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Essay Basics- Let's Practice

Site: Saylor Academy
Course: ESL003: Upper-Intermediate English as a Second Language
Book: Essay Basics- Let's Practice
Printed by: Guest user
Date: Thursday, 3 April 2025, 10:55 PM

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Table of contents

Activity 1: Essay Structure




The activities below allow you to find out how well you understand the basic parts of an essay, thesis statements, and different organizational patterns. If you have a difficult time recognizing these elements, you may return to review the information in the Let's Study section and then try these practice activities again.

Source: Timothy Krause, https://openoregon.pressbooks.pub/synthesis/chapter/3-4-composition-basic-essay-structure/
Creative Commons License This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 License.

Activity 2: Thesis Statement

Source: Emily Cramer, https://ecampusontario.pressbooks.pub/gccomm/chapter/thesisstatements/
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Activity 4: Thesis Statement

Source: Excelsior Online Writing Lab, https://owl.excelsior.edu/research/thesis-or-focus/thesis-or-focus-thesis-statement-activity/
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Activity 5: Essay Structure Example

Put the paragraphs in order by dragging the numbers to the boxes by the paragraphs in the order they should be in for a traditional structure essay.

Source: Excelsior Online Writing Lab, https://owl.excelsior.edu/writing-process/essay-writing/essay-writing-traditional-structure-activity/
Creative Commons License This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Activity 6: Expository Essays

Source: Brenna Clarke Gray, https://studio.libretexts.org/h5p/10688
Creative Commons License This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 License.

Activity 7: Transitions

Place the transitional words or phrases into the blanks where they work most logically into the paragraphs.

Source: Susan Last , https://opentextbc.ca/technicalwritingh5p/chapter/transitional-words-and-phrases-for-university-writing/
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Activity 8: Audience

Consider the two paragraphs and decide the intended audience for each.

Exercise 1 

Last Saturday, I volunteered at a local hospital. The visit was fun and rewarding. I even learned how to do cardiopulmonary resuscitation, or CPR. Unfortunately, I think caught a cold from one of the patients. This week, I will rest in bed and drink plenty of clear fluids. I hope I am well by next Saturday to volunteer again.


Exercise 2

OMG! You won't believe this! My advisor forced me to do my community service hours at this hospital all weekend! We learned CPR but we did it on dummies, not even real peeps. And some kid sneezed on me and got me sick! I was so bored and sniffling all weekend; I hope I don’t have to go back next week. I def do NOT want to miss the basketball tournament!

Source: Libre Texts, https://human.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Composition/Introductory_Composition/Writing_for_Success_(1st_Canadian_Edition)/4%3A_What_Are_You_Writing_to_Whom_and_How/4.10%3A_Purpose_Audience_Tone_and_Content
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Answer key

  1. author's parents; 
  2. author's classmates

Activity 9: Fact vs. Opinion vs. Mix

Determine whether the following sentences are facts, opinions, or a mixture of facts and opinions.

  1. The death penalty should be abolished because it's just too expensive.
  2. Bruce Springsteen wrote "Thunder Road," a classic song of escape.
  3. My car, which has only 10,000 miles on the odometer, will last another six years.
  4. A city in beautiful north Florida, Tallahassee is the state's capital.

Source: Libre Texts, https://human.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Composition/Introductory_Composition/Book%3A_The_Roadrunners_Guide_to_English_(Crisp_et_al.)/07%3A_Practice_Exercises/7.03%3A_Fact_and_Opinion
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Answer key

  1. opinion;
  2. fact; 
  3. mixed fact & opinion; 
  4. mixed fact & opinion.

Activity 10: Connotations: What's the difference?

Which of the sentences in each pair have a positive, negative, or neutral connotation? List at least two words that helped you select an answer.

  • The media were swarming around the pileup on the expressway to capture every conceivable injury for the evening news.
  • The journalists were on the scene at the expressway crash to document the incident for the evening news.
  • Photographers stood patiently along the walkway, awaiting the arrival of the Oscar nominees.
  • The paparazzi lined the walkway anxiously poised to snap the Oscar nominees.

Source: Libre Texts, https://human.libretexts.org/Courses/Community_College_of_Allegheny_County/Book%3A_Reading_and_Writing_for_Learning/09%3A__Academic_Literacy-_Communication_(week_9)/9.01%3A_Author%27s_Purpose_and_Tone___Language_Devices/9.1.03%3A_Connotations_vs._Denotations
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Answer key

1 = negative (swarming/pileup/capture/injury);

2 = neutral (journalist/scene/document/incident);

3 = neutral (photographers/patiently/awaiting);

4 = negative(paparazzi/lined/anxiously poised).

Activity 11: Inferencing

Read this passage and then respond to the questions. Each question will ask you to make a logical inference based on textual details.

Exercise 1 

Read this passage and then respond to the questions. Each question will ask you to make a logical inference based on textual details. 

Kadijah looked in the mirror at the bright red pustule on her nose. She poked at it carefully, afraid that it might burst on her dress. It was large and painful. The more she prodded it, the larger it got. This is not how it was supposed to go! Kadijah thought to herself. Then she began crying. Her mother yelled up the stairs, "Kadijah! Abdul is here!" This news made Kadijah even more distraught. Now her makeup was running and just as she feared, some of it got on her dress. "Why me? Why today?" Kadijah lamented to herself between sobs and gasps.



Exercise 2

Read this passage and then respond to the questions. You will also draw a conclusion based on textual details and explain your answer by referencing the text.

Jack squinted as he tried to see through the holes in the ski mask. He could make out the large bag on the counter. The frightened woman who put it there now had both hands raised. As he took the bag off of the counter, Jack tipped an imaginary hat to the woman. The jest did not brighten her demeanor. Jack exited the first set of doors but stopped in the vestibule. Soon the windows of the building flickered with blue and red lights. Jack hurriedly walked back into the building.

Source: Excelsior Online Writing Lab, https://owl.excelsior.edu/writing-process/audience-awareness/audience-awareness-writing-for-your-audience/
Creative Commons License This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.