1. The Paragraph ¶

A paragraph is a group of sentences where every sentence is about the same topic. There are usually 4 parts to a paragraph: 1. Topic sentence, 2. Support Sentences, 3. Detail or examples, and 4. A concluding sentence. To ensure that a paragraph is consistently about one topic, all writers use a topic sentence to tell the reader what the paragraph is about.

 

1. Topic sentence

A topic sentence consists of two parts: 1. The topic 2. A controlling idea

The topic tells the reader the subject of the paragraph and the controlling idea informs the reader of the main idea of a paragraph.

Note: Writers use the term controlling idea in their topic sentence, but for readers, this is the main idea of the paragraph.

For example, here is a paragraph.

PARAGRAPH 1

Elephants use their trunk in many useful ways. First, their trunk is convenient for watering holes. Elephants can draw water up to their trunk and then release it into their mouths to have a drink. Second, an elephant can use its trunk to eat. Elephants usually break away branches from trees and shrubs with their trunk, and then they feed themselves by directing the food to their mouths. Finally, elephants use their trunks to smell. Elephants raise their trunks high in the air above their heads to smell for water, food, or predators. In these ways, an elephant’s trunk helps them survive.

 

The underlined sentence in the box above is the topic sentence. It contains the topic (elephants) and the controlling idea (use their trunk in many useful ways). This topic sentence tells the reader that this paragraph will only be about the useful ways that an elephant uses its trunk.

Here is the same paragraph again where the topic sentence is found in the last sentence.

PARAGRAPH 2

Have you ever seen an elephant use its trunk? Their trunk is convenient at watering holes because they can draw water up to their trunk and then release it into their mouths to have a drink. Also, an elephant can use its trunk to eat. Elephants usually break away branches from trees and shrubs with their trunk, and then they feed themselves by directing the food to their mouths. Finally, elephants use their trunks to smell. Elephants raise their trunks high in the air above their heads to smell for water, food, or predators. Elephants use their trunk in many useful ways.

 

Although the narrator asks you, the reader, a question, ‘have you ever seen an elephant use its trunk?’, this is not the topic sentence! Rather, the writer has chosen to replace the concluding sentence with a topic sentence and begin with ‘an interest generating question’ followed with Detail and Support Sentences before informing you of the topic sentence at the very end.

1. Support Sentences

Support sentences are called support sentences because they ‘support’ the controlling idea found in the topic sentence. Academic paragraphs usually have at least 3 support sentences because a writer’s work can be deemed ‘weak’ if it is not convincing enough, but 3 properly written support sentences are typically used to prove to readers that their controlling idea in the topic sentence has merit.

In PARAGRAPH 1 below there are 3 support sentences (underlined herein)

Elephants use their trunk in many useful ways. First, their trunk is convenient for watering holes. Elephants can draw water up to their trunk and then release it into their mouths to have a drink. Second, an elephant can use its trunk to eat. Elephants usually break away branches from trees and shrubs, and then they feed themselves by directing the food to their mouths. Finally, elephants use their trunks to smell. Elephants raise their trunks high in the air above their heads to smell for water, food, or predators. In these ways, an elephant’s trunk helps them survive.

 

Elephants use their trunk in many useful ways. First, their trunk is convenient for watering holes. Elephants can draw water up to their trunk and then release it into their mouths to have a drink. Second, an elephant can use its trunk to eat. Elephants usually break away branches from trees and shrubs, and then they feed themselves by directing the food to their mouths. Finally, elephants use their trunks to smell. Elephants raise their trunks high in the air above their heads to smell for water, food, or predators. In these ways, an elephant’s trunk helps them survive.

Notice, too, that each support sentence reflects ‘a useful way’ or the controlling idea found in the topic sentence. Likewise, detail or examples are used to complete the support sentences.

iii.    Detail

Each support sentence is also ‘supported’ by detail. Detail or examples are used to complete the elaboration on the subject which helps ‘round out’ the overall expression of the controlling idea. For example, below, the details that back up the support sentences are underlined.

Elephants use their trunk in many useful ways. First, their trunk is convenient for watering holes. Elephants can draw water up to their trunk and then release it into their mouths to have a drink. Second, an elephant can use its trunk to eat. Elephants usually break away branches from trees and shrubs with their trunk, and then they feed themselves by directing the food to their mouths. Finally, elephants use their trunks to smell. Elephants raise their trunks high in the air above their heads to smell for water, food, or predators. In these ways, an elephant’s trunk helps them survive.

 

You can now see how a proper paragraph is written – Details back up the Support Sentences, and the Support Sentences support the Controlling Idea.

Topic sentence = (Topic + controlling idea)

↓

Support Sentence = supports ↑ the controlling idea

↓

Detail supports = ↑ the Support Sentence

 

It is important that test-takers are able to separate ‘fact’ from ‘opinion’. Below are the typical ways in which ‘fact’ is used to support Supporting Sentences. Opinions have to be sustained by ‘Fact’ or the opinion/argument loses its credibility. In other words, facts are the evidence needed to make an opinion valid, so ‘facts’ remain as ‘truth’ by themselves.

FACT as:

1. Empirical Evidence is usually used in the form of statistics (i.e. 33% of the population, 1/3 of the people etc.).
2. Quotations are usually reported in the first person from the perspective of an expert in the field of the given subject/topic.

iii.                 Examples are used as either: (1) anecdotal evidence or from personal experience – ‘the man that I saw was wearing a mask’ (2) from a common ‘accepted or universal truths’ – ‘nobody is perfect’; ‘people cannot fly’; ‘car drivers have accidents’.

1. Concluding Sentence

The concluding sentence of a paragraph can (1) summarise the main points of the paragraph, or (2) it can be a rewrite of the topic sentence, or (3) it can contain a future-leaning sentence that offers a warning or continued fulfillment. You can use one (1) of these conclusion types to complete your Survey, as in the Email you will write an ‘outcome’, usually.

In the paragraph below, the ‘signal words’, ‘transition words’ or ‘cohesive devices’ are underlined. In the concluding sentence ‘In these ways’ is a prepositional phrase that signals to the reader a ‘summary’ of the ‘usefulness of an elephant’s trunk’ and is followed by a future-leaning statement that this ‘usefulness’ helps the elephant to survive (as we assume it lives in the wildness). So, ‘In these ways’ refers to the 3 ways in which an elephant can use its trunk, which in turn illustrates to the reader how the elephant ‘survives’. Likewise, ‘First’, ‘Second’, and ‘Finally’ all allow for consistent, easy to follow, organized reading, which helps your ‘readability’

Elephants use their trunk in many useful ways. First, their trunk is convenient at watering holes. Elephants can draw water up to their trunk and then release it into their mouths to have a drink. Second, an elephant can use its trunk to eat. Elephants usually break away branches from trees and shrubs with their trunks, and then they feed themselves by directing the food to their mouths. Finally, elephants use their trunks to smell. Elephants raise their trunks high in the air above their heads to smell for water, food, or predators. In these ways, an elephant’s trunk helps them survive.

 

Note: PARAGRAPH 1 and 2 above are basic paragraphs that use all the typical parts of a paragraph.