CTYOnline - Crafting the Essay for Bilingual Students

Sample 1st Assignment
Crafting the Essay for Bilingual Students - web-based format

Welcome to Crafting The Essay! We're going to start this course with a lesson on becoming "functionally unfixed," or seeing things in a different light. Thinking about the same old things in exciting new ways is essential to good writing. Why? Because it gives you the opportunity to see the world in a slightly different way than you did before. If you are "functionally unfixed" as a writer, you can help your readers become the same. A synonym for "fixed" is "stuck." Think of deep, viscous mud, so heavy you can hardly lift your foot. Think of prehistoric flies permanently frozen in amber. If you are too fixed as a writer, you will have trouble-- you and your readers will be stuck in the same old rut. On the other hand, think of "unfixed" as a synonym for free. Think of a dragonfly swooping and darting through the air, its wings shining in the sun. Your writing can become that free!

In this lesson, you will experience the process of considering multiple possibilities, ideas, and directions. In the grammar section, you will discover how parts of sentences fit together in different patterns. In the writing section, you will do exercises and play games that will help you become functionally unfixed. Finally, you will combine everything you've learned in your Lesson 1 FWA (Final Writing Assignment): an anthropomorphic essay, written from the point of view of an ordinary object. Please advance to the next page to begin.

You are expected to complete all the readings and exercises for this Lesson. Look at your course schedule for specific due dates.

Exercise 1-- Definitions. Turn in for your instructor to inspect.
Exercise 2-- Sentence Patterns and Parts. Turn in for your instructor's comments.
Exercise 3-- Molly and Ned Game. On your own.
Exercise 4-- C-A-T. Turn in for your instructor's comments.
Lesson 1 FWA (Final Writing Assignment)-- Anthropomorphic Essay. Turn in for your instructor's comments.

In English, as in all languages, people put their words together in predictable patterns. You have probably learned to recognize and use these patterns without thinking about them; you observe the way other people speak and write, and you start doing the same thing. However, if your teachers occasionally write "awkward" or "check grammar" on sentences in your essays, it may mean that there are some gaps in your knowledge. You can improve your ability to write effectively by studying sentence patterns explicitly.

Think of a good sentence as a mosaic. It has different grammatical pieces that you must assemble into a pleasing pattern. Some pieces must always appear in a certain order, while others can be moved around or left out. In order for us to talk about these sentence mosaic pieces, you will need to learn their names. Please advance to the next page for your first exercise.

Exercise 1: Definitions

Use the glossaries of both your textbooks, Grammar Links 2 and Grammar Links 3, to look up each of the words in the list below. Some words will be in one book, and some will be in the other book, but they are all there! Use Microsoft Word or some other word processor to write your definitions. When you have finished, save your document. Then copy and paste your work into a new message in your assignment topic in WebCT. Title the message, "Lesson 1, Exercise 1:Definitions." Preview and post the message.

How to copy and paste: Use your mouse to highlight the text you want to copy. Press CTRL + C on your keyboard. Click with your mouse on the place you want to paste the text. Press CTRL + V.. Once you have finished, advance to the next page.

The glossary of Grammar Links 2 begins on page A-14 (in the Appendix, near the very back of the book).
The glossary of Grammar Links 3 begins on page A-21 (also in the Appendix).

Define these words:

Subject and Predicate
Now that you have defined some of the terms we will use frequently in this course, let's review sentence patterns. You need two things to make a sentence: a subject and a predicate. The subject is the noun or pronoun and any modifiers that describe it; the predicate is the main verb and any modifiers that describe it. The simplest sentences need only a noun or pronoun and a verb:

Predicates can also include an object after the verb, if the verb is transitive (look up this word in your glossary if you don't know it).

Elaine	is buying	persimmons.
Subject	Verb	Direct Object
	Predicate

The mosquitos	sing	me	songs.
Subject	Verb	Direct Object	Indirect Object
	Predicate

Main Noun, Main Verb
Sometimes, a simple, direct sentence is all you need: The aardvark guffawed. Other times, you will want to add extra information to answer what, when, how and where. That's where phrases come in handy-- you can add on the answers to all these questions. No matter how much information you add, there will always be a subject and predicate.

The main noun and verb are the two essential parts of the sentence. Everything else is there to describe them. If you took them away, the sentence couldn't exist. In this example, what is the main noun in the subject? What is the main verb in the predicate? Advance to the next page to check your answer.

There's no limit to how much modifying information you can add to one sentence or clause, but be careful. The more you add, the more complicated the sentence becomes. A long sentence can be a pleasure to read if the writer keeps all the pieces orderly. Remembering the main noun and verb can help keep your sentence well-organized. Put extra information near the noun or verb that it describes.

Hiding in the bushes, the shiny aardvark that Sarah got for her birthday guffawed loudly after lunch on Tuesday.

Now which part is the subject and which is the predicate? To determine the answer, you can mentally break the sentence into phrases:

The phrases that describe the aardvark belong in the subject. The phrases that describe the guffaw belong in the predicate. Looking at this list, you can also identify the main noun and the main verb-- they are the only two pieces that don't describe anything. Even though there other nouns and verbs in the sentence, they all exist to provide extra information. You could take them away and the sentence would still work.

You've just learned to identify the key parts of a declarative sentence, a sentence that simply makes a statement; it doesn't order anyone around or ask any questions. While this is the type of sentence you will be writing most frequently, let's quickly review two other common sentence patterns, the Imperative (also known as Command) and the Question (also known as Interrogative).

In writing, you are most likely to use the Imperative either to give advice to a reader or to quote someone who is giving a command. The type of question you are most likely to use in your writing is rhetorical: one that you don't expect your readers to answer. For example, I might write, "Did my grandmother's lemons actually taste as sweet as lemonade? Or has my memory exagerrated?" Rhetorical questions can direct a reader's attention to an important idea (in this case, the idea that memory is unreliable), but use them sparingly. Too many questions make for stodgy writing. Please advance to the next page.

The Imperative

For an imperative sentence, a subject is unnecessary because it is implied; imagine the author pointing and whispering, "Hey, you!" right before the imperative statement. All that's needed is the predicate. The main verb in an imperative statement is unconjugated; it is never in the past or future form.

Questions in English are formed with auxiliary verbs, also known as helping verbs. These verbs also appear before the main verb in a sentence to help conjugate it. The main auxiliary verbs are:

1. be 2. have 3. do 4. will

Read page A-1 in your Grammar Links 2 textbook to review how the verb be is conjugated and used in questions. For questions about the future, you use the auxiliary will. Other auxiliaries are can, could, may, might, must, should, and would. We won't study these, but you can review page 319 in Grammar Links 2 for more information if you wish.

Basic question form: Question Word + Auxiliary Verb (conjugated) + Subject + Main Verb and Predicate

Instructions: This exercise has two parts. Use Microsoft Word or some other word processor to write your answers. Clearly label each part and number. When you have finished, save your document. Then copy and paste your work into a new message in your assignment topic in WebCT. Title the message, "Lesson 1, Exercise 2: Sentence Patterns and Parts." Preview and post the message.

How to copy and paste: Use your mouse to highlight the text you want to copy. Press CTRL + C on your keyboard. Click with your mouse on the place you want to paste the text. Press CTRL + V.

PART A: For each sentence below, state which type of sentence it is (declarative, imperative, or question). Next, copy and paste the sentences into your document. Then put ten spaces between the subject and the predicate to separate them. Next, put the main noun and the main verb in ALL CAPS. If there is an object, mark it as (D.O.) for direct object or (I.O.) for indirect object. Follow the example below.

Example: The ravenous lizard under the living room couch wants to eat hotdogs.
Answer: Declarative. The ravenous LIZARD under the living room couch WANTS to eat (hotdogs D.O.).

PART B: Use the noun and verb below to write one of each type of sentence.
Sentence 1: Use the noun and verb to write a rhetorical question.
Sentence 2: Use the verb to write an imperative statement.
Sentence 3: Write a long sentence containing extra information. The sentence must be at least 10 words long, and the given words must be the MAIN noun and the MAIN verb.

MAIN NOUN: brother MAIN VERB: swallow

Have fun!

You're probably asking yourself--what does that mean? What is functional fixedness?

Borrowed from psychology, functional fixedness is a term that describes our patterns of perception. These patterns are functional because they help us perform life's simple jobs. Because these patterns help us function smoothly, we use them repeatedly until they become a habit that is fixed.

This lesson is derived from "Molly and Ned: A Party Game" in Writing Instruction for Verbally Talented Youth: The Johns Hopkins Model by Ben Reynolds, Kendra Kopelke and William G. Durden (Rockville, MD: Aspen Systems, 1984).

You probably have a morning routine.

You wake up,
go to the bathroom,
brush your teeth,
wash your face,
put on your robe,
and go to the kitchen to eat breakfast.

Whatever your routine is, you more than likely perform the same simple tasks in the same way every morning. You're functionally fixed in a pattern that helps you get through the morning without too much thought. After all, you're still a little sleepy--you don't want to have to think about what you're doing every morning.

Example: C-A-T

But sometimes that morning routine changes. When you go on vacation or if you go away to camp, you might discover that it takes a couple of days to adapt to the new way of getting up.

You're functionally fixed! You need to get unfixed.

We are also functionally fixed about the way we use language.

For example, when you see

C - A - T (spell the letters one-at-a-time all the way through this lesson)

you probably think of the furry, four-footed mammals kept as pets (Felis domesticus). That's because, in your daily life, most people who say CAT usually mean pet cat.

But, in other peoples' daily lives, CAT might not mean that.

Circus folks and zoo keepers probably think of lions, tigers, and leopards. Sailors might think of a catamaran sailboat, and roadbuilders might think of a Caterpillar® tractor. For each of these groups, CAT has become a different functionally fixed perception.

Depending on our perspectives and backgrounds we can become functionally fixed in differing ways. Functional fixedness, then, can become a habit or rut. Habits can be helpful, but they also prevent us from seeing other possibilities.

Example: Canadian Flag

Here's a visual demonstration of functional fixedness.

When you look at the illustration below, you see the Canadian flag with its stylized maple leaf in the center.

picture of canadian flag

But if you move the maple leaf from the foreground to the background, you will see the profiles of two angry men forehead-to-forehead and shoulder-to-shoulder, shouting at each other.

Do you see them?

canadian flag showing angry men drawn in

Functional fixedness extends to language as well. In the 1960s, a General Motors car called Chevrolet Nova sold well in the U.S. but not in Latin America. The marketing people were functionally fixed on the English meaning of Nova -- a star that suddenly becomes much brighter, not aware that No va in Spanish means "doesn't go."

The object of the game is to guess the rules of the game.
You may ask me questions that I can answer "yes" or "no."

Read the instructions below carefully before you click on the link.

Click for an interactive version of this exercise, then:
Click on 1: Freeing the Writer
Choose voice overs yes or no (no if you are on a dial-up connection).
Put your cursor in the white box beside "Go to Page" and type the number "15"
Click "Go to Page"
When you are finished, click the "Exit" button at the bottom and return to this lesson.

We have trouble discovering the rules because we are functionally fixed about language: we use language as if it only has meaning. But meaning is just the component we use most often.

Becoming functionally unfixed about language is the first step in learning to write well. Meaning, also called content, is only one component of language. The other component is form.

What is form? Simply put, form is every aspect of language except meaning. Let me show you the difference between form and meaning.

Example: Ecclesiastes vs. Orwell

Here are two passages with the same meaning.

Ecclesiastes 9:11 (King James Version of the Bible)

I returned and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.

George Orwell's parody:

Objective consideration of contemporary phenomena compels the conclusion that success or failure in competitive activities exhibits no tendency to be commensurate with innate capacity, but that a considerable element of the unpredictable must invariably be taken into account.

George Orwell, "Politics and the English Language," in Shooting an Elephant and Other Essays, 1946 (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich).

What is different between the Ecclesiastes and Orwell passages? Which do you prefer? Most people will choose Ecclesiastes. They find it more pleasing because of its form. Everything from diction through syntax to figurative language distinguishes the fine prose of Ecclesiastes from Orwell's parody.

(Don't worry if you don't recognize words such as diction and syntax now. You'll learn about them as you go along, and you can always look them up.)

Functionally Unfixed in this Course

Being functionally unfixed -- dropping conventions -- is essential to good writing. This course will teach you how to go beyond the simple use of content. The lessons will show you how to use content and form together.

In Lesson 2, you're going to look at a room you know well with a very different perspective.
In Lesson 4, you'll use organic form to craft elegant sentences.
In Lesson 5, you'll write an essay starting from either the middle or end of a sequence; the assignment's instructions are to turn the essay on its side or head!
In Lesson 7, you'll revise paragraphs to incorporate alliteration and consonance.
In Lesson 8, you'll write from the perspective of a persona.

These are just a few of the things you'll be doing!

C-A-T Quiz

Remember the earlier example of

C - A - T

We discovered 4 different things that people might think when they see

CAT

Now that you're functionally unfixed, can you think of some others? For example, pixels on a screen that form curves and angles.

Prove that you're functionally unfixed by taking this quiz. Jot down the ONE correct answer. Do not choose the ONE correct answer until you have seen all the choices.

C - A - T is:

1.     A word in the English language
2.     A word denoting the furry, four-footed mammals kept as pets (Felis domesticus) and its larger relatives
3.     A word denoting the abbreviation for catamaran sailboat
4.     A word denoting the name for Caterpillar® tractor
5.     Three letters of the alphabet
6.     A word representing a series of phonemes (sounds that are the smallest unit of speech)
7.     A word representing a series of phonemes used to denote the furry, four footed mammals kept as pets (Felis domesticus) and its larger relatives, or the abbreviation for catamaran sailboat, or -- you get the idea
8.     A set of curves and lines
9.     Pixels on a monitor screen
10. All of the above and more

Okay. Choose your answer, then scroll down to see if you are correct.

Compose a list of the different things people might think of when they see the letters

C - A - T

Come up with a minimum of 5 in addition to those we've already talked about. Remember to look at CAT with functionally unfixed eyes.

Turn in your work in the public topic "Lesson 1, Exercise 4-- Post Yours Here!" Title your message with your first and last name (e.g., Harry Potter's List).

Read and, if you wish, comment on the work of your classmates. When you have finished, advance to the next page in this lesson.

Anthropomorphism

Becoming functionally unfixed about language is the first step in learning to write well. When you are functionally unfixed, you are able to play with words and structure, to experiment with voice and style, to surprise yourself and your reader.

For your first writing assignment, I'd like you to experiment with anthropomorphism.

Choose an inanimate object in your room or house. Pretend you are that object and write about 250 to 300 words from the object's point of view. More is definitely okay, if it takes more to reach your goal.

Write from that object's point of view - the first person point of view.

Respond to the assignment until it feels right - you want the reader to feel satisfied at the end of the piece rather than full of unanswered questions.

Have fun with language!

Turn in your essay in your assignment topic in WebCT. Title the message "Lesson 1 FWA."

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