Paragraph Writing

Dear students:

To craft a good paragraph or even an essay, there are basically five criteria to be considered:

1. Ideas

One of the most important parts of making a good piece of writing is the ideas. Without ideas, it is almost impossible to produce a written piece. Often it is hard to build up some ideas relating to the topics. You may visit Top 10 Tips for Overcoming The Writer's Block to help stimulate your ideas. To break the ice is always hard, but don't be afraid to start. Once you get started, you may find your ideas unstoppable. Also, there are many ways to generate your ideas, for instance free writing, brainstorming and asking questions. Please browse through this site How to Use Free Writing for detailed information.

2. Structure

A well-structured paragraph could make the story more presentable and interesting. Generally, the structure of a paragraph contains the beginning, the middle, and the end. To be more specific, it should include the topic sentence, the supporting sentences, and concluding sentences. You can visit Paragraph Writing and Paragraph Structure for more details.

Please also note that grabbing the reader's attention is very important in writing. Therefore, we should pay a great attention to the start of the paragraph or the introduction. You may learn about various types of making introductory sentences from Introduction.

Moreover, after reading for a while, most readers tend to forget what they have read. The conclusion part; therefore, play an important role as a summary for the whole paragraph to remind the reader of what they have read. There are many ways to produce a good conclusion. Please visit Writing Your Conclusion for in depth information.

3. Coherence 

A good paragraph should have a good flow with combinations of sentences that logically go together in the same direction. When you read the paragraph, it should make sense to you, and you should understand it clearly. 

There are many ways to make the combination of the sentences flow smoothly. You can find more explanation at Cohesion Strategies: Transitional Words and Phrases and Cohesion Exercises. There are also many other factors to check the coherence. For instance, if it is a story of yourself, the pronoun used should be I and me throughout the paragraph, not we, he/she, or they. Also, the tense should be the same. If you tell the story in the past, the tense should be Past Tense, not Present or Future Tense

4. Unity

There should be only one controlling idea in a paragraph from the start to the end. The supporting ideas should also be in accordance with the main idea. When you write a paragraph, remember to always hang on to the main idea, so that you will not produce off topic sentences. For more detail, please view Paragraph Unity. 

5. Language proficiency

Correct grammars, a variety of vocabularies, and writing abilities are also very prominent parts in making a paragraph well-polished. You may improve your grammar and vocabulary by practicing with my Eight-Week Self Learning Plan.

Please remember that your grammar won't improve overnight, so you have to be patient. Learning English is voluntary. Nobody can force you to do it, but yourself. Keep practicing! You will find your writing skill improving for sure. 

Business Letter in General

Dear students:

There are no strict rules in writing business letters; however, please bare in mind that the letter should be easy to read, concise, and positive. These three components are the keys to effective business writing.

First of all, business letter should be easy to read. The letter format can certainly make the letter easily readable. The receiver will feel pleased to see a neat and well-organized letter. In general, there are four letter formats, but in this course I recommend only two types - Full Block and Modified Block. There are some differences between the two. You may browse through http://www.about.com/ for detailed explanation and examples. This website is also included in my Eight-Week Self Learning Plan on the third week. 

 

Second, the text included in the letter should be concise. The message must be clear, short, and direct to the point. Nobody wants to read a long letter. So, the length should be appropriate - maybe not more than seven lines. The words used should also be simple, vivid, and understandable. Try to avoid fancy words you often use in academic writing. For instance, you may choose "to explain" instead of "to elaborate."

 

Last, the tone of the letter should be positive. This is very important in writing business letters to make the reader wanting to continue reading. If the tone is negative, the reader may stop reading since the introduction paragraph or even the subject line. Therefore, the word choices and the tone are essential to make the letter effective. However, if we cannot avoid using the negative tone such as bad news, we may use several techniques to make the letter stay positive as much as possible by following the buffering and indirect pattern.   

     

In the beginning, you may not feel confident in writing, but practicing can surely help you to become more fluent in producing an effective business letter. For a good start, you may visit Making an Inquiry: Basic Business Letter. Please review the lessons after each class and visit the website I recommended for your self-learning.