hspa expository essay writing prompts

hspa expository essay writing prompts

Effective Strategies for Responding to HSPA Expository Essay Writing Prompts

1. Introduction to Expository Essay Writing Prompts

Each paragraph should contain relevant supporting strategies, evidence, and transitions. To show the argument and ideas together, it is necessary for a thesis to be completed. Students are asked by teachers to describe, illustrate, explain, or clarify a particular topic in an expository essay. Expository essays can be structured around these thematic points. The cause and effect of a subject can also be discussed in a chronological manner. You must be persuasive if you are asked to write an expository essay. You cannot state things and hope that the reader understands the relevance of the subject or the argument.

Expository writing asks students to provide an argument with evidence, as opposed to expository writing in which they explain what they’ve been taught in an academic setting. Expository essay writing prompts often ask students to think critically about a particular topic. To provide accurate information, students should keep up with their readers’ needs while preparing the expository essay. A thoughtful introduction sets a tone for the whole paper and grabs the readers’ attention. An expository essay contains three main sections that should include detailed support for the thesis in the form of evidence.

2. Analyzing and Understanding HSPA Expository Essay Prompts

“… a Reason to Persuade Someone” – You are being asked to present a persuasive argument. Even though it is usually best to present several key points to support your main idea, you probably won’t have enough space to persuade someone of something too complex. You should, however, be able to simply outline a basic approach to persuasion. Be sure to follow that outline with a specific example. Remember, an essay prompt like the one above is not concerned with whether your persuasion argument is entirely correct. It is concerned with your ability to write well. You can take a position that you don’t actually believe in, as long as it makes a good argument. However, be warned that you won’t be able to give specific examples from experience which help to better inform and support the clarity of your writing.

Expository writing requires you to describe, explain, define, or otherwise inform your reader about a specific subject. In New Jersey’s HSPA exam, you will be given an expository essay prompt. The prompt is what you, the writer, must answer since it is the question you must address as you write in your essay. The following is a sample HSPA essay prompt for an expository essay: “Explain a way to persuade someone to think the way you do.” Let’s look at the specifics of this prompt: “Explain” – The prompt is asking for an expository essay. This means you should be writing in the third person. You should be using a formal and objective approach and should avoid all personal pronouns.

3. Developing a Strong Thesis Statement and Outline

A strong thesis statement provides an overarching theme in which to measure the importance or relevance of each idea located at the end of an expository introduction. It declares a position on a topic supported by evidence. Then, the thesis will analyze the prompt and suggest the kind of paper that is needed. For example, the prompt should be examined to determine if the essay addresses convincing, informative, descriptive, problem and solution, or cause and effect. This helps not only to choose the best possible rhetorical mode but also to target the audience for whom the article is written.

Developing a strong thesis statement in an expository essay is essential because it is your guarantee of a strong, structured, and logically connected paper. A good organization is achieved by creating an outline based on your thesis. An outline helps you express your ideas as logically flowing from one section to another and proves that your paper is constructed coherently. Statements about how and why the second or third supporting idea is developed into a body paragraph help create a perfect logical structure. When a thesis statement is effective, the body paragraphs contain supporting topic sentences that elaborate on the thesis. Then, you logically proceed through the paragraphs’ supporting sentences that prove or discuss the topic sentences in the paragraphs. By maintaining the flow and the stream of developing subtopics and details, the logical progression of the essay to effectively express your intentions is achieved.

4. Crafting a Coherent and Well-Structured Essay

The #2 problems in specific detail: The huge problem with this essay is that its thesis is confused, ill-defined, and generally unsupported. It is engaged in an unusual struggle to compete. Although the writer is willing to assert that the essay maintains the movie as the thesis, this is not enough. The need for change in the paragraph is to be less inconsistent. If it were consistent, it would surely support the original thesis. Of course, this suggestion is pointless without the added line about Bernadette, yet it contains some sort of application to the movie, some help to allow the reports to fall, as would be helpful.

The nature of the prompt: The essay question is not at all ambiguous. It directly challenges the writer to integrate the images in the movie into the main thesis of the paragraph. This paragraph does not contain a central focus, nor do its central ideas support and develop the thesis. Instead, it contains a series of instructions presented in a superficial manner. As a result, the paragraph is unclear and generally incoherent.

The #2 analysis: The second paragraph is very weak. It is disorganized and generally underdeveloped. Primarily, it does not directly address the writing task. The assertion/thesis is awkward and not convincing. The diction is frequently imprecise and the sentence structure is repetitive or wordy.

The #2 revision was written more hastily than the rest of the essay, in a totally different mood. Clearly, just as the family in the movie finds, it is necessary for errors to enter our lives in order for us to truly respect our abilities. In acceptance, we also cease to berate ourselves.

The question #2 paragraph urges the reader to allow errors to remain a part of our lives, integrating references to the movie “The Visits” and the end of the paragraph.

Effective strategies for responding to HSPA expository essay writing prompts: Crafting a coherent and well-structured essay.

5. Revising and Editing Techniques for Expository Essays

*Group work: Peer and teacher conferences. Until they have enough good quality papers to use as a model, students will need to know what is expected of them. After they have written several rough drafts, it is helpful to use one student’s paper as a model and have them involved in the revision and editing process. Using the essay as a group, students can share positive as well as negative feedback – what the writer has done well and what he/she can be commended for. They commend the thoughtfulness of the open and close, good use of examples to explain points, and careful proofreading and the specific formatting errors.

Most expository essays are thoroughly revised and edited. Writing that is machine-like and does not include varied sentence structures, precise language, or a personal view or reflection of the author is problematic. Words and ideas that generalize or offer vague descriptions set an unpolished tone. Expository essays must have an organized structure, have few if any errors, and include a variety of sentence structures. This list of strategies is designed to assist the thoughtful revision that reinforces student strengths, sets clear expectations (for the teacher as well as the student), and helps students understand honest, supportive writing feedback.