Composition I

Laura Gang

Week 2

Developing Ideas for Writing a Paragraph

1. Brainstorming•quickly writing down all the thoughts

that come into your head.•It doesn’t matter if the first ideas are

good or bad• a good writer thinks before he writes.• not linear, consecutive; rather messy

• ideas are associated

Let’s brainstorm!

How weather affects people

Developing Ideas for Writing a Paragraph

2. The Topic Sentence• Control or guide the whole paragraph.

• It is NOT a general fact.• It is specific.

• Is is NOT TOO specific.• It often has controlling ideas.

Let’s practice!!! Controlling ideas pg. 37

1. The best season for kids is winter.2. Soccer is the world’s most popular sports.3. People from many different cultures live in

Los Angeles.4. Many language students prefer bilingual

dictionaries to monolingual dictionaries.5. The SAT contains two distinct sections that

deal with two different skills.6. The shocking crash of 747 jumbo jet off the

coast of New York has baffled investigators.7. Crossword puzzles are not only educational

but also addictive.

Let’s practice!!! Topic sentences pg. 40

1. Flowers are beautiful.2. Cats are nice.3. Paris is the capital of France.4. The English alphabet has twenty-six

letters.5. It costs forty cents to mail a first-class

letter from the United States to Canada.

6. Tennis is an enjoyable sport.

Language Focus: Capitalization and

PunctuationCapitalization

•Always capitalize the first word of a sentence.• Always capitalize the

word I• Capitalize proper nouns, specific names of people,

places or things.• Capitalize titles’ first letter, content words

(words with meaning) and DO NOT capitalize small

words (function)

End Marks

•Periods (.) Used at the end of declarative sentences.• Question marks (?) Used at the end of a question.• Exclamation points (!) Used a the end of an

exclamation.

Homework1. Choose one of the general topics

below. 2. Brainstorm your ideas on a separate

paper.3. Circle the ideas that you think are

better to include in a paragraph.4. Write a paragraph using the brainstorming you did and an appropriate topic sentence.

5. Be ready to share your writing.

ON LINE HOMEWORK> http://www.sheppardsoftware.com/grammar/capitalization.htm

http://owl.english.purdue.edu/exercises/3/16/14/

Supporting and Concluding Sentences

Like a good foundation of a

house,supporting sentences

need to hold theparagraph together.

The concludingsentence will close

the deal.

• Supporting Sentences

Supporting sentences should:

• Explain and support the topic

• Answer the main wh questions (who, what, where, when, why, how)

• Give details• Be related to the topic

sentence.Go to pg. 50 Activity 1-2

• Supporting Sentences

Kinds of supporting sentences

ExplainingDescribing

Giving reasonsGiving facts

Giving examples

Go to pg. 52 Activity 3

• Supporting Sentences

Analyzing and writing supporting sentences

Do pg 54 Activity 5

• Concluding Sentences

Concluding sentences should:

• Be the last sentence of the paragraph.

• Give the paragraph a logical conclusion

You should read many examples of concluding sentences to help you learn how to write an

effective one.

Kinds of concluding sentences

There are many types of concluding sentences. The following are two examples

from our textbook.

1. Restate the main idea2. Make a prediction

• Concluding Sentences

Restating the main idea

In other words, the concluding sentences summarizes the most relevant points of the

paragraph. It is probably the easiest one.

• Concluding Sentences

Go to pg. 61 ‘Examples’

Making a prediction

To predict is to guess. An interesting conclusion can be one that makes a guess about what will happen, or in what

way a certain event or situation will be resolved. It is also a good way to state your

opinions.

• Concluding Sentences

Go to pg. 62 ‘Examples’

Analyzing and Writing Good Concluding Sentences

Before writing the concluding sentence you should read the

paragraph again, identify the topic sentence, and circle any relevant details. These steps can help you,

once more, organize the ideas properly before writing an appropriate final sentence.

• Concluding Sentences

Go to pg. 62 Do Activity 9

Pronouns

When writing a paragraph, which is about one topic (or subject), it is common and

necessary to use key nouns (the paragraph’s ‘main character’). However, constant repetition and mentioning of our main character causes the writer to fall into repetition that sounds confusing,

awkard, and definitely mistaken. A way to solve such a problem can be by using pronouns. Using pronouns effectively

helps the written text sound more smoothly.

• Language Focus

Do you remember the types of pronouns there are and how to

use them?

• Types of pronouns

Types of Pronouns

Writing> from ‘Great Paragraphs’ Textbook pgs. 53 Activity 4 57 Activity 7 64 Activity 10 Original Writing

No. 1 **Language Focus> Pronouns: Pg 59 & 60 + Activity 8 Sentence Fragments and Comma Splices

online> http://depts.dyc.edu/learningcenter/owl/fragments.htm

http://depts.dyc.edu/learningcenter/owl/comma_splices.htm

(this is an explanation about the two topics. Read them first and scroll to

the bottom to the link for two exercises. Answer them and report the

score, if you can please print the answers before you get you get your

score)

** Original writing sample part of the portfolio!!!

• Homework

• Great Paragraphs Course Textbook

• Online Writing Lab website > http://depts.dyc.edu/

learningcenter/owl/index.htm

• References