The document provides information on effective paragraphs, including their purpose, characteristics, and methods of development. It defines a paragraph as a group of sentences relating to the same main idea and lists the typical characteristics as having a topic sentence, unity, organization, and suitable length. The document also outlines several methods for developing paragraphs, including using general to specific examples, providing supporting details, examining a whole and its parts, asking and answering questions, and showing cause and effect relationships.

1. Writing
Effective
Paragraphs

2. “A mind that is
stretched to a new
idea
never returns to its
original dimension”.
-John Dewey

3. “Writing is a form of therapy;
sometimes I wonder how all
those who do not write, compose
or paint can manage to escape
the madness,
the melancholia, the panic fear
which is inherent in the human
situation.”
Graham Greene (1904 –

4. “A great writer creates a
world of his own and his
readers are proud to live in
it. A lesser writer may
entice them in for a
moment, but soon he will
watch them filing out.”
Cyril Connolly (1903 – 1974)

5. Parts of an Essay
1.Introduction
2.Body
3.Conclusion

6. Stages of Writing
1. Pre-writing
2. Drafting/ Writing
3. Editing
4. Rewriting
5. Proofreading

7. Paragraphs
• A paragraph is a group of
sentences that relate to the same
main idea.
• Paragraphs are the building
blocks of all documents.
• Creating coherent and well
developed paragraphs, therefore,
is one of the most important skills
for any writer to learn.

8. The Purpose of Paragraphs
• It aims to aid in communicating
ideas by setting off the single topic
which is developed or by providing
clear distinctions between separate
parts of a
longer composition.
• Good paraphrasing is essential for
clarity and effectiveness.

9. Characteristics of a Paragraph
1. It contains a topic sentence,
expressed or implied.
2. contains a body of thought
3. Unified
4. Organized
5. Well proportion
6. Suitable length
7. contains transitional aid
8. mechanically correct

10. 1. UNITY
• Oneness
• Each idea in the paragraph
should clearly support the
“one main point” – the
topic sentence.

11. Sample 1
My most frustrating job was cooking for a
local fast food restaurant during my junior
year in high school. No matter how hard I
tried, I never could cook what the menu said
because the food company always delivered
the wrong food or brought it late. I also was
frustrated because I had trouble estimating
how much food to cook. Many times we ran
short of hamburgers or had to throw away
pounds and pounds of French fries.

12. Sometimes we ate the extra French fries,
though, and we’d sit around, joking and
having a good time. The worst thing,
however, was the condition of my clothes
after the meal was over. Even if I hadn’t
spilled anything (and I usually had spilled
some kind of sauce), my clothes smelled
awful. I’d want to go home to change before
going any place else. Some of the managers
also spilled food and wanted to change, too.
No wonder, then, I thought cooking in a fast
food restaurant was
frustrating.

13. Revised
My most frustrating job was cooking for
a local fast food restaurant during my
junior year in high school. No matter
how hard I tried, I never could cook
what the menu said
because the food company always
delivered the wrong food or brought it
late. I also was frustrated because I had
trouble estimating how much food to
cook. Many times we ran

14. short of hamburgers or had to throw
away pounds and pounds of French fries.
The worst thing, however, was the
condition of my clothes after the meal was
over. Even if I hadn’t spilled anything (and
I usually had spilled some kind of sauce),
my clothes smelled awful. I’d want to go
home to change before going any place
else. No wonder, then, I thought cooking
in a fast food restaurant was frustrating.

15. • Topic Sentence:
My job as cook was frustrating.
• Support:
Wrong food was delivered.
• Support
I had trouble estimating amounts.
• Support:
My clothes were messy.
• Conclusion:
Therefore, my job as cook was
frustrating.

16. Order: Method of Development
A. General to Particular (Deductive)
• moving from a generalization to
specific ideas that support it
• generalizations should be supported
with examples with illustrations and
examples.

17. I assume that man is a religious animal in an
anthropological sense. That is, just as men do
not exist except in a social setting, so also
men do not exist with out religion. To describe
the phenomenon of man requires describing
the phenomenon of religion. Even though this
assumption cannot be completely verified,
archeological evidence is quite eloquent. All
known cultures have contained religious
institutions. Most of them have placed religion
at the heart of all other institutions.

18. Moreover, the further we dig back
through time, the closer we come to the
dividing line between true man and
man-like predecessors. One of true
man distinguishing marks is that he
buries, or otherwise provides for his
dead, evincing a concern for the
mysteries of life and death. I find it
ultimately impossible to account for the
care of the dead without hypothesizing
the presence of at least rudimentary
religious beliefs.

19. • Note:
– The author inferred his
assumption that “man is a
religious animal” by citing
evidences from anthropological
findings which are verifiable.

20. b. Development by
details
• Provide details to support the topic
sentence
• Your main purpose in providing
details is to make your
generalization
specific and concrete

21. Between roughly 1590 and 1690, a
host of geniuses, attracted by the
scientific method, produced
a flowering of research scarcely
equaled in any 100 – year period.
Among them, in addition to Galileo,
Kepler, and Newton, were such
giants as Bacon, Boylem
Van Leeuwenhok, Huygens,
Descartes, Harvey, Halley,
and Hooke.

22. The key nature of their role in laying
the foundation of science may be
judge from a partial list
of basic scientific tools associated with
their names: the horse-shoe magnet,
the thermometer, the
chronometer, the diverging lens, the
reflecting telescope, the micro caliper,
the spring balance and the
graph.

23. • Note how the accumulation of
details made the general idea
more specific by enumerating
the “host of geniuses” and by
showing how the “produced a
flowering research.”

24. c. Whole to
parts
• Beginning with a holistic view
then divide the whole into
meaningful groups
• looking at the big picture then to
the individual pieces

25. d. Questions to
Answers
• Asking questions can be an
effective way of generating
ideas.
• questions are given for a more
organized way of supporting
the topic sentence

26. e. Effect/Cause
• Shows the reader the relationship
between something that happens
and its consequences, or between
actions and results.
• Can be informative and insightful

27. e. Effect/Cause
• You can state that the effect is true
and examine the cause in detail.
• You can state that the cause is
true and examine the effect in
detail.
• You can show that the entire
cause effect statement is true.

28. The life sciences concern the study of plants and
animals. The study of living things began because
of early man’s concern for his health. He studied,
herbs for their medicinal value and as a
consequence learned certain things about his
body from his primitive attempts at therapy. The
Greeks took this simple body of knowledge and
vastly enlarged on it. Aristotle’s speculation about
natural things let him pioneer in botany, zoology,
and embryology . Then, the development of the
microscope led to microbiology, which later gave
rise to histology, the study of tissues, and cytology,
the study of cells.

29. • Note:
The cause “early man’s
concern for his health” had led
to the development of the life
sciences.
From the cause given, there
was a reaction of results.

30. f. Definition
• aims to answer the
questions “What is it? Or
What do you mean?”

31. Mathematics is the study of numbers
and shapes. All mathematics has
branched from two main trucks:
arithmetic and geometry, or the art of
computing and the science of shapes
and size. The first was used by the
ancient peoples in record keeping;
the second was utilized in
construction, surveying and mapping
the
stars.

32. The Greeks developed these two trunks,
merged them and fashioned from the
number theory, analysis,
trigonometry, and algebra. They also
invented a method of thought logic and
applied it to geometry to calculate the way
a falling body accelerates. Newton and
Leibnitz later separately invented calculus,
another branch of mathematics. In present
century, information theory has helped to
program electronic computers.

33. presenting a sequence of events in
chronological order
describing the spatial relationship between
items in the same place