KINDS OF PARAGRAPH

EXPOSITORY Its purpose is to explain, define or otherwise provide information to an audience. You write exposition when you prepare a job application, answer a test question, write out a recipe, or direct a friend to your house. Understanding the expository paragraph explains something to an audience subject may be a concept, historical event, process, or the meaning of a word contains factual, objective, and verifiable information does not contain opinions Compare.. Statement of fact The English language is highly hybrid, mixing Anglo-Saxon roots with Latin and French borrowings. Statement of opinion Because of its largely hybrid nature, the English language is the most versatile and flexible language that exists on earth.

The explanatory purpose of expository writing should be clear from its informative tone. For every knowledgeable reader, the writer should develop a more detailed explanation and use of more advance language. In addition, expository writing may have a secondary purpose of defining a term or instructing the reader in some task. The writer might also want to entertain the reader in addition to explaining something. Expository paragraph with an explanatory purpose and an informative tone Hailstones vary greatly in size and shape. They can be as small as a pea or as large as a grapefruit. They can be conical, round, or oblate, dimpled or knobbed two pounds and fall at a speed of some 100 miles per hour. People have been reported killed by hailstones in India and a 1977 plane crash in Georgia was attributed to hail. But the greatest damage from hail is to high-value crops such as fruits and vegetables and is caused by small stones that can blanket the ground and occasionally accumulate to a depth of several inches. John Hallet Expository paragraph with an entertaining purpose and a casual tone Essentially, each holographic movie display in the Museum of Holography is a transparent, 120- degree, screen-like partition suspended in a smooth semicircle against the wall. A light bulb is fitted at the base against the wall and presto!- an ethereal embodiment of a personality appears lurking in midair behind the screen. The uncanny motions come into play as the viewer walks around the screen. Hence, the viewer has delightful control over whether Joseph Papp appears to recite prose or a lethargic one. Adapted from Peggy Selfon Pre-writing, writing, and revising concentrate on explaining focus your topic in single sentence gather and organize your supporting information draft your paragraphs revise with the strong and clear intention to a particular audience in order to expand that audiences knowledge of your subject PERSUASIVE It attempts to persuade the reader to accept the writers opinion. It appears in editorials, speeches, advertisements, and reviews of films, plays, and books. It is also used in writing that offers interpretation of other works attempts to change the readers mind makes the writers opinion or interpretation so convincing that the reader agrees with it

uses language and argument that attracts the readers interest and appeal

Compare.. Nuclear power presents too great a hazard to public safety to be used as a major energy source I dont like nuclear power. Of all the American Presidents of the nineteenth century, Abraham Lincoln faced the greatest problems. No other President, past not future can match Lincolns greatness.

Remember.. Readers of persuasive writing look for: significant opinions; specific examples; strong evidence; and logical argument. When writing persuasively, express your opinions forcefully while respecting opposing views Suggestions for writing persuasive papers: 1. Choose an issue that you care about, determine whether you can support your opinion about it. 2. Decide how controversial the issue is and how intensely you want to convince your reader. 3. Determine your readers probable response: apathetic, unsympathetic, or strongly opposed. 4. Express your opinion in a main idea that is clear, significant, and supportable. 5. Gather examples, facts, reasons, and incidents to support your opinion. Consider the opposition and list evidence for and against your view. 6. Organize your support logically. For controversial issues, plan to concede one or more points. 7. Write in forceful but reasonable language, suing specific, concrete words and logical connections between ideas. 8. Revise by looking for weaknesses in your approach or inconsistencies in tone. Pre-writing, writing, and revising concentrate on defending your opinion to an unsympathetic or apathetic reader in choosing content and language remember to consider any opposing arguments counter reader objections anticipate opposing arguments to eliminate weak spots in your defense DESCRIPTIVE It paints a picture in words that appeal to a readers senses and imagination. Much of your writing will involve description, ranging from impressions of a vacation spot to a word picture of the structure of a cell. conveys a dominant impression of a topic which may be a quality, characteristic, mood, or feeling that the topic creates stated explicitly or implied uses language which appeals to readers senses, imagination, and emotions includes striking details such as sizes, colors, and shapes, and exact verbs, concrete nouns, and vivid adjectives words and details are vivid enough to enable the reader to see the topic as clearly as the writer did Compare.. The middle-aged hiker carried a strange collection of things, including binoculars and some pipes. The hiker, a man in his late fifties or early sixties, wore a Russian fur cap and carried binoculars and a small knapsack with an umbrella sticking out. Around the back of his belt in little hoops hung twelve or more pipes, some of wood, some of horn, and some of ivory.

Effective description

Uses: 1. sensory impressions and details that appeal to the sense of sights, smell, hearing, touch, or taste. 2. figures of speech like simile, metaphor, and analogies These should be presented logically. It should be easy for the reader to follow and should clarify the dominant impression the writer wishes to communicate. Many descriptive paragraphs presents detail in spatial order, such as top to bottom, left to right, or near to far. Others might be in chronological order. It was a Sunday evening in London, gloomy, close and stale. Maddening church bells of all degrees of dissonance, sharp and flat, cracked and clear, fast and slow, made the brick-and-mortar echoes hideous. Melancholy streets in a penitential garb of soot stepped souls of the people who were condemned to look at them out of windows in dire despondency. In every thoroughfare, up almost every alley, and down almost every turning, some doleful bell was throbbing, jerking, and tolling, as if Plague were in the city and the dead-carts were going round. Everything was bolted and barred that could possibly furnish relief to an overworked people. Nothing to breathe but streets, streets, streets. Charles Dickens Pre-writing, writing, and revising Choose a topic, a person, place, or experience that you know well and can describe with strong impressions. Determine a dominant impression and state it in a topic sentence. Decide a secondary purpose your paragraph might have such as entertainment or instruction. List as many details, sensory impressions, and comparisons as you can to describe your topic. Use exact and vivid verbs, nouns, and adjectives. Organize your details, impressions, and comparisons in an order which establishes your dominant impression. Appeal to the readers sense, imagination, and emotions. Revise for vividness and consistency of mood, and make the description as vivid as possible. NARRATIVE presents chronological order involves and entertains through action, details, and sensory impressions tells a series of related events in story form and graphic language Remember.. It covers a limited period of time. It may be complete in itself or part of a longer piece of writing It moves through time; something happens between the opening and closing sentences It sets the scene and starts the action The events usually are arranged in chronological order; that is, they move forward in time, telling what happens next. The writer should involve the readers in what is happening through action verbs, specific nouns, and colorful adjectives. Pre-writing, writing, and revising connect a series of events in graphic language with a consistent point of view make sure narration is realistic and captivating through action and story-telling language Suggestions.. Choose an idea that you can develop into a series of events in clear, graphic language. Determine the point of view by considering the different narrations that you will have. Decide on any secondary purpose, such as to amuse, instruct, or persuade, and any mood you want to convey. Decide on a topic sentence that states a general truth or launches the story. Jot down a version of it. List the events of the story you will relate, keeping in mind the point of view. Jot details, impressions, land language that will make the account realistic. Organize the events in chronological order.

 As you write, keep a consistent point of view. Involve the reader through graphic language and clear action. Revise for clarity, vividness, and consistency of points of view.