Seeing Both Sides of an Argument

It's important to be able to see both sides of an issue, even if you cannot imagine sympathizing with your opposition's viewpoint. This may be easier or harder based on how you feel about an issue. It’s relatively easy to understand someone’s position if you are dispassionate about an issue, but take a topic you are passionate about and it gets exponentially harder. Yet it’s important to understand both sides of an issue for conflict resolution or to support your position more effectively.

• Using a conflict from your own life, state your position on an argument you have with someone.
• Then, list three of the best points you have that support why your position is correct or valid.
• Next, think of three points your opposition would make on why he is right in the matter.
• Last, refute your opposition’s points.

You will likely need to brainstorm for this assignment!

Transitional Words & Phrases

• First, using the transitional words and phrases handout, add at least 4 transitional words and phrases to the following paragraph and repost:

One reason people lie is to achieve personal power. Achieving personal power is helpful for someone who pretends to be more confident than he really is. One of my friends threw a party at his house last month. He asked me to come to his party and bring a date. I didn’t have a girlfriend. One of my other friends, who had a date to go to the party with, asked me about my date. I didn’t want to be embarrassed, so I claimed that I had a lot of work to do. I said I could easily find a date even better than his if I wanted to. I also told him that his date was ugly. I achieved power to help me feel confident. I embarrassed my friend and his date. This lie helped me at the time, since then it has made me look down on myself.

• Next, also using the handout, write one paragraph on the topic of your choice of at least 6 sentences that incorperates 4 transitional phrases and/or words and post online.
• Last, when you are finished, look at your essay and incorperate some of these phrases and words into it in preparation for draft 3 to make your ideas flow more smoothly into each other.

Some suggestions for your paragraph topics:

• Registering for classes
• Getting to school in the morning
• Any "how to" instructions: ex: How to ask for a date or How to ask for a raise

Caveat: Using first, next and last should be avoided for this assignment. Also, please do not take any "shortcuts" such as modifying existing writing unless it is your own as this will not have the same impact upon your writing skills.

Exemplification Essay PowerPoint Pres

View this presentation on Exemplification Essays to refresh yourself on our discussion from last week.

Topic Sentences & Paragraphs

Write 3 paragraphs about the classmate you interview. Be sure there is a topic sentence for each paragraph and supporting details that support the topic sentence.

When writing a paragraph about a person, the topic sentence includes the person's name, and the idea is the concept communicated about the person. For example, fill in any one of the blanks below and create different topic sentence that may be used in a paragraph describing a person.

John Smith enjoys ________________________________
John Smith hates _________________________________
John Smith loves __________________________________
John Smith works _________________________________
John Smith plays _________________________________
John Smith makes ________________________________
John Smith builds _________________________________
John Smith expects _______________________________
John Smith provides _______________________________

Write a summarizing topic sentence for each of three paragraphs of your choice. In the sentence, state the classmates' full name and describe the singular focused idea that the paragraph will develop. Then, draft a paragraph using the supporting details below:

Supporting Details

The supporting details are the remaining sentences of the paragraph, after the topic sentence. There are usually between 7 to 10 sentences that explain and develop the main idea or topic.
Some techniques used to develop a paragraph and provide supporting details include:

• Using examples and illustrations,
• Citing data (facts, statistics, evidence, details, and others),
• Examining testimony (what other people say such as quotes and paraphrases),
• Using an anecdote or story,
• Defining terms in the paragraph,
• Comparing and contrasting two ideas or items,
• Evaluating causes and reasons,
• Examining effects and consequences,
• Analyzing the topic,
• Offering a chronology of an event (time segments).

Weak vs Strong Thesis Statements

Weak vs Strong Thesis statements: Presentation

Taken from this PDF: Thesis Exercise

30 Things to Stop Doing to Yourself

30 Things to Stop Doing to Yourself

Take a look-- we can all make positive changes, right?

Thesis Statements

View this presentation on Writing a Thesis Statement. Draft and post three of your own thesis statements based on the notes we made during our brainstorming session on Monday.

Note: The examples you will be viewing are based on literature, but the essence of technique remains the same.