Course Match

Composing With Confidence: Writing Effective Paragraphs and Essays, 7/e

BASIC APPROACH

(Note: This textbook was published by our college division for use by students at post-secondary institutions whose writing skills are below the level needed to succeed in college English. Please review this text carefully to ensure appropriateness of content for your students.)

This student-friendly Seventh Edition of Composing with Confidence focuses on the writing of paragraphs and essays within the composing process.

Composing with Confidence retains its most popular feature: fast-paced, high-interest, continuous discourse materials that make the book fun to read and work with.

Students are guided step-by-step through the composing process, but are provided with options in prewriting, discovery, outlining, and predicting. Each chapter in the unit on the rhetorical modes offers student model paragraphs and essays, as well as professional models. Each chapter in this unit includes a well-wrought paragraph assignment, an optional essay writing assignment, and at least five alternative assignments—several of them in response to readings—to allow for maximum instructional flexibility.

Original contributions from well-known authors, textbook writers, professors, and editors offer students advice and insights into the composing practices of professionals. And a full unit of fifteen readings from professional as well as student writers establishes the reading/writing connection, while providing students with additional models and prompts for writing.

A full unit on sentence-level issues of grammar and mechanics offers students instruction in only those skills that they need to master to make their writing clear and grammatically correct. Each chapter in the unit ends with two "Editing for Mastery" exercises, in which students must find and correct errors in extended prose passage. The answers to the first exercise are provided in an appendix. "Tips" boxes and "If Your First Language Is Not English" boxes also provide short, specific, and practical advice to students.

FEATURES

• Well-known authors, professors, textbook writers, and editors share insights and excitement about the craft of writing which, in turn, motivates students to improve their own writing.
• Optional collaborative activities—outlining classroom-tested methods that produce results—have been added to expand learning opportunities, guide peer review, and offer additional flexibility in teaching.
• ESL (English as a Second Language) boxes throughout the book address the specific needs of this growing segment of the basic writing population.
• A recurring feature offers students practice in summarizing, paraphrasing, and quoting by providing them the information they need to write from outside sources without having to undertake actual research.
• "A Word About Words," offers short word histories and discussions of the roots of English from many languages.
• There are two Editing for Mastery exercises at the end of all Troubleshooting chapters, with the answers to the first exercise provided in an appendix.
• A chapter on Writing on the Job offers instruction in and models of a job application letter, a résumé, and two memos.
• The "Blueprints for Success" concludes each unit with a two-page visual summary of key points and topics for easy reference.

<< Back to Book List