M4: Properties of a Well-Written Text

• In any piece of writing, the tone should be consistent and identifiable.Good writing includes smart and appropriate word choices and well- crafted sentences. Being a critical reader entails not only the skill to distinguish various text types and patterns of development, and to determine the context in which a text was developed but also the ability to evaluate whether a text is well written. In preparing for a written task, you need to ensure that it is well organized, coherent, and compliant with the rules of grammar. In other words, it should be well-written.
• PROPERTIES OF A WELL-WRITTEN TEXT: organization, coherence and cohesion, language use, mechanics
• Organization serves as the structural framework for writing. It is the logicalprogression and completeness of ideas in a text. An essay, however, may consist of more than a single paragraph. The thesis statement is the controlling idea of a text. It reveals the writer’s opinion or claim about a given topic.

  Parts: Introduction, Body, and Conclusion
• introduction = roadmap
• How to write an introduction?

  1. Get the reader interested in your paperyou have written the paper
  2. Tell the reader what you are writing about
  3. It must explain why the topic is relevant or why (never use “I” in your essay)
• Body

  The organization of the middle of a piece of writing depends on the genre.Narrative story structures include an initiating event, complicating actions that build to a high point, and a resolution. Many narratives also include theprotagonist’s goals and obstacles that must be overcome to achieve these goals
• Conclusion: restate or recap
• Coherence and Cohesion: Effective communication through the written discourse is a process of combining words and sentences into paragraphs, which connect concepts and convey meanings. Types: Collocation, Repetition, Substitution
• Collocation - Words are associated with phrases

  
  

  Example: Arriving safe and sound at the airport is what I have been praying for.

  It should be free and easy to find a coffee bar at the airport lounge
• Repetition: Words or phrases are directly repeated, or synonyms are used.
• Substitution: one linguistic term replaced by a shorter one

  1. personal pronoun
  2. auxillary verb
  3. “so” for a positive clause but “not”for a negative clause
  4. ellipsis
  5. referencing
• Personal Pronoun- substitute for noun phrases in the subject or object clauses.

  
  

  Example: Bill loves the latest gadgets and Bill has two of the latest gadgets.

  Bill loves the latest gadgets and he has two of them
• Auxillary Verb- a replacement for verb phrase

  
  

  Example: Marie indulges in painting and Zorro indulges in painting, too.

  Marie indulges in painting and Zorro does, too
• “so” for a positive clause but “not” for a negative clause

  
  

  Example: “It’s going to be a challenging task!” They say so. (instead of repeating theentire utterance)

  “We wonder if we need to buy another luggage?” Mother said no
• Ellipsis - a part of a sentence is left out

  
  

  Example: My brother is taller than I am.

  My brother is taller than I.

  The children ate jelly and the adults ate bread and cheese.

  The children ate jelly and the adults, bread and cheese
• Referencing - pronouns are used to make references

  
  

  Example:The black horse ran fast, but the white horse ran faster.

  The black horse ran fast, but the white one was faster
• LANGUAGE USE: It is the use of the writing system of code of the language. Any language consists of letters of the alphabet or symbols, sounds assigned to them, and how they are put together to spell out the words and deliver the intended meanings
• Mechanics: It is the term we use to describe the technical aspects of writing, such as spelling, punctuation, and capitalization

  1. Capitalization
  2. Abbreviations
  3. Punctuation marks
  4. Word Spelling
• Capitalization - names of specific people, locations, events, languages, religious, references, course names, titles of articles, books, poems, plays, songs, brochures, and the like

  Examples: Greek literature, Christian, Asian, The Alchemist
• Abbreviations – academic and professional titles, degrees, acronyms, times,and dates.

  Examples: St. Therese, Dr. Wallace, Atty. Enriquez
• Punctuation marks - used to signal the type of statements.

  Examples: comma, colon, semi-colon, apostrophe, parentheses, brackets,hyphens, and dashes
• Word spelling – A well-written text contains no misspelled word/s.