GREETINGS

My name is Susan Whitelock and I will be your OWL tutor this time. I confess I love watching television, although Reality Shows have never been my favorite. I do confess I like American Idol, and sometimes I tune in to The Bachelor just to see what’s up (I hate to confess this!) There is no denying that Reality TV is popular, so you’ve chosen a good topic. Your essay makes me think about why I like some of the shows.

I like the fact you state about television vs. bathrooms. Amazing. I also like in P4 (paragraph 4) when you give specific examples of suspense, because since I don’t watch those particular shows, the examples help me understand your point. I also like the example of surprises—the wait for the bachelor’s decision about who will get the ring. Again, this example helps me get your point.

In my response to your draft, I am going to first focus on the big picture (global) and then the sentence-level (local). I will let you know where as a reader I might need some help from you, the writer.

GLOBAL COMMENTS:

1) Focus/Thesis

As a reader, after reading your essay, I see that you have a lot of ideas going on here, but I am never really clear about your main point or thesis. At the end of P2 you state that "We want to see a bit of our problems on television."

This seems to be your thesis for this draft. But as I read on, I find that your essay isn’t just about seeing our problems on tv. You seem to give other reasons that don’t fit in this category. You later also say we like suspense and surprises. You also mention that we like to see unscripted tv that makes it more like real life and real people.

So as a reader I am a bit confused about your thesis. Could you make your thesis more strongly connected to all that you say? Here are some ways I do this when I am in the same spot:

Tool: Gisting to Find a Thesis

Read over a mid-writing draft and "Gist." You do this by reading each paragraph and writing down the main idea of each paragraph in the margin next to each paragraph. This will help you see your points, and will also help you discover when you might have more than one point in a paragraph, so you need to separate points.

This helps you see if your Body paragraphs are connected to the thesis. And this also helps you see when you are straying off topic or have made the same point twice.

Study what you have written in the margins. Can you create a sentence that all of these topics will fit under? There seem to be so many different reasons besides wanting to see our problems on tv.

Tool: Nutshelling to find a thesis

Now ask yourself: What do all of these points add up to? Can you write an umbrella statement that covers all of these?

Put your idea in a nutshell. The answer will be your thesis.

If I go by just the points you have in your essay, your thesis might be something like this:

"There are several reasons for the popularity of reality shows. Viewers like to see a bit of them selves on television, they like suspense and surprises, and they like to see people with problems worse than theirs so the can feel normal."

This thesis allows for all that you want to say, whereas your current thesis is so narrow it leaves out your other good insights into reasons. You might also think of some new points as you are reading. Just keep in mind that your thesis needs to encompass all that you say in the Body of your essay.

2) Rethinking a Thesis and Looking at Organization with a Function Outline

The Function Outline is a great tool to use to see and improve organization. This tool works best not at the beginning of writing, but after you have done a lot of exploratory writing, and you have something to organize. At the top of the form, write your thesis.

Then you list all of the points you want to make in each paragraph (Point 1, Point 2, etc...) If you have done the Gist exercise above, you should be clearer now about the points you do want to make in the Body of your essay.

This tool will help you see your points more clearly, to see repetitions and confusions, and to see a need for rethinking some points.

For example, in the paragraphs on suspense and surprises—you use the suspense idea twice in two different paragraphs, and the examples for surprises serve your point on suspense. Perhaps this is the same idea instead of two different ideas?

3) Developing with Detail

Tool: Show as Well as Tell

Here is another tool for developing an essay. As I mentioned above, the parts of your essay I understand the most are the parts where you give specific examples. The examples help especially when I am unfamiliar with the shows.

Ask yourself as you read each paragraph: "Do I show my point, not just tell my point?" For example, in P7 you say that we like to see people that have "worse problems that we face ourselves." Examples would really help me here. Try to provide evidence that what you say is true. Look through your essay for other places to show as well as tell.

Remember that your reader may not be as familiar as your are with the shows, so you need to explain more and provide examples for your points to be clear and convincing.

LOCAL COMMENTS:

I don’t see any major error patterns. However, since you will be writing a lot of new material, be sure to print out a hard copy and read it aloud to hear and see errors. Don’t rely on the computer to catch all errors. It won’t.

CONCLUSION:

I think an analysis of why Americans like Reality Shows is important. There sure are a lot of them lately! So it makes sense to analzye why.

To be honest, I sometimes use tv for escape into other worlds. One could consider it a kind of addiction for some, too. You might think about these reasons as well.

We do need to think about why we do what we do. You have some great insights here about people’s needs here. You just need to make your answer to why very clear up front in your essay (it is always best in a short essay to place the thesis at the end of the Introductory paragraph). In essays it is part of the conventions for a reader to expect your answer first (the thesis) and then the explanation after, but the thesis must match what follows, and vise versa. Readers also need details and examples. We also like transitions between paragraphs

Once you work on these areas, your rich draft will be even more reader-friendly.

Send me a revision if you can. I would love to read it!