2.5  Learning Activities: Analyzing Tasks

Now it is your turn to practice analyzing tasks. Each practice item will ask you to determine the contexts of a task and then ask you to identify the writer's role, audience, subject, purpose, pattern and the controlling (central or main) idea that would guide the writing. You must read every prompt carefully to decide exactly what your job is as a writer. Write down your answers down on your own paper, then click the suggested response link to view an example of an acceptable answer.

Activity 1: Analyzing Literary Tasks    ( Click for PDF Version )

Your Task: Some works of literature make use of foreshadowing, a writer's technique which involves suggesting or giving a hint about what is to happen later in the work. From the novels and short stories you have read, choose one work which involves foreshadowing. Write a well-organized essay which shows how the author uses foreshadowing to suggest later events. Also explain what effect the foreshadowing has on the reader of the work.

Focus Checklist

Writer's Role:	_________________
Audience:	_________________
Subject:	_________________
Purpose:	_________________
Pattern (Form):	_________________
Controlling idea:	_________________

Do your answers look like this one? Click here for suggested response.

Here is the task again with the contexts identified:

Your Task: Some works of literature make use of foreshadowing, a writer's technique which involves suggesting or giving a hint about what is to happen later in the work. From the novels and short stories you have read, choose one work which involves foreshadowing.

    Write a well-organized essay which shows (pattern and use thesis-proof because you must show and interpret) how the author uses foreshadowing to suggest later events. Also explain what effect the foreshadowing has on the reader of the work (two parts).

     Let's use our equation: controlling idea = subject x purpose x point of view. Since the subject has two parts, our controlling idea must show what the foreshadowing is and how it affects the reader.

     Notice that in this task, your role as a writer is just to be a literature student. The audience of this writing is probably your teacher. The task does not need to say, "Pretend you are a literature student and write a letter to your teacher explaining the use of foreshadowing."

     Like many test tasks, this one does not mention a specific person you are to write to. However, it is still important to know that the word choice and style of the writing should be appropriate for a literature class.

     In other words, the writing will be pretty formal. If you read it aloud, it shouldn't sound like you talking to one of your school friends.

     Did you notice that there are two parts to the subject or topic of this writing? A student who explains the foreshadowing but doesn't explain its effect on the reader is only doing 50% of the task. If the student does a brilliant job of completing 50% of the task, do you think the grade for the writing will be passing? If you were hired to wash two cars and you washed only one of them, do you think you'll be paid for both cars?

      Here is a conclusion from a teacher who has read thousands and thousand of essays or responses to tasks: More students get low scores on essays because they do not complete all the parts of the task than because they are unable to complete the task.

     That's right. More students get low scores from incomplete answers than from incorrect answers. This unhappy result should tell you something about the importance of reading and analyzing the task before you get started writing. If you have the wrong idea about a task, you aren't going to write a good response or get a good score. If you are hired to paint someone's house and you only paint half of it, you are not going to get full pay.

     Analyzing the task is so important that we're going to practice it on six more activities. Two will be independent writings, two will be informational, and two will be literary/critical. You will see that informational tasks, like many literary tasks, want you to read one or more texts on the spot and then to write about them.

Learning Activities: Practice with independent, informational, and literary tasks.

Directions:

1. Read each task and fill in the list of contexts that follow it.
   
   
2. Write a controlling idea that fits the subject and purpose of the task. You might need more than one sentence to express a controlling idea. Notice that you can establish a controlling idea in a general way even before you read the texts that might come with a task.

Jot your answers down on your own paper. After you complete an activity, you may click on a button to see a suggested response.

Activity 2: Analyzing Independent Writing Tasks (True narrative task) - Bad Situations Lead to Good    ( Click for PDF Version )

     We have all encountered bad situations in our lives that later turned out to lead to good things. Think of a time when a bad situation later had a good result for you. What bad situation were you in? How did it later have a good result for you? What did you learn from the experience? Write an essay about a bad situation that later turned out to have a good result for you, and tell what you learned from the experience.

Focus Checklist

Writer's Role:	_________________
Audience:	_________________
Subject:	_________________
Purpose:	_________________
Pattern (Form):	_________________
Controlling idea:	_________________

Do your answers look like this one? Click here for suggested response.

Activity 3: Analyzing Persuasive Writing Tasks - Requiring School Uniforms    ( Click for PDF Version )

     Your school is considering requiring all students to wear uniforms to school. Do you think it is a good idea or a bad idea to require all students to wear uniforms? Why or why not? Write an essay persuading your principal to accept your recommendation on whether or not school uniforms should be required.

Focus Checklist

Writer's Role:	_________________
Audience:	_________________
Subject:	_________________
Purpose:	_________________
Pattern (Form):	_________________
Controlling idea:	_________________

Do your answers look like this one? Click here for suggested response.

Activity 4: Informational Household Safety    ( Click for PDF Version )

The Situation: Your technology class is studying common threats to health and safety found in the home. Your job is to write a report for the class in which you explain three common household safety threats and what can be done to make risk from these threats as low as possible.

Your Task: Read the article Hazards in Your Home and choose three common threats to health and safety. For each, explain the nature of the threat, the injury or health problem that could result, and what can be done to avoid or prevent the problem.

Focus Checklist

Writer's Role:	_________________
Audience:	_________________
Subject:	_________________
Purpose:	_________________
Pattern (Form):	_________________
Controlling idea:	_________________

Do your answers look like this one? Click here for suggested response.

Activity 5:Analyzing Informational Tasks - Tropical Rainforests    ( Click for PDF Version )

The Situation: Your science class is studying tropical rainforests and the animals. You have been assigned to write a report on insects that live in tropical rainforests.

Your Task: Read the text that follows and use the facts from it to write a report about insects in tropical rainforests. Write about at least two insects. In your report, be sure to include:

• what these insects look like;
• what they use for food;
• one way in they have adapted to their environment.

Focus Checklist

Writer's Role:	_________________
Audience:	_________________
Subject:	_________________
Purpose:	_________________
Pattern (Form):	_________________
Controlling idea:	_________________

Do your answers look like this one? Click here for suggested response.

Activity 6: Analyzing Literary/Critical Tasks - The Little Prince - The Importance of Setting to a Story    ( Click for PDF Version )

Background: The setting of a story can be as important to the story as the characters. The Little Prince is a story that takes place in the Sahara Desert, 1000 miles from any city.

Your Task: Show how the setting of The Little Prince is important to the story. How does the desert setting allow events to take place and characters to show you what they are like? Do not summarize the plot. Instead, explain how the setting in the Sahara Desert is important by using specific details from the story.

Focus Checklist

Writer's Role:	_________________
Audience:	_________________
Subject:	_________________
Purpose:	_________________
Pattern (Form):	_________________
Controlling idea:	_________________

Do your answers look like this one? Click here for suggested response.

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