader knows: Moving to a new country can be exciting.

Support: General ideas that the reader is familiar with, moving to more specific ideas that support the paper’s thesis.

Essay’s thesis statement: Although not everyone experiences culture shock in exactly the same way, many experts agree that it has roughly five stages.

Funnel

Moving to a new country can be an exciting, even exhilarating experience. In a new environment, people somehow feel more alive. Seeing new sights, eating new food, hearing the foreign sounds of a new language, and feeling a different climate against their skin stimulates their senses as never before. Soon, however, this sensory bombardment becomes sensory overload. Suddenly, new experiences seem stressful rather than stimulating, and delight turns into discomfort. This is the phenomenon known as culture shock. Cultures shock is more than jet lag or homesickness, and it affects nearly everyone who enters a new culture – tourists, business travelers, diplomats and students alike. Although not everyone experiences culture shock in exactly the same way, many experts agree that it has roughly five stages.

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Funnel Practice

Broad topic: A computer is necessary for college students.

Topic sentence: Support: Thesis statement:

Dramatic, Interesting or Funny Story

On November 14, 1963, a few miles off the southern coast of Iceland, the crew of a fishing boat noticed smoke on the horizon. Thinking that another fishing boat was on fire, they went to investigate. When they got closer, they discovered that the smoke was not from a boat on fire; rather, it was from an undersea volcano about to erupt. The next day, ash, cinders, and pumice were blown 1,000 feet into the air. The fishermen had witnessed a rare event – the violent birth of an island. The volcano continued to erupt for about four years, eventually creating an island about 1 square mile in area and 560 feet in height. The birth of Surtsey, as the island is named, offered scientists an extraordinary opportunity to learn how life takes hold on a sterile landmass.

Surprising Statistics or Facts

Got high blood pressure? Try a truffle. Worried about heart disease? Buy a bon-bon. It’s the best news in years! Studies in two prestigious scientific journals say dark chocolate is good for you. It seems that eating a small piece of dark chocolate regularly can reduce the risk of heart disease because dark chocolate – but not milk chocolate or white chocolate – contains high amounts of flavenoids, powerful cholesterol-fighting compounds. What is the next health food going to be? Ice cream Sugar cookies? There are so many conflicting news stories about which foods are good for you that it is often difficult to make the right choices at the supermarket.

Historical Background

The Pilgrims who arrived in Massachusetts in 1620 came to find religious freedom. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, large numbers of African men and women were brought as slaves to work on large plantations in the South. Immigrants from northern and southern Europe came in the early nineteenth century to escape poor economic conditions at home. Later in the nineteenth century, the first immigrants from China came as contract laborers to build the railroads connecting East and West. In the twentieth century, political and economic refugees arrived from Asia, Eastern Europe, and Latin America. Indeed, the United States has seen immigrants come from many different parts of the world, and they have come fro many different reasons. Their ability to adjust to life in their adopted land has depended on several factors.

Introduction Practice 1

Currently under study are four main methods for predicting when and where the next Big One will occur.

In 1976, an earthquake in Tangshan, China, killed over 250,000 people.

In an average year, earthquakes kill 10,000 people worldwide and cause millions of dollars worth of property damage.

Iran suffered more than 80,000 deaths in two massive quakes in 1990 and 2003.

Scientist keep trying to find ways to predict earthquakes - so far without much success.

What type of introduction is this? Which sentence is the Thesis Statement?

Introduction Practice 1

In an average year, earthquakes kill 10,000 people worldwide and cause millions of dollars worth of property damage. In 1976, an earthquake in Tangshan, China, killed over 250,000 people. Iran suffered more than 80,000 deaths in two massive quakes in 1990 and 2003. Scientist keep trying to find ways to predict earthquakes - so far without much success. Currently under study are four main methods for predicting when and where the next Big One will occur.

Thesis Statement Practice

Three of the advantages of living in a large city over a small town are ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

More Practice

Write an Introductory Paragraph using the thesis statement you just developed for: Three of the advantages of living in a large

city over a small town are …

Body - Types of Support

Examples Statistics Quotes (Sources)

It is no secret that performance enhancing drugs have been used by Olympic athletes for decades. In  1993, the head of the International Olympic Committee’s medical commission, Prince Alexandre de Merode of Belgium, stated “I believe that as many as 10% of all [Olympic] athletes …are regular users  of performance enhancing drugs”(Bamburger & Yaeger, 1994, p. 63). 

Conclusions Purpose

Signals the end of the essay, thus a concluding transition signal is needed

Reminds reader of the main points by Leaves the reader with your final

thoughts on the topic

Parts of a Conclusion

Concluding transition

signal• All in all...• In brief...• In short...• To conclude...• To

summarize...• In

conclusion...• In summary...

• For these reasons...

Summary

• Restate the thesis OR

• Summarize the main points

Final comment

• Suggest result or consequence

• Make a prediction

• Suggest a solution, make a recommendation or a call for action

• Quote an authority on the topic

Writing a Final Comment

Suggest result or consequence

In conclusion, although the costs of attending college are up, financial aid for students is down. Fewer and fewer future members of the workforce are able to educate themselves beyond high school. As a result, the nation will waste the intelligence, imagination and energy of a large segment of the present college-age generation.

Writing a Final Comment, Cont. Make a prediction

To sum up, the costs of attending college have been rising while, at the same time, sources of financial aid for students have been disappearing. If this trend continues, fewer and fewer families will be able to send their children through four years of college.

Writing a Final Comment, Cont. Suggest a solution, make a recommendation or

a call for action

In brief, the U.S. system of higher education is in trouble. For many students, four years of college is no longer possible because of increasing costs and decreasing financial aid. To reverse this trend, its citizens must demand that government increase its financial support of colleges and universities and restore financial aid programs. The future depends on it.

Writing a Final Comment, Cont. Quote an authority on the topic

In summary, costs are rising and financial aid is declining, with the result that many can no longer afford to go to college. If our nation is to prosper, increased government funding for education is essential, even if it requires higher taxes. As Horace Mann stated in his Fifth Annual Report, “A nation’s economic wealth will increase through an educated public.” It is therefore in the self-interest of business to pay the taxation for public education.

Conclusion Pitfalls

Introducing new information Not restating the thesis/summarizing

main points Not making a final comment/only using

one type

REVISION STRATEGIES

It’s important to revise (literally “re-envision”) your paper after you’ve finished producing a draft. There are a couple of helpful strategies that you can use.

Revision happens on TWO LEVELS: Global & Local

Global Revision has to do with organization, paragraph formation, sentence order within a paragraph, and the development of thesis and topic sentences and ideas.

Local Revision has to do with sentence level concerns like grammar and syntax issues, typos, and word choice.

IT IS IMPORTANT TO WORK ON GLOBAL REVISION BEFORE YOU MOVE ON TO LOCAL REVISION.

Can you guess why?

Global Revision Strategy: The Reverse Outline

You’ve probably done an initial outline BEFORE writing a paper, but have you done one AFTER, too?

A reverse outline is the single most useful revision strategy for catching global paper issues.

Here’s how it works:

REVERSE OUTLINE

Step #1: Number each paragraph in your paper sequentially

Step #2: Take out a clean piece of paper and write out the corresponding numbers

Now go, paragraph by paragraph, through the paper and try to summarize in ONE SENTENCE what you actually write/accomplished in each paragraph

What kinds of things does the Reverse Outline tell us?

If you are having a hard time summarizing the paragraph in one sentence, you may have tried to accomplish too much in that paragraph. You may have more than one topic idea.

Looking at all of the sentence summaries together, you can easily see where you’ve been redundant or repetitive, where you’re missing information, if the paragraphs are in the best order for smooth, natural transitions, if you have off-topic paragraphs or too-short paragraphs, and if you have covered everything you set out to do in the paper.

Envisioning your paper

I find it helpful to create visual images of a successful and unsuccessful paper. You can use any number of metaphors to describe how a paper works and this is one…

The Jellyfish

IMPORTANT: Thesis Idea

Your thesis idea and statement is the single most important aspect of your paper. IF YOU DO NOT HAVE ONE, your paper is in serious trouble before even getting started.I can almost guarantee that if you have no thesis idea, your paper will meander, unfocused and disorganized, all over the place before coming to an unsatisfactory end. Think of this as the BODY or CORE of your Jellyfish.Without it, the jellyfish cannot survive!

Topic Sentence Tentacles

Supporting Ideas

Each tentacle represents a single idea that serves to support and explain your thesis idea.

It is it’s own developed point, but it MUST tie back to the thesis idea.

Mutant Tentacles! Warts! Fish Parts!

More than one topic Idea in a paragraph

Off topic! Maybe you wroteSomething really good, but it Just doesn’t fit in this paper

Topic ideaThat doesn’t tieInto the thesis idea…beSure to make a clear connection!

UnderdevelopedParagraph/topicidea

Global Revision Strategy: Cut and Rearrange

You’ve probably already noticed how important it is to print out your paper in order to review and revise. You see things in print that you simply do not see on the computer screen.

This revision strategy requires that you print out your paper…and then CUT IT UP!

Cut out each paragraph and place all of them on a big table. Then start rearranging the paragraph in different ways to see what order works the best.

This is not only a great way to play with organization, it’s also a good way to stay engaged in both your mind and your body. It employs “kinesthetic learning” which focuses on both mind and body working together.

Local Revision Strategies: Read Out Loud

When you’ve arranged your paper in the best possible way, it’s time to move on to local revision.

Reading your paper out loud is a great way to catch grammatical and syntactical errors.

Reading your paper out loud Reading your paper out loud can help

you catch awkwardly worded sentences. If you find yourself stumbling over words, it’s a good indication that something’s not quite right.

Alternatively, have someone else read it out loud. This is an even better option, because they DON’T know your paper. When you read your own writing, sometimes you read what you THINK you wrote, not what is actually on the page.

Read out loud back to front

This isn’t to say you should read the words backward or the sentences…! However, starting from the last sentence of the paper, read each sentence outloud until you get to the beginning of the paper.

Decontextualizing each sentence helps you see and hear grammatical errors because (again) you’re reading what you wrote versus what you THINK you wrote.

Citations

MLA style In-Text citations

Author’s name mentioned in sentence Basic in-text citation

Works Cited is in alphabetical order

In-Text Citations – Author Name in Sentence

Author directly stated and page number cited Wordsworth stated that Romantic poetry was

marked by a "spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings" (263). Romantic poetry is characterized by the "spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings" (Wordsworth 263). Wordsworth extensively explored the role of emotion in the creative process (263).

Wordsworth, William. Lyrical Ballads. London: Oxford U.P., 1967. Print.

In-Text Citations – Basic Citation Author not stated and only cited Human beings have been described as

"symbol-using animals" (Burke 3). Burke, Kenneth. Language as Symbolic

Action: Essays on Life, Literature, and Method. Berkeley: U of California P, 1966. Print.

In-Text Citation Practice

Question 1: Most of the birds could already fly well.

Question 2: Bob Gray says “All birds on the island of Hawaii

fly well.”

Book Information: Gray, Bob. Birds in Flight. Boston, Standard

Publications, 1986. This information was found on page 267

Works Cited Page

Alphabetical order Lastname, Firstname. Title of Book. Place

of Publication: Publisher, Year of Publication. Medium of Publication.

Henley, Patricia. The Hummingbird House. Denver: MacMurray, 1999. Print.

Works Cited Practice

Book Author: Edward Cornish Title: Futuring: The Exploration of the

Future City of Publication: Bethesda, Maryland

Publisher: World Future Society Date: 2004

Persuasive Strategies

Ethos

Pathos

Logos

Kairos

Persuasive Strategies

Ethos – making yourself seem trustworthy and believable

Pathos – appealing to your audience’s emotions

Logos – using logic, numbers, facts, and data

Kairos – building a sense of urgency

Persuasive Strategies

Ethos - MePathos – You/ThemLogos - Logic

Kairos - Time

Analyzing Arguments

Identify the Thesis, or Claim as it is called in argument

Look for Reasons why someone would believe the argument – reasons that validate the claim

Determine what kind of Support is used to back up the argument – facts, examples, quotes, statistics, etc.

Identify the Persuasive Strategy

What are Fallacies?

Incorrect or misrepresented part of an argument Can be an error in structure of argument Can be an error in logic Can be an error in support

Fallacies are something that makes an argument completely or partially invalid. If there are fallacies in your argument, your audience may not be convinced you have a good argument.

Types of Fallacies We Will Examine

Hasty Generalizations

Ad Populum

Slippery Slope

Ad Hominem

Red Herring

Hasty Generalization Example

Many books in English are written by American and British authors. So, all Americans and British people are excellent writers.

Hasty Generalizations

Occurs when a person makes a judgment about a something based on only a small bit of information about the subject

Hasty generalizations often occur about a population or group of people, such as in the example of American and British writers

Ad Populum Example

Everybody thinks that Barak Obama is a good president.

Ad Populum

Occurs when an argument is assumed to be true because most people believe it

You might know this argument in the form of popular opinion or peer pressure

Sometimes, popular opinion can be true if it is from a reputable source like a doctor, but just be careful to evaluate support

Slippery Slope Example

Global warming will lead to the destruction of the earth.

Slippery Slope

When a person asserts that one event must necessarily follow another, inevitably

Bypasses the middle argument and assumes that A will lead to B, regardless of any conditions or factors

No reason is given for this middle ground to be bypassed

Ad Hominem (against the man) Example

My opponent is stupid, therefore global warming doesn’t exist.

Ad Hominem

Literally translates “Against the Man” A person employing this type of

argument is ignoring the issue and attacking their opponent

Used as a distraction from the real issue at hand

Red Herring Example

Polar bears are tough animals, therefore we don’t need to worry about global warming.

Red Herring

Red Herrings are the introduction of irrelevant information or issues that distract from the argument at hand

Leads attention away from the real argument and engages it in a completely separate issue in order to win sympathy or approval

Fallacies in Advertising