How to Write a Paragraph: The Art of Substantive Writing

by Richard Paul, Linda Elder

Though close reading and substantive writing are essential skills for the educated person, they are frequently ignored in education. How to Write a Paragraph applies critical thinking tools to the process of writing to guide students towards developing clear, effective, and meaningful written communication.

As a companion to How to Read a Paragraph, this volume in the Thinker’s Guide Library includes activities to sharpen writing skills and overall reasoning abilities. Readers who work through this guide learn to be clearer, more purposeful, more aware of the assumptions guiding their thoughts, and more substantive in their approach to writing.

As part of the Thinker’s Guide Library, this book advances the mission of the Foundation for Critical Thinking to promote fairminded critical societies through cultivating essential intellectual abilities and virtues across every field of study across world.

Genres: Writing, Philosophy

58 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2003

About the author

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Reviews

[Mohammad · Rating 1 out of 5]

احتمالا کتاب خوبیه، ولی به درد من نمی‌خورد.

[Essareh · Rating 2 out of 5]

دلیل امتیاز پایین بد بودنش نیست؛ انتظار زیادمه.
به‌هرحال پل و الدر از کله‌گنده‌های حوزهٔ تفکر نقادن و انتظار‌ می‌ره ازشون کلی یاد بگیری؛ ولی این تقریباً تکرار مطالب کتاب تفکر انتقادی بود.

اگه دنبال یه کتاب جمع‌وجور برای نکات اصلی نوشتن هستید، احتمالاً مناسبتون خواهد بود.
می‌شه مطالبش رو هم برای نوشتن (متن غیرداستانی/غیرادبی) و هم برای خوندن دقیق و نقادانه به‌کار برد.

کتاب دو بخش نظری و عملی داره. همون‌طوری که پیداست، بخش دوم تمرین‌هاییه برای تثبیت یادگیری. بخش نظری هم خیلی کوتاهه. تقریباً سی‌صفحه‌ست. (البته کل کتاب کمتر از صدصفحه‌ست.)

نکات کلیش اینه که مفاهیم اساسی رشته‌تون رو یادبگیرید؛ اگه توش نظرهای متضاد دارید، نقطه‌های اختلاف نظر رو پیدا کنید. به علوم دیگه ربطش بدید. موقع نوشتن به وضوح توجه کنید؛ دید خواننده رو فراموش نکنید و باهاش در گفتگو باشید. اون‌قدری به مطالب مسلط باشید که بتونید توی یه جملهٔ ساده خلاصه‌ش کنید و به‌شکل‌های دیگه بیانش کنید.

خلاصه برای منی که عشق نوشتن دارم و تفکر نقاد برام جالبه، خوندنش خوب بود؛ ولی چیزی هم دستمو نگرفت.

ممنون که خوندید.💙

۱۳ دی ۱۴۰۳، خونه.

[Christos Antonaros · Rating 4 out of 5]

Satisfying for what it tries to accomplish.

I really liked the exercises and the analysis in various subjects. I will keep it to read again in College!

[منوچهر محور]

کتاب مختصر مفیدی بود. قسمت تئوری اول کتاب خیلی مفید بود چیزهایی بود که می‌دانستم یا نوک زبانم بود و نویسنده برایم شسته رفته نوشته بود. کتاب بیشتر به کار معلم‌ها می‌آید. البته برای یادگیری نوشتن هم خوب است به شرطی که تمرین‌هایش انجام شود نه که فقط خوانده شود. مقدار زیادی ایده برای تنظیم یک سیلابس درسی به من داد.

[David Layton · Rating 4 out of 5]

How to Write a Paragraph might be more accurately titled How to Write a Paraphrase. That aside, this addition to the Thinker's Guide Library from the Foundation for Critical Thinking is a useful tool. Paul and Elder seem to have two audiences in mind: 1) students interested in independent study, and 2) instructors. It works like a textbook, but also like the instructor's guide to a textbook. The book is in two parts: The Theory and The Practice. In The Theory, Paul and Elder provide their reasoning for why college writing is pretty bad, and the theory for how to fix it. Basically, the argument is that to be good, writing must have a purpose and a system. The goal is not to produce elegant writing or flashy writing, but to produce substantive writing. Thus, Paul and Elder spend very little time on rhetorical patterns, figures of speech, or ornamentations in general. Instead, high quality writing to them is writing that conveys substantive ideas and information clearly and unambiguously. In The Practice, Paul and Elder provide several exercises in paraphrasing. These guided practice exercises could work well for the student looking to improve their writing skills, and the exercises could work well for writing instructors to give to students. All of the exercises are variations on the practice of paraphrasing. The assumption seems to be that all writing begins from reading. I would have liked to have seen some exercises on synthesizing (combined paraphrasing to generate new concepts) and on exposition (starting from paraphrase and then developing ideas beyond the original source). For what it is, though, this little volume is quite helpful.

[Tara Brabazon · Rating 2 out of 5]

Warning. Another short 'book.' Further, the first ten pages are strong and useful. The remaining 34 pages provide writing exercises and examples. There were too many of these. While there were some teachable ideas in this book, the concepts and ideas are straight forward.

[Benjamin Anku · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is a very good book. I would recommend it to my buddies.

[Scott Whitney · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. It has given me some great ideas to use with my students. My department head is reading it right now and we should be able to collaborate on new lesson plans which use this information.

[Katie · Rating 5 out of 5]

very clear and helpful!