Writing a Paper… Paragraph by Paragraph

Four Square Writing

Planning Paragraphs

• To help you with your research paper, we will walk through a paper using a completely different topic.

• This is just to show you how you will organize your facts into paragraphs.

• Let’s begin…

Reasons to live in Barbers Hill

• Suppose you are writing a paper to encourage a 6th grader moving to Barbers Hill.

• You would need to think of three reasons he/she would like it here.– The Intermediate School is great.– The city has a new park.– There are a lot of activities to do, like

sports, fine arts, or church groups.

Break each idea into a paragraph.

• Now that you have three topics, you can turn each topic into a paragraph.

• (Do you have your three topics for your paper?)

• Let’s break down the first topic – “The Intermediate School is great”

Step #1: Write a topic sentence.

Barbers Hill Intermediate is a great school for

students.

Step #2: Insert supporting detail sentences.

Barbers Hill Intermediate is a great school for

students.

The teachers at BHI work very hard to teach in interesting ways. They are also kind and fun.

Mr. Kana, the principal loves the students, and even though he is strict, he is also really kind.

The other students are nice. People here treat each other positively without bullying.

Step #3: Add a transition sentence to introduce the next topic (paragraph).

Barbers Hill Intermediate is a great school for

students.

The teachers at BHI work very hard to teach in interesting ways. They are also kind and fun.

Mr. Kana, the principal loves the students, and even though he is strict, he is also really nice.

The other students are really nice. People here treat each other kindly without bullying.

Not only are the schools great, but the city has a brand new park with lots of things to do.

Step #4: Repeat for the other topics.

Topic Sentence:

Supporting detail #1: Supporting detail #2:

Supporting detail #3:

Transition sentence to next paragraph:

Body Paragraph:

Writing the Introduction

• Now that you have the body of your paper basically written, it’s time to move on to the introduction.

• It’s important to build interest in your paper. Your goal is to make your reader to want to keep reading!!!

The Thesis Statement

• The most important sentence in the introduction is your thesis statement.

• It will be the last sentence of your introduction and will include ALL THREE TOPICS of your paper.

• You are basically summarizing your paper in one sentence.

The Thesis Statement, con’t.

• For our example paper, the thesis statement would read:– Barbers Hill offers a great school for 6th

graders, a wonderful new park, and lots of activities to get involved in.

Thesis Sentence – this will be the LAST sentence of your intro.:

Opening sentence – “the hook” Another interesting fact to draw in your reader:

Further information to draw in the reader.

You may or may not use this blank.

Introduction Paragraph:

Writing the Conclusion

• Now that you basically have your paper written, it’s time to wrap things up.

• You will want to start your conclusion with a transition that brings closure to your paper:– As you can see,– In conclusion,– Thus,

Writing the conclusion, con’t.

• At this point, you do not want to add any new information.

• You are simply summarizing your paper – you do this by restating your three main topics.

• After you wrap-up, it is good to end the paper with a personal/reflective sentence.

Writing a conclusion, con’t.

• Personal/reflective sentence ideas:– Give advice, “Now that you know ______,

you should ___________.”– Ask a question, “Wouldn’t you like to

_____________?– Show feeling, “_________________ is

amazing.– Discuss the future, “Perhaps, in the future,

__________________.”

Wrap-up sentence that begins with conclusion transition words – this will be the FIRST sentence of the conclusion.

Continue restating any topics that you haven’t yet mentioned from your first conclusion sentence.

Personal/Reflective sentence.

Conclusion Paragraph: