Explain Your Ideas
You now have strategies to comprehend what you read, apply your prior knowledge, combine your ideas with those of an author, and organize everything to draw conclusions about a reading. Now you can bring all of those skills together to explain your ideas in writing. This page walks you through a writing assignment.
Sometimes, it's difficult to decide how much to explain or how much detail to go into in a paper. Remember that you need to explain the major concepts in your paper and provide clear, accurate information. Your reader should be able to make the necessary connections from one thought or sentence to the next. When you don't, the reader can become confused or frustrated. Make sure you connect the dots and explain how information you present is relevant and how it connects with other ideas.
Time to Write
The purpose of most college essay writing assignments is not for you to find and directly report the information you find. Instead, it's to think about the information you find, come up with your own idea or assertion about your topic, and then provide support that shows why you think that way.
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 OWL, https://owl.excelsior.edu/writing-process/audience-awareness/audience-awareness-writing-for-your-audience/
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