2.7  Learning Activities: Analyzing Text

Finding purpose, pattern, and controlling idea in texts

It’s time to practice. For each of the following texts, identify the organizing pattern or structure and the purpose of the writing. Although these texts are much shorter than texts you will see in prompts or tasks, the organizing patterns or structures are the same as they are for longer texts. Here are the patterns again, organized by purpose. Also identify the controlling idea in each of the examples.

Purpose: Organizing Pattern: Informational    To give information about a topic    explain or give directions    tell what happened   topic-aspect   how-to   true narrative Critical    To persuade, recommend an action    analyze, make a case, prove a point   opinion-reason   thesis-proof Literary    To teach and/or entertain   fictional narrative

One model activity is completed for you. The model text is followed by a prompt or task. Besides identifying the purpose, pattern and controlling idea from the text, the model goes on to show you what a response might look like. The model includes the essay writer’s purpose, choice of organizing pattern, and an outline of a response, starting with a controlling idea.

Model Activity    ( Click for PDF Version )

The Task: Read the selection that follows and then write an essay in which you agree or disagree with the idea proposed in the selection.

The Selection: Homework Scheduling

There should be a schedule of days when different teachers can assign homework. For example, a math teacher might be able to give homework on Tuesdays and Thursdays, while an English teacher might be scheduled for Mondays and Wednesdays.     The reason for the schedule is to avoid the homework overloads we get when all five teachers decide to give a 40-minute assignment on the same day. We can’t work effectively all day in school and all night, too.     The schedule would also allow us to do all of our assignments more carefully. We would almost always have some homework, but it could be done and done well in an hour or so.     Our grades would probably go up and our teachers would be happier because we would actually do the homework.     Please suggest this plan to teachers at your next faculty meeting.

About the Selection:

Purpose:	to persuasive, to make a recommendation
Organizing Pattern:	opinion-reason
Controlling Idea:	There should be a schedule of days when different teachers can assign homework.

About the Response:

Purpose:	persuasive, to agree or disagree with proposal
Organizing Pattern:	opinion-reason
Controlling Idea:	(For a writer that disagrees). Although it seems like a good idea to schedule days when different teachers can assign homework, I disagree with proposal because I think the schedule would soon fall apart.

Note:

What follows is not a complete essay response, but a topic-sentence outline showing you one sentence for each pattern part.

Opinion:	Although it seems like a good idea to schedule days when different teachers can assign homework, I disagree with the proposal because I think the schedule would soon fall apart.
Reason 1:	Since we are on a six-day (A-F) academic schedule now, and Monday isn’t always going to be A-day, it would be hard to keep track of who is and isn’t supposed to give homework.
Reason 2:	Because there are special times (test review, end of the marking period) when teachers feel they have to give homework, they’re going to give it anyway, no matter whose day it is supposed to be.
Recommendation:	Leave well enough alone and don’t make up a complicated schedule that will soon be ignored and forgotten.

Activity 1 – Friendship    ( Click for PDF Version )     Sometimes you have to deal with a friend who wants to be more than a friend. What do you do? You don’t want to hurt your friend’s feelings, but you don’t want to give him or her the wrong idea, either.     You might solve this problem in such a way that you don’t lose your friend. First, avoid being alone with your friend. This will limit opportunities for things to go where you don’t want them to.     Second, actively look for other “matches” for your friend. Introduce your friend to other people he or she might like because of similar interests. Maybe one of the people will catch on.     Finally, if all else fails, tell your friend that you’re not interested in more than a friendship, and that you value the friendship as it is.     If you do this carefully, maybe you can keep the friend. Purpose: Pattern: Controlling Idea: Do your answers look like this one? Click here for suggested response.

Activity 2 – Staying Awake    ( Click for PDF Version )     What would happen to you if you were not allowed to sleep for 10 days? Research on human beings and the importance of sleep has shown that sleep is critically important to your health and well-being.     After three days of being kept awake, the subjects of the experiment started to act strange. They felt anger, sadness, and joy at times when there was nothing to be angry, sad, or joyful about.     After six days, subjects started to see things that weren’t there and to hear noises no one else could hear. In other words, they started to hallucinate.     By the tenth day, subjects showed signs of severe mental illness. The experiment was stopped because more days without sleep might cause permanent harm to the subjects.      Sleep isn’t just a nice idea or a comfortable way to rest; sleep is an absolute need for your physical and mental health. Purpose: Pattern: Controlling Idea: Do your answers look like this one? Click here for suggested response.

Activity 3 – The Giant Squid    ( Click for PDF Version )     The giant squid is a fearsome creature, indeed. It is the villain in many stories of the sea, supposedly pulling people overboard and even sinking entire ship     The giant squid is “dressed” for the part of sea villain, a huge sea villain. It can be 40 feet long. It has eight arms with suction cups and two long tentacles, perhaps 25 or 30 feet long. It uses these arms and tentacles to catch prey and draw it towards a beak-like mouth with strong jaws.     The squid is fast, too. No person can out swim a squid. In fact, many ships, especially sailing ships, can’t outrun a squid.     Ugly, strong, fast, and fearsome—that’s the giant squid. Purpose: Pattern: Controlling Idea: Do your answers look like this one? Click here for suggested response.

Activity 4 – Car Trouble    ( Click for PDF Version )     As he turned the key in the ignition, he heard a soft popping sound from under the hood of the car. The car didn’t start, so he tried again. This time the car did start, but the engine was making a lot of noise. What “started” was a lot more than what he expected.     “That doesn’t sound right,” he thought. “I’d better take a look under the hood and see what’s making that weird noise.” He unlatched the hood and stepped out of the car, leaving the engine running. From the front of the hood, he popped the safety catch on the hood.     A tremendous WHOOSH! of smoke and flame blew out of the car’s engine when the hood was raised enough to feed some oxygen to the fire already underway. The blast of heat knocked him backward into the garage, and the flames shot twenty feet into the air, fed now by the rubber hoses and engine parts and the leaking gasoline.     A neighbor arrived with a home fire extinguisher, but it had no effect on the roaring flames. A passing police officer’s extinguisher was no more effective, and the flames were dangerously close to the garage and the porch of the house.     The fire truck arrived and began pumping water on the fire. Again and again, the fire would be doused by the water, only to start up again from the gasoline on hot engine parts as soon as the water stopped. Finally, the hose was hooked to a hydrant and the car was blasted with water for almost twenty minutes, washing away the gasoline and cooling the entire car so that it could not ignite itself again. Purpose: Pattern: Controlling Idea: Do your answers look like this one? Click here for suggested response.

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