EXpository Writing

1. EXpository Writing Essays: To Explain

2. Expository • 1st the student must determine if the prompt is asking them to explain or to tell a story! • Expository prompts direct students to explain something. • Example: Write about a place you have been to and that you love. Explain about this special place.

3. Summary of Expository • An expository essay instructs, gives information, or explains something . It also can clarify a process such as making school rules or defining a concept like "beauty." The support in the middle of this essay should provide specific examples or relate an incident to further clarify or explain the topic without straying from the topic. The author is explaining, not arguing or taking a side.

4. Paragraph #1 EXAMPLE Can you imagine something so breathtaking, something so awesome, that it is next to impossible to describe? That’s what I experience when I walk through the tropical rain forests of Panama, Nature’s wonderland where I was born. Amazingly, rainforests are the most exotic places that one can visit! • This is your introduction. Begin with a good "grabber." a question or an exciting statement. • Restate the topic and define it. • Conclude with a transition sentence that leads into the next paragraph.

5. Paragraphs 2,3,4 • These paragraphs are the body of your essay. • Use a transition at the beginning of each paragraph. Try to be different and creative with each one. • In each paragraph you develop one argument, point, or explanations as fully as you can, state the explanation and then expand on it with examples or evidence that supports it. • These are the most important paragraphs in the grading of the State Assessment Test. The judges are looking at how you support the broad statements you make with great details. • Each of these paragraphs needs an introductory sentence and a concluding sentence. • These are the paragraphs where it is important to use spectacular vocabulary to show a good knowledge of words. • A little well placed humor and creativity definitely add to the quality of the paper.

6. Paragraphs 2,3,4 ~ Example To begin with, in the rainforest it is like being under a giant green umbrella. The canopy of the trees that grows high over the understory is an ever-changing kaleidoscope of greens: olive, lime, charteuse, forest and many shades in between. Very little light filters down through the leafy branches, and the rainforest floor remains shady and humid, even on the hottest of days. I enjoy walking barefoot so I can feel the earth and shuffle through the fallen leaves as I admire all of the animals around me. No trip through the rainforest of Panama would be complete without the familiar sights and sounds of the animals that make the jungle their home. Slow-moving, scraggly-furred sloths lie sleeping in the high branches of the eucalyptus tree. A harpy eagle swoops in screeching with his talons poised to pluck one of the sloths from his napping place. Howler monkeys swing from tree to tree, leaping and hooting as they hunt for ripened fruit. Colorful toucans clack their long curved beaks. Clat! Clat! They sit on swaying

7. Paragraphs 2,3,4 ~ Example branches, looking just like they stepped off the front box of Fruit Loops. Flocks of green parrots and scarlet macaws fly overhead, brilliantly screaming their distinctively loud calls. All of these things you can see up overhead, but the rainforest is home to a host of other animals and insects you can see at close range. Green tree snakes, s-shaped, wrap themselves around thin tree trunks, waiting for unsuspecting frogs. Rhinoceros beetles lumber across the humid path, clumsy and comical. Armies of leaf cutter ants carry leaf “umbrellas” over their heads. They march to and fro in ant lines that can stretch for over a mile. Animals are just one thing you can enjoy while listening to the tunes of the rainforest. Soothing sounds of the rain forest are melodic. A waterfall whispers in the background. Rain drip drops from the lacy leaves of a mimosa tree. Ripe fruit swiftly falls to the ground. Peacefulness encompasses you as you listen to the exquisite songs of nature.

8. Paragraph 5 EXAMPLE Even though I am grown now and no longer live there, the rainforest calls to me still, amazingly, breathtaking and stunningly beautiful. If you ever get a chance I would recommend you visit this amazing utopia. The rain forests of Panama are indeed Nature’s wonderland, a place to dream about everyday!! • This is your conclusion. • Restate your topic in words that are different from those in paragraph 1. • Draw a one sentence conclusion. • End with a "zinger" that makes the reader think or smile.

9. Expository Tips! • Keep to the topic. Do not stray or go off on a tangent. • Use great vocabulary. You want to show that you have a good command of words that is above and beyond what the average student your age knows. • Organize yourself well. Never make a statement that you do not back up or support. Develop that support well. • Use transitionssuch as: To begin with, Another amazing thing, etc...  These should be creative transitions. Some of the Information was taken from "Blowing Away the State Writing Assessment Test" by Jane Bell Kiester available through Maupin House Publishing.