Expository and Argumentative Essay Writing

This course is designed to help students develop skills in expository and argumentative writing by completing multi-draft essays of varying degrees of complexity. In these essays students develop topics in at least four of these five rhetorical patterns: example, comparison/contrast, classification, process analysis, and cause/effect analysis. The students also write an argumentative essay that demonstrates familiarization with methods of research documentation. During the course, students will utilize the various stages of  the writing process: prewriting, drafting, and revising.

TOPICS

• Course Introduction & Goal Setting ● What is academic writing? ● Exposition, Narration and Persuasion in academic writing ● Writing in context

• The Expository Essay [Foundations] ● Developing an expository topic ● Pre-writing strategies ● Designing the thesis statement

• From thesis to paragraph ● Idea development ● Keeping ideas focused ● Paragraph transitions

• Doing background research for the essay ● Sourcing credible information ● Interpreting and using graphical data ● Preparing the reference page

• Review of expository writing ● Different types of editing ○ Grammar and mechanics ○ Coherence and fluency ○ Evidence and support

• Incorporating tables, diagrams, graphs ● Effective use of graphical information in formal essays ● Analyzing graphical information

• Conceptualizing recommendations/areas for further research ● Providing solutions in the context of the essay ● Pointing out gaps in knowledge

• Review of expository writing ● Final checking of style and content

• Argumentative Writing [Foundations] ● Developing an argumentative thesis ● Argument structure ● Persuasive strategies

• Logic, Truth and Critical thinking ● What is critical thinking? ● Developing healthy skepticism ● Logical reasoning

• Researching rhetorical strategies ● Different types of rhetorical strategies ● Avoiding fallacies in reasoning ● Developing the counter-argument

• Review of persuasive writing ● Reviewing rhetorical strategies ● Fallacy detection ● Refining the counter-argument

• Anecdotes and analogies as rhetorical strategy & Developing a Rebuttal ● Persuasive storytelling in the argumentative essay ● Using strategic concessions ● Countering the counter-argument

• Review of argumentative writing ● Final checking of style and content