UNGRADED WRITING SAMPLE

Please complete this in-class assignment showing me your best work. This sample is purely for evaluation and in no way affects your grade. This ungraded writing sample allows me to assess your strengths and identify areas where you may need work. This paragraph will also be a draft of your first graded assignment.

ASSIGNMENT: Using vivid details and examples as evidence, prove that someone close you possesses a specific personality trait. Select a parent, child, spouse, partner, best friend, etc. Restrict yourself to one dominant aspect of your subject and be as accurate and honest as possible (you may also be humorous). For example, describe your subject as sloppy, neat, a health freak, organized, overly cautious, obsessed with something, frugal, gregarious, a risk-taker etc. Select one of these or come up with your own adjective or phrase.

• Use ballpoint pen writing on one side only of lined paper.
• Staple a blank cover sheet to your essay with:

Name:

Goo #:

Current Phone #:

• State your claim—the main point of the paragraph—in the topic sentence.
• Restrict yourself to one paragraph of 250 to 300 words (about three pages plus)
• The first challenge is to provide VALID PROOF. This means you need to provide factual details and examples as proof. Give descriptive details as proof (the unmade bed, the alphabetized spices) and for actual examples of behavior, offer enough details to convince the reader that the event or events took place. Give time, place, action, parties involved, and dialogue if pertinent. Provide lots of specifics.

• The second challenge is to observe UNITY. Include only details that are relevant to proving the main point of the paragraph (stated in the topic sentence). If you're using a description of how father mother cleaned his car last Saturday to prove that he is “obsessively neat,” don't include the weather, the state of the lawn, or that the fact that the leather front seat is cracked unless it's relevant to proving your father is neat. Do include how much time he spent, the cost and range of the cleaning products, and the parts of the car he cleaned. Don't use a general claim (“he always does this”), but use an actual example to stand for the general.

When I read your sample, I will be commenting on basic skills as well as quality of proof (examples and details) and unity.