Teaching Writing: Introductions and Conclusions

[Chrysalis Academy]

How are you teaching your kid to write introductions and conclusions?  Or if you are using a curriculum, do you have one that you feel like does this really well?  We did do the lessons in WWS2, but I still feel like we're struggling with this.  I'm trying to stay away from the "tell us what you are going to say/tell us what you said" model.  But it's frustrating, because I think my dd can write a nice paper, but then the intro/conclusion is just so . . . blah.  If I suggest something specific, she runs with it, but otherwise it kind of seems to devolve into something either too personal or too juvenile ("Imagine yourself" or "I think") both of which can have their place, but certainly shouldn't be the only tool in the toolbox . . . anyway, I could use some advice, suggestions, tips, or resources - even curricula - for working on this skill.  Thanks!

[KeriJ]

This:

http://web.archive.org/web/20130122070655/http://www.kid-friendly-homeschool-curriculum.com/support-files/writeon37.pdf

 

this:

http://jimmiescollage.com/downloads/writing/introduction-paragraph-graphic-organizer.pdf

 

and this:

http://jimmiescollage.com/downloads/writing/conclusion-paragraph-graphic-organizer.pdf

 

:)

[TracyP]

This is a good reminder, because I need help with this as well. Have you looked back through The Writer's Jungle for this? (iirc, you have TWJ) I think I remember liking her suggestions, but it has been awhile.

[Chrysalis Academy]

No, I haven't - thanks for the reminder! Always a good idea to check out the resources you have  :rolleyes:  :auto:

[Chrysalis Academy]

Dang, this teaching writing thing is not for the fainthearted, is it?  It always comes back to adequate preparation - make sure they know what they're talking about before they start writing:  THINK FIRST!!!

 

And then revise, revise, revise. . . . . 

 

It amazes me how much you can get out of one writing assignment if you really dig into it.  We are definitely completing fewer papers this year, but hopefully getting more out of them.  Re-reading TWJ is very helpful.  It always reminds me to slooooowwwww down and keep my eye on the goal, which is helping dd learn to write, not completing one specific writing assignment.

 

ETA: I'd love to talk about this more, if anyone is interested - how do you "work" a paper with your kid after they've written it?

[TracyP]

LOL. I just glanced through TWJ and my big take away was - I need to assign fewer papers, but spend more time with each one. :lol: Page 88 is where she talks about intros. There isn't as much there as I remember, but there is a couple helpful tips.

[lewelma]

My older and I are reading lots and lots of examples, and picking apart the intro and conclusions VERY carefully.  What was done? Can you outline the role of each sentence in creating the whole of the paragraph.  Was it effective?  Why or why not?  How could you change it? What would happen if you dropped out this or that sentence? How does it compare to what else you have seen?  We are getting there very slowly with my older, but it is working. 

 

In contrast, I think the younger has it figured out already. Here is my 10-year old's effort:

 

The dome of the Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore was and still is the largest masonry dome ever constructed.  Also known as Brunelleschi's dome, it most likely sparked the renaissance.  Why did Florence, an unimportant city state in Italy, try to undertake such an amazing task? It all began 200 years earlier.

 

He reads a LOT of National Geographic, and is beginning to write that way.  I definitely think reading in the style you want to write is immensely helpful.

 

Ruth in NZ

[fourisenough]

Is she writing her body paragraphs first? I find this makes it much easier to write robust introductions/conclusions.

[Chrysalis Academy]

Is she writing her body paragraphs first? I find this makes it much easier to write robust introductions/conclusions.

 

Yes, she is.  It always goes better when I let her write her intro & conclusion the next day . . .  otherwise she's tired of writing and they are bad for that reason.  But in general, it's just not something she's practiced enough to get the hang of, I think.

[Chrysalis Academy]

My older and I are reading lots and lots of examples, and picking apart the intro and conclusions VERY carefully.  What was done? Can you outline the role of each sentence in creating the whole of the paragraph.  Was it effective?  Why or why not?  How could you change it? What would happen if you dropped out this or that sentence? How does it compare to what else you have seen?  We are getting there very slowly with my older, but it is working. 

 

In contrast, I think the younger has it figured out already. Here is my 10-year old's effort:

 

The dome of the Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore was and still is the largest masonry dome ever constructed.  Also known as Brunelleschi's dome, it most likely sparked the renaissance.  Why did Florence, an unimportant city state in Italy, try to undertake such an amazing task? It all began 200 years earlier.

 

He reads a LOT of National Geographic, and is beginning to write that way.  I definitely think reading in the style you want to write is immensely helpful.

 

Ruth in NZ

 

Ok, this seems like it would be really helpful.  Are you mostly reading magazine articles, like National Geographic? I need to find some things for us to do this anaylsis with - if anything stands out in your mind as having been particularly user-friendly or effective, I'd love some suggestions.

 

Your 10 year old's introduction is fantastic! I will show it to Shannon.

[Mrs Twain]

We're learning intro and conclusion paragraphs now with IEW SICC-B.  I really like how Andrew Pudewa teaches it. 

 

As for revising:

I sit with my children to edit every paragraph they write.  First we correct the obvious things like spelling or basic grammar problems. 

Next, if they had to use the IEW checklist, we make sure they included everything on that.

Next, I pick maybe two or at most three parts of the paragraph that could be improved.  Perhaps the wording could be better, or a sentence is unclear.  I work with my child to improve those.  However, I don't overdo this part because it would be too discouraging to fix everything in every paragraph. It is not my composition and it doesn't need to sound exactly like the way *I* would write it.

Finally, we find all of the IEW "banned words."  You can make your own list of banned words, such as "say/said, think/thought, go/went" etc.  It is amazing that merely replacing the banned words or else all of the boring verbs vastly improves the composition. 

 

That is basically our editing process.  It seems to me that the editing process has been one of the most valuable exercises we do in writing.

 

[Kareni]

I posted this on the high school board a number of years ago in response to a similar question.

 

 

My daughter is taking a writing the Research Paper class at the local community college. One exercise that the instructor had the class do was to write three different introductory paragraphs to the paper. So, my daughter used a quote to start one and different anecdotes in her other two paragraphs.

One thought -- perhaps you can find a good essay and remove the introduction. Ask your daughter to try to write a few different openings to the essay and then compare her introductions with what the author did. Perhaps dissecting a few introductions in this method might give her some insights into different approaches.

Regards,
Kareni

[lewelma]

Ok, this seems like it would be really helpful.  Are you mostly reading magazine articles, like National Geographic? I need to find some things for us to do this anaylsis with - if anything stands out in your mind as having been particularly user-friendly or effective, I'd love some suggestions.

I also use Scientific American and The Economist, but they are a bit tougher so I choose the easier articles. National Geographic is definitely the best I have found.

 

I also started using The Norton Sampler: Short Essays for Composition. HUGE range of styles in there. But my son is in 8th grade, so might be a bit beyond your dd.

 

But what my ds really finds helpful, which I have just started doing, is finding similar essays to read before he tries to write one. So for example, we have just read the Luminaries (This year's Mann Booker prize winner), and are going to write a literary analysis of the characterization techniques. Well, I don't know how to do that. So I just picked a couple of books that we have read that I know have good characterization, Great Expectations came to mind. I googled characterization of Great Expectations, and found an analysis of each of the characters in Shmoop http://www.shmoop.com/great-expectations/characterization.html. Easy little essay/analysis was written by a different person, we could tell because the styles were so different. But it gave us a really firm feel for *how* to write this kind of essay. And of course how to write an introduction for this kind of essay.  All the introductions were of a different style , so we really studied those given that I was not clear how you actually write an intro for a lit analysis.

 

These essays are casual, but still useful for looking at how to make an essay more interesting to read.  Here are 2 examples, which struck us as taking very different approaches and using different styles:

 

Pip's great expectations are ruined, and he becomes a better man. Miss Havisham's expectations are ruined, and she becomes an "immensely rich and grim lady" who refuses to take off her decaying, tattered wedding gown (7.80)—or to hire a cleaning service......

 

Magwitch—the thief with a heart of gold—never had a chance. His first memory is of stealing turnips (which is just sad—not only does he have to steal food as a kind, but he has to steal turnips), and it never really gets better. He has a rap sheet a mile long; he's been in and out of juvie; and eventually he gets shipped off to Australia, where England used to send its convicts. It's no surprise to anyone that he ends up dying in jail. But what happens in between—well, that is a little surprising. Because he makes a fortune—and he gives it all to the little boy who brought him food years ago on the marsh......

 

 

We just talk talk talk.  I may not be a literary genius, but I know what I like and what I don't like.  And so does he.  So we just try to figure out what works and why.

 

 

Your 10 year old's introduction is fantastic! I will show it to Shannon.

Thanks! I was pleased as punch. He has read Nat Geographic for 30 minutes a day for about a year now.

[PeterPan]

I assume you're working on week 20?  I told my dd to write one body and write all 3 intros and all 3 conclusions.  She was supposed to do that this week, but I don't know if she got it done yet to see how it turned out.  I know she gets the idea, because we already did the analysis of weeks 23 and 24.  Those models were super funky btw.  I think it's definitely a good idea to move on to analyzing and being inspired by something more modern, mercy.  I've intended to head into rhetorical analysis of NYT website articles after WWS, but we haven't done that yet.  The NG idea sounds fun, so I'll have to drag out some and look at them.  :)

[Chrysalis Academy]

I assume you're working on week 20?  I told my dd to write one body and write all 3 intros and all 3 conclusions.  She was supposed to do that this week, but I don't know if she got it done yet to see how it turned out.  I know she gets the idea, because we already did the analysis of weeks 23 and 24.  Those models were super funky btw.  I think it's definitely a good idea to move on to analyzing and being inspired by something more modern, mercy.  I've intended to head into rhetorical analysis of NYT website articles after WWS, but we haven't done that yet.  The NG idea sounds fun, so I'll have to drag out some and look at them.   :)

 

Oh goodness, we haven't made it anywhere near that far in WWS2!  We did a few of the early lessons and remembered why it was a really bad fit for us.  We did do the Intro and Conclusions lessons (Week 6), and I've been really trying to work on that skill in her across-the-curriculum compositions.  The actual assignment she's working on right now is the Ozymandias poetry assignment back in WWS 1,  But it's a general weakness, and I feel like I haven't addressed it very well yet.  I'm also planning on pulling out some NGs and Scientific Americans to look for some good models!

 

It seems clear that the problem with this assignment is that she didn't really understand WWS's discussion of the poem.  So I need to back up and have a discussion about the poem, what it really means, in language she can understand - and then I bet she'll do a lot better writing about it.  :rolleyes:

[PeterPan]

Hmm, but then you'd be saying what I've been saying, that some things really are better with age.  :D

[Chrysalis Academy]

Yeah, we really enjoyed the first WWS poem lesson, on the Bells, but this one has been less inspiring - all the focus on Italian vs English sonnets, and movement, I think it's kind of gotten in the way of enjoying what is at heart a really cool poem, filled with irony . . . I think we're just going to have to back away from the WWS lesson, re-discuss it, and write about it based on that.  I'm having kind of a hard time finding something at her level for poetry - I have found a couple of great things for when she's a little farther along, but still looking for the perfect match to get there.