start writing, they must first carefully understand the task to Introduction ensure that they comprehend what is expected from them.
The ability to write in line with academic rules and settings The next step is to specify the subject and decide on the is crucial in the twenty-first century. due to new technology writing context, which contains determining the purpose, and new methods of communication like e-mail and audience, and tone. Then, it is usually followed by generating discussion boards because people build opinions of a main idea, which further requires examples, details, and ourselves and our ability to communicate well through our explanations to support your argument in it. way of writing. Therefore, it is crucial to develop your writing skills since they provide you with power. Writing Understanding the Task
properly helps you reach your objectives, whether they are Writing actually starts by reading. If you want to write well, to succeed academically, get and maintain a decent career, you should read as much as you can before you start or just to express yourself clearly. Language is the means writing. Although writing well in terms of content is more through which we communicate who we are and how we related to reading background, you should not forget that see the world since each of us has a unique perspective. It reading the task specifications is crucial since it is the first may not be simple to learn how to use language properly, step of the actual writing process. Therefore, when you are but doing so can help you communicate with people about expected to write a paragraph, an essay, or any other your worldview. Moreover, the ability to write well is academic paper (e.g. a term paper, a project report, a crucial for landing and keeping a satisfying job. Employers proposal, a cover letter, a dissertation, etc.), you must make frequently state that they are searching for workers who can sure you understand what is being asked from you. In order clearly communicate. Writing well can be the difference to do that, consider the following points in mind: between getting promoted and remaining in a low-level position. College education will require a very specific type • Task prompt of writing. You will be expected to compose short essays • Text length and paragraphs both in and outside of class. Both the topic • Due date.
of your writing and its accuracy will be considered in your Understanding the Topic grade. When you are given a writing prompt, your task is to Paragraph and Essay Writing Processes carefully consider the subject and identify a good aspect of It can be helpful to regard writing as just another process, it that you can write about. The following terms, which are similar to making bread or building a house. That tells us frequently used in assignments, may help you concentrate that effective writing is the result of a process, and you will on your writing:
not succeed if you omit crucial phases from the process. Compare: Focus on the similarities between two or more Making a decision about what to write about and coming topics while examining the contrasts. up with writing ideas are the first steps. The following step is to arrange your ideas, then produce a draft of your Contrast: Focus on the differences between two or more paragraph or essay. Finally, effective writers edit and topics.
update their manuscript to ensure accuracy and to improve Discuss: Provide a range of viewpoints on, emphasise, or communication. detail a single subject.
Pre-Writing: From Ideas to Words Analyse: Inquire into one or more components of a subject.
The biggest mistake new writers usually make is to start Explain: Clearly state, provide support for, or provide a writing on the topic without giving the mental effort step-by-step analysis of a subject. required to it. Therefore, they fail to understand what is being asked and risk their whole process right from the Summarise: Briefly summarise the key ideas of a topic or beginning. However, experienced authors are aware that article.
before they can start writing, they must first carefully Prove: Support a claim with evidence to persuade the understand the task to ensure that they comprehend what is reader that it is true. expected from them. The next step is to specify the subject and decide on the writing context, which contains Examine the example below for various task types given for determining the purpose, audience, and tone. Then, it is the same topic usually followed by generating a main idea, which further Narrowing Down the Topic requires examples, details, and explanations to support your argument in it. You might want to set a limit to the topic as your initial step, depending on your task. If you are given a broad topic, The biggest mistake new writers usually make is to start you should focus on something you can discuss in a writing on the topic without giving the mental effort required paragraph or brief essay. You might start by using topic- to it. Therefore, they fail to understand what is being asked specific brainstorming strategies to help you focus your and risk their whole process right from the beginning. thoughts. Do not worry about what you write down However, experienced authors are aware that before they can especially when you use a piece of paper to jot down your
ING182U-COMMUNICATION SKILLS AND ACADEMIC REPORTING II
Chapter 1: Why Bother to Write Well: The Power of Language
ideas. Nothing is right or wrong because this is a process of going into the topic. Simply unwind, concentrate on the subject, explore your knowledge, and identify the topics you wish to write about. You can brainstorm by working alone or with a group to come up with a more focused topic when you are faced with a broad topic. When working alone, you can focus on a topic by considering its facets or particular examples, and then jotting down all the concepts that occur to you. Similar to this, two or more people can jointly help brainstorm a topic. Each person provides their own ideas, which inspire other ones. In the workplace, teams frequently come up with original solutions to issues.
Deciding on the Writing Context
Examining your writing goal, your intended audience, and the tone you want to utilise are all necessary steps in determining the writing context. The purpose of your writing should include its motivation, objectives, and intended results. Understanding your purpose can assist you in forming your topic sentence or thesis and in deciding what to include and what to omit from your writing. The second thing to consider might be the audience. The reader or readers with whom you are speaking make up your audience. Speaking to an audience help us choose what to say and how to say it, adjusting our words to the individual or group to whom we are communicating. When choosing what information to include and how to deliver it, keep in mind the interests, concerns, values, educational backgrounds, and attitudes of your audience. The last thing to consider might be the tone. Tone refers to the author’s perspective on the issue or audience. When we speak or listen to others, we typically pay more attention to tone than when we write. Writers should think about how their tone will affect the target audience. Audiences are unlikely to respond favourably to voices that could be characterised as dismissive, condescending, degrading, insensitive, or strident.
Generating a Main Idea and Supporting Ideas
Right after deciding on your goal, audience, and tone, you had better try to develop a main idea regarding your focused issue. Having a tentative main idea can make it easier for you to come up with suggestions for your focused subject. Because you might want to alter the main idea statement to more effectively represent the thoughts you have developed, this main idea is tentative (meaning temporary). After generating supporting ideas, you can always change your direction or focus point in the main idea. A crucial step in the writing process is coming up with supporting ideas because it helps you come up with adequate concepts or specifics to develop your subject. The key is to focus on your topic because as soon as you begin thinking about it, ideas will begin to flow. Your task at this point in the writing process is to generate as many concepts and images as you can. Later on, you can assess them.
Brainstorming
In generating supporting ideas, you allow as many thoughts as possible to come to mind. As one concept leads to another, you note down any additional thoughts you have
on the subject. All about the process of brainstorming is to start it; as soon as one idea starts to appear on your mind, the others do so more quickly. Once more, brainstorming can be done in a group or independently to produce ideas. Grammar, punctuation, and spelling are not important at this time as we discussed earlier. In individual brainstorming, like the majority of good authors, you may visualise or mentally picture the task prompt. Visualise the person, location, or object. In group brainstorming, two or more people can assist one another in coming up with ideas. Everyone provides as many ideas as they can as the group concentrates on the narrowed topic and preliminary main idea of each participant. Before you know it, the group has produced enough ideas to get the writer started after one person’s thoughts inspired another. The discussion then moves on to another writer’s potential main idea, and so forth.
Freewriting
Another technique for coming up with ideas is to “free- write,” in which you concentrate on the subject and note down whatever comes to your mind, essential or not.
List-making
List-making is a different method of coming up with ideas. Simply list any words or phrases that come to mind while you think about your topic.
Clustering
Visualising ideas is called clustering. Clustering starts the process of arranging your ideas by grouping related concepts together. When clustering, you jot down any words or images that come to mind that relate to your subject. Then, connect ideas that are connected by drawing lines between them.
Dividing
By separating the subject into its constituent pieces, dividing helps to produce thoughts. Divide a topic using the journalistic questions of who, what, where, when, why, and how. Dividing a topic can help you come up with suggestions to support your main idea.
Paragraph Writing
Stating the Main Idea
The main idea is numerated in a topic sentence in the paragraph, which is usually at the beginning. Your essential argument is succinctly and precisely stated in this statement. To create a topic sentence, you must focus on a specific writing subject, create supporting ideas for the main idea’s tentative primary idea by keeping in mind the audience, purpose, and tone in mind while creating and revising your main idea statement. Make sure that your main idea statement is appropriate for the length, type, and audience of the assignment you are writing for.
Generating and Organizing Supporting Sentences
You need to come up with three to seven supporting points, depending on the assignment. Before you begin writing,
organising your ideas is an essential stage in producing an effective paragraph. Sometimes you may need to come up with new ideas and additional thoughts before you start writing. Second, you must thoroughly consider each supporting idea and note down particular information, such as facts and examples that you could possibly utilise in your paragraph. You might also want to think about how each additional supporting idea relates to or advances the main idea regarding their features. You can prepare your supporting sentences by using a map or outline to ensure that you do not omit crucial information or lose direction or focus off of your main idea. Since a map displays supporting ideas on a single line, some writers prefer to use them
Writing the Conclusion
The conclusion is the last sentence of the paragraph. It either sums up the paragraph by reminding the reader of the main idea or interprets the significance of the supporting ideas. It should not start a new argument. You might end your paragraph by giving suggestions, steps to be followed, providing your own stance, or just outlining the issue as it is depending on your writing assignment, your main idea, and your purpose (e.g. to persuade, to exemplify, to compare, etc.)
Drafting
You are prepared to create a first draft after organising your ideas. Following your plan or outline, you compose a first draft by organising your ideas into sentences. When writing a first draft, you should put all of your attention into making your ideas as clear as possible. As you construct your paragraph, try to incorporate the words from your map or outline. Include all of the crucial ideas you intend to use
Revising
You can determine that your topic statement needs more evidence, or you might opt to cut out any elements that do not support it. When you revise, you also focus on enhancing how your thoughts are presented. You might want to think about using suitable vocabulary and exact phrasing. Your writing will be better if it is more detailed.
Assessing Your First Draft
It is always useful to get feedback on your first draft. If you have some peers or an instructor, it will be even more practical for you. However, if you are on your own, you should be prepared to assess your own draft. First, it is wise to step away from what you have written by setting your paragraph aside for as long as you can before returning to it to make revisions. When rewriting, examine your paragraph as critically as you can while looking for opportunities to make it better.
Editing
Editing is one of the most crucial writing abilities. You can find and fix English mistakes by using an editing checklist like the one below. When editing, you should read your paragraph enough times, concentrating on one form of error
each time (fragments, verb errors, punctuation errors, spelling errors, etc.), paying special attention to errors you have previously struggled with.
Paragraph Types
Descriptive Paragraph
In a description, the writer uses one or more of the five senses (smell, taste, hearing, touch, and sight) to create a word image of a person, place, or item. Because it aids the reader in seeing the people, locations, or things being described, description is helpful in a variety of writing genres. The reader will be more able to picture the image you have in mind if you can be as descriptive as you can. It is practical to use precise, concrete verbs and nouns, evocative adjectives and adverbs, and colourful language and images throughout your description.
Narrative Paragraph
A story concerning a sequence of events is told by the author via narration. The story must first be told in such a way that the reader can follow what happened when. Second, the story must be told dramatically enough to maintain the reader’s interest. Using detailed descriptions of the characters and settings in the story is one approach to hold the reader’s interest. In general, narratives follow a chronological order and respond to the following six fundamental journalistic questions: What, Why, When, Who, Where, and How? Because the author is relaying a personal experience, narration frequently uses the first person (I, we).
Expository Paragraph
In an expository paragraph, the writer goes over a basic idea or supports a general statement using definitions or examples. Definitions and explanations are precise and detailed. They define, clarify, or introduce a basic idea. An expository paragraph usually includes examples (also including illustrations) and definitions to make abstract concepts clear and simpler to comprehend, which aids readers in understanding the writer’s thoughts. A solid definition should aid the reader in understanding the concept. A phrase or concept is limited, distinguished, or clarified using a variety of approaches in an extended definition. In an expanded definition, the author may employ several rhetorical devices to provide more details.
Essay Writing
An essay is well-structured and well-developed longer version of a paragraph. That means, each paragraph in an essay should have its own main idea, supporting sentences, and a conclusion sentence. A body paragraph in an essay serves to support your main argument presented in the introduction paragraph. However, that specific body paragraph should be organised to have its own main idea, and supporting and concluding sentences. In that way, you will also have the chance to organise your essay in a better way by linking each paragraph to one another. The purpose of an essay opening is to attract the reader’s curiosity and
explain its subject. The thesis is stated in the final sentence your reader know whether the next paragraph’s subject will of the introduction. A thesis statement identifies the specific continue along the same vein or take a different turn. subject of the essay, much like the main idea of a paragraph. Essay Writing Checklist There are one or more paragraphs in the body. A subdivision or category of the issue is developed in each Essay writing process might seem easy at first; especially if paragraph. The conclusion is a recap or review of the main it is considered simply as an extension or a longer version ideas raised in the body, much like the last sentence of a of a paragraph. However, depending on the type of your paragraph. Similar to how a paragraph has consistency and essay, some of which are covered in the following chapters unity, so does an essay. Signals for transitions attach the in this book, you need to focus on a lot more details, facts, paragraphs together into a logical whole. Study the and considerations compared to a paragraph. Therefore, in structure of the following essay as you read it. The first order to guide you in this process, you can use the essay transitional signals for the three body paragraphs can be writing checklist provided in the book.
seen.
Structure of an Essay
An essay consists of three main sections; introduction, body, and conclusion. Usually, the introduction and the conclusion sections are one paragraph each and relatively shorter while the body section might include two to five paragraphs with longer sentences and content.
Introduction
The opening paragraph of an essay is known as the introductory paragraph or introduction. It has two purposes: it draws the reader’s attention and it introduces the topic of the essay. Different beginning paragraph types exist. You will discover how to create an introduction that is referred to as a “funnel” in this chapter. A thesis statement and a number of broad statements make up a funnel introduction.
Typically, the final sentence of an introduction is the thesis statement. It serves three objectives:
• It identifies the precise subject of the essay. • It might include a list of the main topic’s subtopics. • The organisation strategy might be mentioned.
Body Paragraphs
One or more paragraphs make up the body of the essay. A topic sentence and many supporting sentences are found in each body paragraph. It might or might not have a final sentence. The thesis statement is supported by each body paragraph.
Conclusion
The last paragraph of an essay is the conclusion. It serves three objectives:
1. It denotes the conclusion of the essay. 2. It serves as a reminder to the reader of your key points. 3. It concludes with your last observations on the subject.
Transition Between Paragraphs
A transition signal should be used between each paragraph to indicate how one paragraph relates to the next, just as it is crucial to utilise transition signals to connect concepts inside a paragraph. Transitional words and phrases can let