tailieunhanh - Developing writting skills 2 part 6

This book which covers all the 4 types and is intended for students of the English Depaitnient upper intermediate level/ at Yerevan State Linguistic University after , is the logical continuation of the one published m 2004, which dealt with topics ranging from sentence structure to paragraph writing, from linking paragraphs together to drafting essays. | get the reader s attention. Unless you get the reader s attention the rest of the essay is wasted. Therefore to write an interesting and effective introduction first it is important to write a few sentences that draw the reader into the topic of your essay and then present the argument through a thesis statement that contains the topic and the ideas to be developed. There are a number of different ways to grab your reader s attention when writing an introductory paragraph. 1. You may want to tell a story. Stories are an interesting way to appeal to the reader s curiosity. They should be brief and related to the main idea the thesis statement . They can be your personal stories or something you read or heard about. 2. You could start by describing a situation or an incident. The reader can relate to situations or incidents that illustrate clearly your point of view. They serve as examples and help the reader recognize the problem more readily. 3. You might use facts and statistics. However it is important to use facts or statistics that startle the reader because he or she does not expect this kind of information and the facts or statistics must be from a credible source. 4. You could ask one or more questions. You may want the reader to think about possible answers or may want to answer those questions yourself. 5. You may want to use quotations. This is another way to attract your reader s attention. Quoting someone famous using a proverb a favorite expression or a slogan is expressing your ideas through someone else s voice. 6. You may challenge a widely held assumption or opinion or you may open with a paradox an apparent contradiction . 50 7. No matter which approach you take make sure that your introductory sentences are related to the thesis statement. It is not a good idea to have a great gap between these two parts. Therefore having a transition sentence to connect the two parts is very useful it brings them close together. In summary an introduction .