The Use of Service Dogs Explanatory Task

You will now review your notes and sources, and plan, draft, revise, and edit your writing. You may use your notes and go back to the sources. Now read your assignment and the information about how your writing will be scored; then begin your work.

Your Assignment:

Now that you have completed the research on the effectiveness of dogs as service animals, your teacher has assigned you with the task of writing an explanatory article about the most critical characteristics and benefits of dogs as service animals. The audience for your article will be the students, teachers, and parents reading the published journal.

Using more than one source, develop a thesis/controlling statement to explain the effectiveness of dogs as service animals. Once you have a thesis/controlling statement, select the most relevant information from more than one source to support your thesis/controlling idea. Then, write a multi-paragraph explanatory article explaining your thesis/controlling idea. Clearly organize your article and elaborate your ideas. Unless quoting directly from the sources, use your own words. Be sure to reference the source title or number when quoting or paraphrasing details or facts from sources.

Explanatory Article Scoring:

Your explanatory article will be scored using the following:

1. Organization/purpose: How well did you state your thesis/controlling idea, and maintain your thesis/controlling idea with a logical progression of ideas from beginning to end? How well did you narrow your thesis/controlling idea so you can develop and elaborate the conclusion? How effective was your introduction and your conclusion?
2. Evidence/elaboration: How well did you integrate relevant information from the sources? How well did you elaborate your ideas? How well did you clearly state ideas using precise language that is appropriate for your audience and purpose?
3. Conventions: How well did you follow the rules of grammar usage, punctuation, capitalization and spelling?

Now begin work on your explanatory article. Manage your time carefully so that you can

• Plan your multi-paragraph explanatory article.
• Write your multi-paragraph explanatory article.
• Revise and edit the final draft of your multi-paragraph explanatory article.

Word-processing tools and spell check are available to you.

You are being asked to write a multi-paragraph explanatory article, so please be as thorough as possible. Type your response in the space provided. The box will get expand as you type.

Remember to check your notes and your prewriting/planning as you write and then revise and edit your explanatory article.