Lecture Summary – Brainstorming

Understanding Essay Questions

The first thing you need to do when preparing to write an essay is to read and understand the topic question. If you don’t understand the question properly you cannot possibly answer it properly. Generally, these questions are asking you to argue for or against a specific idea. For example, the question on page 46 of your textbook asks if you agree or disagree with the following statement:

Attending a live performance is more enjoyable (is better) than watching the same event on television.

This sentence is a Thesis Statement. It says one thing is better than another. Now the question is asking us if we think this thesis is true or if we think the opposite is true.

If you say that you think the question’s thesis is true, then the thesis of your essay will be the same – however, remember to write your thesis a little differently (paraphrase the thesis statement in the prompt question). If you say that this thesis is wrong, then your thesis statement will be the opposite. Still, you need to write it differently from the prompt. Use synonyms or restructure the sentence if possible.

Another kind of question can be found on page 49 of your textbook.

Some people choose friends who are different from themselves, while others choose friends who are similar to themselves. Do you usually choose friends similar to yourself or different from yourself? Which type have you made the closest friendships with?

This topic question does not make a thesis statement. It does not state that one is better than the other. Rather, it asks which, in your opinion, is better based on your experience. Therefore, in your essay, you must restate the topic question as a thesis statement. Two possible examples are:

I believe that it is better to have friends who are similar to myself rather than friends who are different.

And the argument opposing that is:

I believe that it is better to have friends who are different from myself rather than friends who are similar.

Now we have two thesis statements, both of which answer the topic question. If we can answer the topic question, by writing a thesis statement, we clearly understand the question.

Brainstorming

Now, once we choose our thesis, we need to determine what are the pros and cons of this statement. This is where we brainstorm – try to think of any and all possible reasons for or against our thesis. We do this to find good arguments to support our thesis statement.

So, if our thesis statement is, “Attending a live performance is more enjoyable than watching the same event on television,” we must think of some general reasons to support this idea. These general ideas will become Topic Sentences in the Body of our essay. But after we think of our topic sentence we need Specific Examples to support those ideas. Again, we brainstorm – think of any concrete facts or experiences that can support the topic sentence’s claim to be true.

Structuring the Essay

Next we need to structure our essay. There is a specific formula to structuring an essay. The structure of an essay looks like this:

Paragraph 1: Introduction
· Restate the Topic Question.
· Suggests or summarize the Main Ideas in the body of your essay supporting your Thesis Statement.
· State your Thesis Statement.Paragraph 2: Body
· Write the Topic Sentence (Supporting Idea) for this Paragraph
· Write Specific Examples to Support this Idea.

Paragraph 3/4/5/etc.: Body
· Same as Paragraph 2 (but with Different Supporting Idea and Examples)

Conclusion
· Restate the Thesis
· Summarize the Supporting Ideas that support this Thesis.

So we restate (paraphrase) the Topic Sentence. We state our thesis statement. Now we need to decide which ideas we are going to use to support our thesis. Now, naturally we want to use the strongest, most convincing ideas first. It is always best to hit the reader with the best, strongest argument first, so that they will be more willing to agree with us later in the essay if our arguments get weaker. Also, if we use up our word count and have to throw out some supporting ideas we will have included the best ones in our essay. So we choose the best ideas and put them in the body of our essay with their supporting examples.

How many supporting ideas we include in our essay will depend on the required word count. For an essay of 250-300 words we only have space for one or two supporting arguments. For a 1,000 word essay, we will need maybe four supporting ideas.

Remember, each supporting idea is written in a separate paragraph with its examples. Each argument is a new topic, and each paragraph should have only one topic.

Conclusion

Now to write the conclusion: our concluding paragraph should restate our thesis (in different language to our original thesis statement – we paraphrase it), and summarize our supporting ideas as briefly as possible (in as few words as we can possibly make it). Make sure that when you summarize your arguments you paraphrase them: do not write the same sentences or passages you wrote in the body of your essay.

Lecture Summary: Skill B – Paraphrasing

When summarizing an essay it is important to use our own words to convey the essay’s ideas. If we copy long passages from the essay, the reader of our summary cannot be sure if we truly understand the essay’s meaning. However, if we explain the essay’s ideas using different language, it will be apparent that we understand its meaning.

One method of altering an essay’s language is to use synonyms. A synonym is a word that has the same meaning as, or very similar meaning to, another word. For example, “barren” and “desolate” are two words that both mean “devoid of life”. Thus “desolate” is a synonym for “barren” (and vice versa). Another two words that are synonymous are “area” and “region” Therefore, when summarizing the sentence, “Deserts are barren areas of land”, we can write, “the reading explains that deserts are desolate regions of land.” Our summary has the same meaning as the original sentence, but it is not a direct copy. It is our own sentence. By using synonyms in this way we show that we understand the meaning of the original sentence and that we are capable of writing out own sentence.

A thesaurus is a very useful tool for finding synonyms. However, we must be careful when using synonyms from a thesaurus, because many words are polysemic – they have more than one meaning. As a result, depending on context, a word may be synonymous in one instance, but not in another. For example, if a source sentence reads, “I heard a sound,” we can change the sentence to, “I heard a noise,” and the original meaning is retained. However, if the source sentence is, “The word ‘bear’ and ‘bare’ have the same sound,” the word “noise” is not synonymous. We cannot say, “The word bear and bare have the same noise. For this reason, we must be sure that we understand the precise meaning of a word in the specific sentence we are paraphrasing before we choose a synonym for it.

Another, more complex way to demonstrate our understanding of a text is to paraphrase. Paraphrasing involves changing the grammatical structure of the source sentence while retaining its original meaning. For example, when summarizing the sentence “Deserts are barren areas of land”, instead of writing, “the reading explains that deserts are barren areas of land”, we could summarize, “the reading explains that barren land characterizes desert areas.” Of course, even better would be to paraphrase and use synonyms, thus producing “the reading explains that desolate land characterizes desert regions.” Now we have not only shown that we understand the meaning of the original sentence, but also that we have a vocabulary sufficient enough to use synonyms appropriately and that we are capable of reproducing meaning in our own language (by changing the sentence structure).

Ideally, when paraphrasing, you will do so in fewer words than the source material. One way to do this is to combine separate information from the reading into the one, complex sentence. For example, the reading states:

Deserts are barren areas of land. Little vegetation grows in deserts. This is a consequence of harsh weather conditions and the absence of minerals in the soil of these places.

We can combine the meaning of these three sentences and paraphrase them as:

The reading explains that desolate land characterizes desert regions, resulting from their extreme climates and the absence of soil nutrients in these places, which inhibits plant growth.

With this new, complex sentence, we have expressed the meaning of three sentences from the reading, and shown our understanding of that meaning by reproducing it in our own words.

Using synonyms is relatively easy, but still necessary. Restructuring sentences while retaining their original meaning is much more difficult, and much more important. It is one of the defining characteristics of a good writer to be able to impart information in an original way. It is a skill you must practice constantly if you wish to do it well.

Questions & Answers: Organizing Information – Dec 8

Students in the “Developing English Writing Skills” course, ask any questions you have concerning your coursework in the comments section of this post. I will update the “Writing Tips” section every week.