Materials | Student journals, computer with Internet access and a projector, copies of the handout.
Overview | What are the qualities of good expository writing? What is process analysis, and how can it help us write for clarity? In this lesson, students examine and evaluate a Times slide show that explains how to pack 10 days’ worth of clothes in a carry-on suitcase. They then generate qualities of good process analysis or procedural writing and create their own physical, video or explanatory, audio demonstrations or explanations.
Warm-up | As students enter, ask each to them to write instructions for doing something that can be done in the room with available materials, such as tie a shoe, make a paper airplane, do a dance move, play a basic game like duck-duck-goose, and so on. For an alternate opening activity, see our 2008 lesson Show Me!.
Once students have finished, ask for three volunteers to read their how-tos aloud as one or more other students – or even the entire class, depending on the activity – follow the directions. Introduce the caveat that they cannot fill in the blanks – they have to follow the instructions exactly as written. See what happens. (It may be quite humorous!)
Then discuss what happened. Ask: Were the directions you received clear and easy to follow? What assumptions did the writer make that led to difficulty in executing the directions exactly as written? What would have made the instructions easier to follow?
