1. Cause and Effect Reading Check
Please clear desks for a reading check on the chapter you read last class.

2. Cause and Effect Essay Questions?

3. Planning 1) Make chart of causes and effects 2) 3 options:
Identify the specific relationships on that chart
2) 3 options:
Discuss causes
Discuss effects
Discuss both (keep scope limited)

4. Thesis statement Essay must present and support a particular thesis
Ex: p. 328 (1st para.)
Thesis statement should:
Identify the relationships among the specific causes or effects you discuss
Indicate the significance of the causes or effects  ARGUMENT

5. Thesis - example
Ex 1: Facebook revolutionized the way that people date.
Not a thesis
Just an observation
Very general (not specific)

6. Thesis Statement
Ex 2: Facebook altered the way that people ask others to go on a date, and in effect made a task that was scarier in the past much easier and less socially awkward.
Thesis
Specific
States the significance of an effect

7. Thesis statement Thesis tells reader 3 things:
1) issues you plan to consider
2) position you will take on those issues
3) whether your emphasis is on causes, effects, or both

8. Thesis Statement
May also explicitly or implicitly indicate the main cause or effect you will focus on
May include the order you will present your points

9. Arranging Causes and effects: Options
1) Chronological order
Be careful of post hoc reasoning!
2) Introduce main cause first, then contributory (or do the opposite—save the best for last)
3) focus on positive consequences, briefly summarize negative (vice versa)

10. Arranging Causes and effects: Options
4) Dismiss any events that were not causes
Explain what the real causes were (helps to avoid post hoc reasoning)
5) Begin with most obvious causes or effects
Move to the more subtle causes or effects

11. Transitions – distinguish causes from effects
The first cause,
The second cause,
One result,
Another result,

12. Transitions – show causal relationships
Main cause =
Most important
Contributory causes =
Least important/Another cause
I.e. Hartford Roof Collapse
Main cause: Roof Design
Contributory cause: Weight of Snow

13. Transitions – show causal relationships
Immediate cause =
Closely precedes the effect; most obvious
Remote cause =
Less obvious; possibly in the past or far away
i.e. Hartford Roof Collapse:
Immediate cause: Weight of Snow (straw that broke the camel’s back)
Remote causes: Roof design, improper maintenance, etc.

14. Structure
Let’s take a look at the student’s example in your Patterns textbook:
Pg 333: The Irish Famine
How is it organized?

15. Structure The Irish Famine Introduction: (Thesis statement)
1st Cause: Failure of Crop
2nd Cause: Landlord-tenant system
3rd Cause: Failures of government policy
4th Cause: British prejudice
Results of the famine
Conclusion, more nuanced

16. Structure
In this essay, all causes are seen as important and interrelated.
Evelyn starts with immediate cause of the famine: failure of potato crop.
Ends with most remote cause: British Prejudice

17. Structure
This was an answer to an exam question. Hence, it could be improved:
More interesting opening (eyewitness account of famine’s effects. Quote from A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift)
Her conclusion could have been developed further, pointing towards the nation’s eventual recovery. Or commenting further on the enrichment of other nations alluded to at the end of the conclusion.
Body paragraphs could have included supporting statistics/quotes from historians/or a brief history of Ireland before the Famine.

18. Assignment Revision
Pick Topic, Cause and/or Effect Focus, and write a preliminary thesis by the end of next Class (3/04)
Essay Due Date Extended: Monday 3/14 or next corresponding class!
We will be watching a Documentary Food, Inc. for the next couple of classes…
Ishmael to begin after that…(Late Next Week or early the week after that!)

19. HWs
Read Alan Weisman’s “Earth Without People” ( ) and complete the following questions
Comprehension
1-4, 8
Purpose and Audience
1 and 4
Style and Structure
1,3, and 4
Due Tuesday 3.26
Cause and Effect Essay
Turnitin.com
Due 3.29, 11:59 PM