Hollywood and History

Essay Writing

The papers you are writing are to be constructed in essay style. I will evaluate in terms of content, analysis and proofreading. Here are some guidelines to assist you:

1. Once you have selected your topic, construct an outline and develop a thesis statement. A thesis is a statement you wish to prove or disprove in your essay. Begin your writing and develop a rough draft and make revisions. Remember an essay begins with an introduction and moves into a body of ideas and ends with a conclusion.

2. Structure: again the essay is based upon the ideas you present. The arguments presented must be presented logically and coherently. Please organize your ideas into fully developed paragraphs. Paragraphs normally consist of several sentences developing a complete idea.

3. Mechanics: check for the proper usage and spelling of words. Also, capitalization and punctuation demand special attention.

4. Make sure you are consistent in verb tenses and their agreement with your nouns. Do not change tenses unless there is a good reason. Single subjects have single verbs and plural ones plural nouns.

5. Pronouns need to be clear in their references. Repeat the noun if in doubt.

6. Write clear crisp sentences. If the sentence becomes too long and unwieldy, scrap it and start over and write a new one.

7. Make sure you know the difference between homonyms: there, their and they’re; too, to, two.

8. It’ s means it is. Its: this is a possessive pronoun. This is the only possessive pronoun that does not take the apostrophe.

9. Use a dictionary to proof read your paper

10. Here are some misused words:

Whether, weather strait, straight

Which, witch where, wear, and were

Knew, new a, an

Know, no

Our, are

The Movie Critique is an essay writing assignment. You will develop an opening paragraph introducing your ideas for this work. First, you remind the reader, me, which you are going to tell the story of the film. Let’s say it’s Amazing Grace. This story is about the life and times of William Wilberforce. You tell me the who, what, where … etc. of this dramatization. This will take you a page or two. Next you will assess the accuracy of the film. You will need to consult some sources. Cite them into the essay (nothing fancy). Tell me where you find accuracy in the history and where you find story telling (non-factual). This is a couple paragraphs. Finally, what would you do to improve the film? It can NOT be perfect. This is a page of ideas. The overall work will take you 4-5 pages. Two pages is too few. You need a solid performance on this work