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The Four Step in Essay Writing

游客2023-07-26  20
问题                    The Four Step in Essay Writing
                                    —College Writing Skill with Readings
    Step 1 : Begin with a Point, or Thesis
    Your first step in writing is to discover what point you want to make and to write that point as a single sentence. There are two reasons for doing this. You want to know right from the start if you have a clear and workable thesis. Also, you will be able to use the thesis as a guide while writing your essay. At any stage you can ask yourself, "Does this support my thesis?" With the thesis as a guide, the danger of drifting away from the point of the essay is greatly reduced.
    To write a good thesis, you must begin with a subject that is neither too broad nor too narrow. Sup pose, for example, that an instructor asks you to write a paper on marriage. A topic such as marriage is obviously too broad to cover in a five-hundred-word essay. You would have to write a book to support adequately any point you might make about the general subject of marriage. What you need to do, then, is limit your subject. Narrow it down until you have a thesis that you can deal with specifically in about five hundred words.
    Step 2: Support the Thesis with Specific Evidence
    The first essential step in writing a successful essay is to formulate a clearly stated thesis. The second basic step is to support the thesis with specific reasons or details. To ensure that your essay will have adequate support, you may find an informal outline very helpful. Write down a brief version of your thesis idea and then work out and jot down the three points that will support the thesis.
    Just as a thesis must be developed with three supporting points, each supporting point must be developed with specific de/ails. Specific details are valuable in two key ways. First, details excite the reader’s interest. They make writing a pleasure to read, for we all enjoy learning particulars about people, places, and things. Second, details serve to explain a writer’s points. They give the evidence needed for us to see and understand general ideas.
    Step 3 : Organize and Connect the Specific Evidence
    As you are generating the specific details needed to support a thesis, you should be thinking about ways to organize and connect those details. All the details in your essay must cohere, or stick together, so that your readers will be able to move smoothly from one bit of supporting information to the next. This section will show you how to organize and connect supporting details by using common methods of organization, transitions, and other connecting words.
    (1) Common Methods of Organization
    Two common methods used to organize the supporting material in an essay are time order and emphatic order.
    Time, or chronological, order simply means that details are listed as they occur in time. First this is done; next this; then this; after that, this; and so on.
    Emphatic order is sometimes described as "saving the best till last." It is a way to put emphasis on the most interesting or important detail by placing it in the last part of a paragraph or in the final supporting paragraph of an essay.
    (2) Transitions
    Transitions signal the direction of a writer’s thought. They are like the road signs that guide travelers. Transitional, or linking, sentences aroused between paragraphs to help tie together the supporting paragraphs in an essay. They enable the reader to move smoothly from the idea in one paragraph to the idea in the next one.
    (3) Other Connecting Words
    In addition to transitions, there are three other kinds of connecting words that help tie together the specific evidence in a paper: repeated words, pronouns, and synonyms.
    Step 4: The Fourth Step in Essay Writing
    This part will focus on the fourth goal Of writing effectively: sentence skills. You’ll learn how to re vise an essay so that your sentences flow clearly. The following strategies will help you to revise your sentences effectively:
    (1) Use Parallelism: Words in a pair or a series should have parallel structure. By balancing the items in a pair of series so that they have the same kind of structure, you will make the sentence dearer and easier to read.
    (2) Use a Consistent Point of View: Don’t shift verb tenses unnecessarily. If you begin writing a pa per in the present tense, don’t shift suddenly to the past. If you begin in the past, don’t shift without reason to the present.
    (3) Use Specific Words: To be an effective writer, you must use specific words rather than general words. Specific words create pictures in the reader’s mind. They help capture interest and make your meaning dear.
    (4) Use Active Verbs: When the subject of a sentence performs the action of the verb, the verb is in the active voice. When the subject of a sentence receives the action of a verb, the verb is in the passive voice.
    (5) Use Concise Words: Wordiness—using more words than necessary to express a meaning—is of ten a sign of lazy or careless writing. Your readers may resent the extra time and energy they must spend when you have not done the work needed to make your writing direct and concise.
    (6) Vary Your Sentences: One part of effective writing is to vary the kinds of sentences you write. If every sentence follows the same pattern, writing may become monotonous to read. [br] To write a good thesis, you must begin with a subject that is neither too ______ nor too______.
选项
答案 broad, narrow
解析 答案在文章第一部分的第二段首句。
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