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Essay Rules | Word Choice

Word Choices for Essays

Essay Word Choice

“Why are you using that thesaurus?” asks Lance.

“I need bigger words, so that everyone will see how smart I am,” replies Dawn.

“You are so pretentious,” says Lance.

“Is that a criticism or a compliment?” asks Dawn.

Definition and Examples

Precision (exactness) of meaning, the tone of the writing, and the audience should guide your selection of word choices in an essay. Using a word which doesn’t match what you mean to say or how you want to say it creates confusion for your readers.

Example: The comprehensive solution regarding cake and ice cream for the class party failed to address many of the students’ concerns.

Comprehensive means “thorough and complete” and suggests that nothing else is needed. A solution which failed to “address many of the students’ concerns” would not be comprehensive, so the word choice is imprecise. Also, the word choices, comprehensive, address, and concerns are formal and serious and don’t match the tone of the rest of the sentence with words such as “cake and ice cream” and “class party” and the audience of students preparing for a class party.

Read the rule.

If a simple word means exactly what you want to say and it fits the tone of your writing and your audience, use it. If a technical term or unfamiliar word must be used, define it or build writing context so that it is easily understood.

Practice

Write the following sentences and [bracket] the poor word choices.

  1. She planned to enhance her drawing in the coloring book with a few stickers.
  2. Frances exaggerated how badly she did on the math quiz.
  3. The author suggested adding a mysterious villain and a clown to the children’s cartoon.
  4. The cafeteria lunch included a burrito, fruit, and milk. The fruit was a tragic choice.
  5. The witness statements, DNA, police report, and the defendant’s opinion were convincing.

Revise the poor word choices. Use a dictionary if necessary.

Avoid big words when more utilitarian words would suffice.

Answers

  1. She planned to [enhance] her drawing in the coloring book with a few stickers.
  2. Frances [exaggerated] how badly she did on the math quiz.
  3. The author suggested adding a [mysterious villain] and a clown to the children’s cartoon.
  4. The cafeteria lunch included a burrito, fruit, and milk. The fruit was a [tragic] choice.
  5. The witness statements, DNA, police report, and the defendant’s [opinion] were convincing.

Pennington Publishing's TEACHING ESSAYS BUNDLE

TEACHING ESSAYS BUNDLE

For more essay rules and practice, check out the author’s TEACHING ESSAYS BUNDLE. This curriculum includes 42 essay strategy worksheets corresponding to teach the Common Core State Writing Standards, 8 on-demand writing fluencies, 8 writing process essays (4 argumentative and 4 informative/explanatory), 64  sentence revision and 64 rhetorical stance “openers,” writing posters, and helpful editing resources. 

Differentiate your essay instruction in this comprehensive writing curriculum with remedial writing worksheets, including sentence structure, grammar, thesis statements, errors in reasoning, and transitions.

Plus, get an e-comment bank of 438 prescriptive writing responses with an link to insert into Microsoft Word® for easy e-grading (works great with Google Docs),

Download the following 24 FREE Writing Style Posters to help your students learn the essay rules. Each has a funny or ironic statement (akin to “Let’s eat Grandma) to teach the memorable rule. 

Get the Writing Style Posters FREE Resource:

Grammar/Mechanics, Literacy Centers, Spelling/Vocabulary, Study Skills, Writing , , , , , , , , , , , ,

How to Teach Writing Transitions

Well-intentioned teachers sometimes create more problems than they solve. Teachers often fail to teach developing writers how to use effective writing transitions within or between paragraphs in argumentative, informational/explanatory, or narrative writing (Common Core Writing Standards 1, 2, and 3). Three key instructional practices can lead to counter-productive learning.

How to Teach Writing Transitions

First, many teachers assume that their students understand the meanings of transitional words and phrases. These teachers simply post a Transitions Poster on the classroom wall and assume that their students will grab which ones they need for each writing exercise. Both are faulty assumptions. To use transitions effectively, developing writers must know both the denotative and connotative meanings of commonly used transitions. Using the wrong or imprecise transition create confusion for readers. Developing writers also need to learn which transitions work in each writing context. One helpful solution to this problem is to teach transitions in categories of meaning. Download this helpful Writing Transitions page for instruction and reference.

Another reason some teachers fail to get their students to use effective writing transitions is because teachers tend to focus on teaching writing structure over content. Requiring students to “write a five-paragraph essay with transitions between each sentence and paragraph” will force most students into incoherent writing. Requiring students to use an arbitrary number or placement of transitions within and between paragraphs will result in padded and chunky writing. Some teachers even award points for each transition–not the best motivator for concise and coherent writing. Instead of pitting structure versus content, my advice is to teach flexible writing. Begin students with a structure to paragraphing and multi-paragraph writing, but model, permit, and encourage deviation from the basic structure to fit the needs of the content. Content should always dictate structure.

Finally, teachers sometimes fail to teach their students the two secrets of effective transitions. The first writing rule for argumentative, informational/explanatory, or narrative writing is to “Always continue a new paragraph where the previous one ended.” This continuity helps the readers understand the progression of the writing and is oftentimes a better writing technique than “add-on” transition words and phrases. The second writing rule is to “use repetition, paraphrase, and reference.” Repeating key words or phrases found in preceding sentences or paragraphs unifies the writing and is considerate to the readers. Paraphrasing previous ideas helps the readers see the idea from another point of view and avoids the over-use of irritating repetitions. Reference to previous writing with relative pronouns and adverbs, demonstrative pronouns and adjectives, and well-connected pronouns and antecedents improves writing coherence. However, make sure to teach students not to use references to the writing itself. For example, “In the last paragraph…; This essay was about… That sentence proves that…”

Using effective writing transitions can significantly improve writing coherence and help the reader understand the writing as a unified whole. However, teachers need to emphasize the precise meanings of “add-on” transition words and phrases, avoid over-emphasis of structure over writing content, and teach the value of repetitions, paraphrases, and references.

The author’s TEACHING ESSAYS BUNDLE provides 11 Transition Worksheets, one for each purpose. Each worksheet requires students to identify, select, and apply the

Pennington Publishing's TEACHING ESSAYS BUNDLE

TEACHING ESSAYS BUNDLE

transition words in the context of sentences and paragraphs. Great practice! Check out the free samples below.

Get the Transition Worksheets FREE Resource:

Also, check out Mark Pennington’s articles on writing unity, coherence, and parallelism.

TEACHING ESSAYS BUNDLE includes 42 essay strategy worksheets corresponding to teach the Common Core State Writing Standards, an e-comment bank of 438 prescriptive writing responses with an link to insert into Microsoft Word® for easy e-grading, 8 on-demand writing fluencies, 8 writing process essays (4 argumentative and 4 informative/explanatory), 64  sentence revision and 64 rhetorical stance “openers,” remedial writing lessons, writing posters, and editing resources to differentiate essay writing instruction in this comprehensive writing curriculum.

Literacy Centers, Study Skills, Writing , , , , , ,