PURPOSIVE COMMUNICATION

UNIT 3: COMMUNICATION FOR VARIOUS PURPOSES

LESSON 1: CONVEYING MESSEGES THROUGH WRITTEN COMMUNICATION

WRITTEN COMMUNICATION: Writing and Essay

What is an essay? What is it for? And why is it written?

Essays are brief, non-fiction composition that describe, clarify, or analyze a subject. Essay
derives from the French infinitive essayer, “to try” or “to attempt”. In English, essay first meant “a
trial” or “an attempt”, and this is still and alternative meaning.

Consedirations in an essay:
 Who is the writer writing for?
 What is the purpose of writing?

Purpose in writing and essay are the following:

1. To respond
a. To express reaction to a work
2. To interpret
a. To explain possible meanings and analyze the work
3. To evaluate
a. To assess the work’s literary merits; its appeal to different cultures using the
critical sense, and opinions of experts to make judgments about the work

Types of Essays
1. Expository Essay – The function of the expository essay is to explain, or to acquaint your
reader with a body of knowledge. By explaining a topic to the reader, you are
demonstrating your own knowledge.
2. Persuasive Essay – It is an essay used to convince the reader about a particular idea or
topic. Persuasive essay must choose a side, make a case for it, consider the refute
alternative arguments, and prove to the undecided reader that the opinion it presents is
the best one.
3. Informal Essay – It is written mainly for enjoyment. This is not to say that it cannot be
informative or persuasive; however, it is less a formal statement than a relaxed
expression or opinion, observation, humor or pleasure.
4. Review Essay – A review essay may be either formal or informal, depending on the
context. Its goal is to evaluate a work, which implies that the reviewer’s personal opinion
plays a significant role in the process.
5. Literary Essay – It examine and evaluate a work of literature or an aspect of a work of
literature.

Process of Writing an Essay

The essay writing process consists of three main stages:

1. Preparation
2. Writing
3. Revision

1. Preparation 2. Writing 3. Revision

 Define your essay topic You start to create the structure of  Evaluate the overall
your essay: organization
 Do your research and
gather sources  Write the introduction  Revise the content of
each paragraph
 Come up with a thesis  Write the main body,
organized into paragraphs  Proofread your
 Create an essay outline essay or use
 Write the conclusion a Grammar
Checker for language
errors

 Use a plagiarism
checker

WRITING THE ESSAY STRUCTURE

1. Analyze the question

Student essays are responses to specific questions. As an essay must address the question
directly, your first step should be to analyze the question. Make sure you know exactly what is
being asked of you.

Generally, essay questions contain three component parts:

 Content terms: Key concepts that are specific to the task

 Limiting terms: The scope that the topic focuses on
 Directive terms: What you need to do in relation to the content, e.g. discuss, analyze,
define, compare, evaluate.

Example:

Essay Question: “Analyze the effects of using digital learning tools on academic performance
among students, with attention to self-paced learning.”

 Content terms: digital learning tools, academic performance, students, and self-paced
learning
 These are the central ideas that the essay needs to address

 Limiting terms: students and self-paced learning

The scope is limited to students, and the focus is on self-paced learning within digital tools,
excluding other educational levels of teaching methods.

 Directive terms: Analyze

You are asked to break down and examine the relationship between digital learning tools
and academic performance, identifying key components and explaining how and why self-
paced learning influences these outcomes

2. Define your argument

As you plan and prepare to write the essay, you must consider what your argument is going to be.
This means taking an informed position or point of view on the topic presented in the question,
then defining and presenting a specific argument.

Consider this argument statements:

“The integration of digital learning tools in school has a positive impact on academic performance,
as these tools enhance individualized learning, increases engagement, and provide students with
valuable self-regulation skills, despite concerns over potential distractions.”

3. Use evidence, reasoning and scholarship

To convince your audience of your argument, you must use evidence and reasoning, which
involves referring to and evaluating relevant scholarship.

 Evidence provides concrete information to support your claim. It typically consists of

specific examples, facts, quotations, statistics and illustrations.
 Reasoning connects the evidence to your argument. Rather than citing evidence like a
shopping list, you need to evaluate the evidence and show how it supports your
argument.
 Scholarship is used to show how your argument relates to what has been written on the
topic (citing specific works). Scholarship can be used as part of your evidence and
reasoning to support your argument.

4. Organize a coherent essay

An essay has three basic components - introduction, body and conclusion.

Introduction
The purpose of an introduction is to introduce your essay. It typically presents information in the
following order:

 A general statement about the topic that provides context for your argument
 A thesis statement showing your argument. You can use explicit lead-ins, such as ‘This
essay argues that...’
 A ‘road map’ of the essay, telling the reader how it is going to present and develop your
argument.

Example introduction in a question form:

How do digital learning tools influence the academic performance of high school students? As
technology continues to evolve, its role in education has sparked discussions about both its
benefits and potential drawbacks. Digital platforms and self-paced learning tools are
increasingly used in classrooms, offering students more flexibility and access to personalized
learning experiences. But do these tools truly improve academic outcomes, or do they lead to
distractions that hinder learning? This essay will explore whether digital learning tools positively
impact high school students' academic performance by enhancing engagement and fostering
essential self-regulation skills, while also addressing the challenges they may present.

Body
The body of the essay develops and elaborates your argument. It does this by presenting a
reasoned case supported by evidence from relevant scholarship. Its shape corresponds to the
overview that you provided in your introduction.

The body of your essay should be written in paragraphs. Each body paragraph should develop one
main idea that supports your argument

Conclusion
A great conclusion should finish with a memorable or impactful sentence that leaves the reader
with a strong final impression.

What not to include in a conclusion

To make your essay’s conclusion as strong as possible, there are a few things you should avoid.
The most common mistakes are:

 Including new arguments or evidence

Your conclusion should not offer any new material. Your evidence and argumentation
should have been made clear to the reader in the body of the essay.

 Undermining your arguments (e.g. “This is just one approach of many”)

 Using concluding phrases like “To sum up…” or “In conclusion…”

Use the conclusion to briefly restate the main argumentative position and provide a short
summary of the themes discussed. In addition, also consider telling your reader:
  What the significance of your findings, or the implications of your conclusion, might be
 Whether there are other factors which need to be looked at, but which were outside the
scope of the essay
 How your topic links to the wider context (‘bigger picture’) in your discipline.

Do not simply repeat yourself in this section. A conclusion which merely summarizes is repetitive
and reduces the impact of your paper.

5. Write clearly

An essay that makes good, evidence-supported points will only receive a high grade if it is written
clearly. Clarity is produced through careful revision and editing, which can turn a good essay into
an excellent one.

When you edit your essay, try to view it with fresh eyes – almost as if someone else had written it.

Ask yourself the following questions:

Overall structure

 Have you clearly stated your argument in your introduction?

 Does the actual structure correspond to the ‘road map’ set out in your introduction?
 Have you clearly indicated how your main points support your argument?
 Have you clearly signposted the transitions between each of your main points for your
reader?

Paragraphs

 Does each paragraph introduce one main idea?

 Does every sentence in the paragraph support that main idea?
 Does each paragraph display relevant evidence and reasoning?
 Does each paragraph logically follow on from the one before it?

Sentences

 Is each sentence grammatically complete?

 Is the spelling correct?
 Is the link between sentences clear to your readers?
 Have you avoided redundancy and repetition?