ENGL 1301 Week 4

ENGL 1301 Week 4 | Assignment 1 Help | Central Texas College

Descriptive Essay

Write a 500-750 word essay using description as the chief method of development. Follow the guidelines for formatting as described in Notes on Writing a Descriptive Essay, located above. Make sure that you have viewed the MLA Sample page under Helpful Resources, located to the left of your screen.

Writing Assignment

Purpose: to inform

Method of Development: description

Choose your own topic, but make sure that the topic allows you to be able to describe it. You can choose to describe a place, your favorite piece of clothing, an event, your cell phone, a friend, or something else totally different. If you have something in mind but you are unsure if it will work as a descriptive essay, please send me a message through the Messages link for assistance. 

Reminders

1.      Brainstorm for topics.

2.      Accumulate as many details as you can about your topic, and then sift through them, discarding those that are irrelevant, weak, or unrelated to the impression you would like to convey.

3.      Organize your ideas.

4.      Use vivid language and varied sentence structure.

5.      Remember this is not a narrative. This essay is based on painting a picture for the audience.

6.      Check the syllabus for due dates.

Writing Approach

In this essay assignment, description will be the dominant technique used to develop a distinct impression of your topic. Remember that description must appeal to the senses: taste, touch sound, sight, smell. While you need not appeal to every sense in your essay, be sure to give the reader enough description so that he/she can be a part of your topic’s development.

You may certainly use figurative language in your descriptions – simile, metaphor, personification, etc. In any case, be aware of your audience (your classmates) and your tone. Your choice of words may greatly influence your reader’s impression of your topic. Be careful to present your topic as you would like it to be interpreted.

Complete your assignment using word-processing software such as MS Word 365 (download free software at https://products.office.com/en-us/student?ms.officeurl=getoffice365), LibreOffice (download free software at https://www.libreoffice.org/download), or other per course requirements. Save your file as an .rtf file or .doc to ensure that it can be opened at any computer.

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Students are required to present this first essay to the Writing Lab before submitting them to me for a final grade. They will not be accepted without you first submitting a rough draft to the lab, so plan accordingly.

You must work with the Writing Lab on this essay, and I must receive confirmation from the lab prior to the paper’s submission of your active participation with the lab on the essay’s completion.

Keep in mind that you must allow enough time for feedback (approximately 72 hours) so the rough draft should be submitted to the writing lab by the due date on the syllabus to allow you enough time to make the final changes. Failure to adequately prepare for this requirement will not constitute an excused late submission.

Submit your descriptive essay rough draft to the writing lab as an attachment using your school email address ending in ctcd.edu.

Include my name, Corinne Tatum, the assignment description, and email the rough draft to [email protected].

Please note that any essays submitted through non-CTCD emails will likely be blocked by our security system.   (This includes gmail, hotmail, yahoo, etc.)

Check your school email account for a response within 72 hours.

Enrollment in the lab is not required for essay submission.

Once you receive feedback from the writing lab, make the corrections and submit the final, edited version with the suggestion revisions from the writing lab using the link below.

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Submit your FINAL draft assignment by selecting the Descriptive Essay link, browsing to, and attaching your saved file. Make sure to select SUBMIT. You may view your posting both on this page and under My Grade (available under Tools). Please contact me with any questions or concerns through Messages.