Mini Lesson: Moving from Prompt to Introduction

Mini lesson: Moving from prompt to introduction.

Although works of fiction and nonfiction have significant differences, both often reflect themes that are universal to human life. Many works, for example, focus on a character’s struggles against adversity and ability to remain true to oneself despite these struggles. Choose a character from The Secret Life of Bees and one from Outcasts United and compare how the two characters deal with adversity. Support your discussion with specific references to each text but avoid merely summarizing what happened in each book.

Step one: determine what you need to do to answer the question.

Step two: create a theme sentence for each work you will be discussing. Hint: look at the prompt and see if it gives you any hints.

The Secret Life of Bees is about adversity and the ability to remain true to oneself.

The (character you are discussing) shows that______.

Outcasts United is about adversity and the ability to remain true to oneself.

The (character you are discussing) shows that______. Step three: Relate theme statement to the task you have been assigned in the prompt to create a thesis.

In this case, you were not asked to talk about a device. Instead you have to relate your theme statements to the comparison.

Figure out what they have in common and what they have in opposition. Then complete the template.

Both ______in The Secret Life of Bees and ______in Outcasts United struggle with adversity and the ability to remain true to oneself; however, Kidd shows that ______while St. John reveals that_____. Introduction:

General to specific

Use information from the question to help you make this movement from general to specific quick and painless.

Although works of fiction and nonfiction have significant differences, both often reflect themes that are universal to human life. Many works, for example, focus on a character’s struggles against adversity and ability to remain true to oneself despite these struggles. Choose a character from The Secret Life of Bees and one from Outcasts United and compare how the two characters deal with adversity. Support your discussion with specific references to each text but avoid merely summarizing what happened in each book.

Although works of fiction and nonfiction have significant differences, both often reflect themes that are universal to human life. Lily in The Secret Life of Bees and Luma in Outcasts United, for example, both deal with the struggle against adversity and the ability to remain true to oneself despite these struggles. However, Kidd shows that ______while St. John reveals that ______. Structuring the essay.

Block method Point by Point method

Book A. Points 1,2, and 3 point 1: Book A and B

Book B. Points 1,2,and 3 point 2: Book A and B

Point 3: Book A and B

Point l should focus on the adversity the character faces

Point 2 should focus on a way that the character deals with that adversity

Point 3 should focus on the character’s ability to remain true to oneself while overcoming the adversity.

In order to keep your essay manageable, you need to determine which of these points best supports your thesis and concentrate on it. You may just summarize the others, leaving the text evidence for the point that is your primary emphasis. Be sure that your text evidence supports your thesis.