Assignment – An Informative (and Surprising) Essay
Option A: Short Informative Report
Write a short informative report (4 to 8 pages) based on data you
have gathered from observations, interviews, and/or your own
questionnaire. Aim your paper at readers of a popular magazine or
newspaper. The introduction of your paper should engage your
readers’ interest in your question. The body of the paper should
present your results (which in many cases can also be displayed in a
table or graph as well as in prose).
Option B: Informative Paper Using Surprising Reversal
Write a short informative essay (4 to 8 pages) following the
surprising-reversal pattern. Choose a topic about which you are
reasonably informed, and imagine an audience of readers who hold a
mistaken or overly narrow view of your topic. Your purpose is to give
them a new, surprising view. Pose a question, provide your audience's
commonly accepted answer to the question, and then give your own
surprising answer, based on information derived from personal experience, observation, and research.
This assignment, regardless of the option you choose, asks you to use your own
personal experiences, observations, and research to enlarge your reader's view of a subject
in a surprising way.
If you choose option B, the introduction of your essay should engage your reader's
interest in a question and provide needed background or context. It is usually better not to put
your thesis early in the introduction but rather delay it until after you have explained your
audience's common, expected answer to your opening question. This delay in presenting
the thesis creates a slightly open-form feel that readers often find engaging.
Quoted from the Allyn and Bacon text
You might wonder why we call this assignment "informative writing" rather than "persuasive
writing," since we emphasize reversing a reader's view. The difference is in the kind of question posed and
the reader's stance toward the writer. In persuasive writing the question being posed is controversial
(Should drugs be legalized? Does rap music promote violence?), with strong, rational arguments on all
sides. Often, disputes about values are as prevalent as disputes about facts. When writing persuasive
prose, you imagine a resistant reader who may argue back.
With informative prose, the stakes are lower, and you can imagine a more trusting reader,
willing to learn from your experiences or research. You are enlarging your reader's view of the topic by
presenting unexpected or surprising information, but you aren't necessarily saying that your audience's
view is wrong, nor are you initiating a debate.
For this assignment, avoid disputed issues that engender debate, and focus on how you,
through your personal experience and research, can enlarge your reader's view of a topic by providing
unexpected or surprising information.