CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.5.8

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Prewriting for Opinion Essays

Prewriting for Opinion Essays

Prewriting is your first step in writing an opinion essay. These prewriting activities will help you select a topic to write about, develop an opinion statement, and gather and organize your details before you begin a first draft.

Prewriting to Select a Topic

For your own opinion essay, you need to select a topic that is debatable and that you feel strongly about. A debatable topic is one that people have differing opinions about. There is no debate that young people need to exercise, but there is debate about extending the school year.

Brainstorm topics.

For each category, list at least two debatable opinions that you could write about.

School Classes

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Reflecting on Summaries

Reflecting on Your Writing

Reflect on your writing.

Complete the following form to think about what you learned.

Reflection Sheet
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Paraphrasing and Quoting

Paraphrasing and Quoting

When you write, you can use ideas from sources, but you must avoid plagiarism—presenting others’ words as your own. Use one of these strategies:

  • Paraphrasing is using your own words to express the ideas from a text.
  • Quoting is using a text’s exact words in quotation marks and naming the source.

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Flying Fish, Ocean Acrobats

Flying fish are called the dragonflies of the deep, but flying fish don’t have wings like dragonflies or birds. They use two sets of pectoral fins as wings to fly. Their front fins lift them out of the water, and their back fins help them soar over the surface.

  • Paraphrase: Flying fish use sets of fins to glide above water.

  • Quote: The article “Flying Fish, Ocean Acrobats” points out that “flying fish are called the dragonflies of the deep.”

Teaching Tip

Students may paraphrase well known ideas and established facts without giving credit to a specific source. When students quote a source, however, they must give credit. Students can cite sources by naming the author and title.

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Editing and Publishing Summaries

Editing Summaries

After revising your summary, you need to make little changes (editing) to correct any remaining errors. You'll look for problems with sentences, punctuation, capitalization, grammar, usage, and spelling. The following instructions will help you edit and publish your writing.

Editing in Action

When you edit, you check to make sure your paragraph is correct.

  • Paragraph Before Edits

    Editing

  • A proper noun was capitalized and a usage and agreement error was fixed.

    Editing

  • Paragraph After Edits

    Editing
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Revising Summaries

Revising Summaries

Once you draft your summary, take a quick break and come back to it to see it freshly. When you revise, you make sure the source is cited and all the key ideas are in order. These activities will help you revise.

Revising to Cite Sources

In your topic sentence, you should add the title and author of the text you are summarizing. By doing so, you cite the source of the ideas. Try these strategies:

  • Add an introductory part:

According to “K-Pop Goes Global” by Frances Blake, Korean pop music is gaining a worldwide following through a mix of sound and technology.

  • Make the title the subject:

Frances Blake’s article “K-Pop Goes Global” describes how Korean pop music is gaining a worldwide following through a mix of sound and technology.

  • Add an introductory part and make the author the subject:

In the article “K-Pop Goes Global,” Frances Blake writes that Korean pop music is gaining a worldwide following through a mix of sound and technology.

Cite the source.

Use some of the strategies above to add the title and author to the following topic sentences. Then add the title and author of “The Modern Day Magellan” to the topic sentence of your summary.

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Writing a Summary

Writing a Summary

Once you finish prewriting, you are ready to create the first draft of your summary. These writing activities will help you create a strong beginning, middle, and ending for your summary.

Writing the Topic Sentence

The topic sentence is the first sentence of a summary. It states the focus (overall point or thought) of the text in your own words. To write an effective topic sentence, follow this formula.

Topic of the reading

+

Overall point about the topic

=

Topic sentence

Korean pop music

  

gaining worldwide popularity through a mix of sound and technology

  

Korean pop music is gaining a worldwide following through a mix of sound and technology.

Write your topic sentence.

Answer the questions below to help you form a topic sentence for your summary of the article.

By Anonymous (not verified), 12 March, 2026

Prewriting for Summaries

Prewriting for Summaries

Prewriting is your first step in writing a summary. These prewriting activities will help you read closely and pick out the important details for your summary.

Prewriting to Read Closely

Before you can write a great summary, you need to read closely. To do so, use a close-reading strategy called SQ3R—Survey, Question, Read, Recite, Review.

Survey, question, and read.

Follow these instructions before you read the article below.

  1. Survey the article: Place a check mark by the title and author.
  2. Question the topic and purpose: Write notes on the document.
  3. Read the text: Underline the focus statement and topic sentences.

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By Anonymous (not verified), 12 March, 2026

Reading an Article and Summary

Reading Summaries

Before you write your own summary of an article, you'll want to see how others did so. In this lesson, you'll read a sample article and summary. As you read them, think about what parts of the original article are included in the summary.

Reading a Sample Article and Summary

A summary identifies the key information in a text, condenses it, and states it using the writer’s own words. Read this article about a popular type of music and think about the main idea and key information.

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Sample Article

Title

K-Pop Goes Global

Author

by Frances Blake

Korean pop music, or ‘K-pop’ as it’s more commonly called, has already taken over Asia’s music scene and is gaining more fans in the West all the time. Beginning But what is it about K-pop that is attracting so many listeners? It’s K-pop’s unique blend of sound and technology.

To begin with, the music of these young Korean pop stars is unique and captivating with its energetic mix of musical styles, including hip-hop, techno, R&B, and even dubstep. Middle

Where American or British pop groups rarely have more than four or five members, it’s common for K-pop groups like Girls' Generation to include nine or ten singers. Members of the groups are recruited at an early age by Korean record companies, and the young musicians must train for two years singing and dancing before they can join a group. “Every time they perform a song, it’s got to be perfect,” says record company owner Yi Yuen.

Ending

It’s not just the music that attracts fans to the genre. K-pop groups produce larger-than-life music videos complete with multicolored light shows, impressive choreography, and several outfit changes. Listeners keep track of their favorite K-pop groups on the Internet and follow group members on social media Web sites like Twitter. One music video by the group 2NE1 has over 100 million views on YouTube. K-pop’s international influence shows no signs of slowing down soon.

By Anonymous (not verified), 12 March, 2026

Warm-Up For Summarizing, Paraphrasing, and Quoting

Warm-Up for Summarizing, Paraphrasing, and Quoting

Writing a Process Essay
(c) Thoughtful Learning 2016

Summarizing, paraphrasing, and quoting all involve using key details from other sources in your own writing. This lesson will help you get a feel for summarizing.

What Is Summarizing?

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Summarizing means identifying the key information in a text, condensing it, and putting it in your own words. In this unit, you will learn the steps to writing an effective summary. You will also learn about two other research skills called paraphrasing and quoting.

All three skills will help you decide what ideas from other sources are most important. These skills will allow you to write about information from other sources and use the information fairly.

Thinking by Summarizing

Read the comic strip below called Black Ducks. Study the pictures, read the speech bubbles, and think about the key information. Then read the summary that explains the comic strip.

Episode 74

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Revising Narrative Paragraphs

Revising Narrative Paragraphs

Once you finish writing your narrative paragraph, you'll be ready to start revising. When you revise, you think about the "big picture": your topic and details and the way you build your paragraph using transitions. These activities will help you revise.

Revising for Time Order

Review the order of actions.

Use a time line to list the actions from your paragraph. Review the list to make sure the actions are in time order (in the order they happened). Rearrange any actions that are out of order.

  1. Action 1
  2. Action 2
  3. Action 3
  4. Action 4
  5. Action 5
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.5.8