Writing On/Off

These writing prompts are followed by text boxes for your input. If you are working online and your instructor has given you the go-ahead, you can e-mail your work to him or her and also to yourself by copying your answers (CTRL-C on most systems) and pasting them (CTRL-V) into an email or text document.


1		Activity 1 Directions: This activity will help familiarize you with how professional writers vary their sentences. Visit any or all of the following sites and find an essay that interests you. The New York Times Magazine The Atlantic Monthly Salon Magazine New Scientist The Smithsonian Note the kinds of sentences the author uses. Does he or she use one more frequently than the others, or is there a good balance?



2		Activity 2 Go to a search engine such as Yahoo! or Lycos, and find some sites about lemons. Read a little bit about lemons, and then write a brief report on them--but use only one kind of sentence. That is, your lemon report should include only simple, compound, or complex sentences. Did you find this activity challenging?

2003 McGraw-Hill Higher Education
Any use is subject to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
McGraw-Hill Higher Education is one of the many fine businesses of The McGraw-Hill Companies.