Overview

Over the last several weeks, we have examined short literary works that have explored the interactions and dynamics between parents and children.

Write a fully developed essay in which you address both of following questions:

What do you believe are 2 or 3 important characteristics of effective parenting?
Which works of literature covered in our class do you think contain examples of characters that illustrate your idea of effective parenting?
As part of your essay, you can also discuss examples from the literary works that you believe represent examples of ineffective parenting. Doing this can help you back up your points about the characteristics of effective parenting by providing a contrast to effective parenting. Comparing and contrasting are important writing skills that can be used in a variety of writing situations. The key thing is that you explain your rationale and choice of examples.

You should use occasional direct quotations, but do not over-use quotations.  Sometimes, it is best to summarize or paraphrase aspects of the text that you are discussing.

Here is a link with information for quoting and citing: Citing Long and Short Quotations (Links to an external site.)

The paper needs to have a clear thesis statement (Links to an external site.) that establishes the focus of the essay.

Example Thesis Statement: Langston Hughess poem Mother to Son provides an excellent depiction of effective parenting because

You might wish to use the following resource to help you to begin thinking about what you believe makes for a good parent so that you can come up with a concrete framework on effective parenting in your essays introduction: Parenting Styles (Links to an external site.)

Your essay must discuss at least two of the following literary works that we have discussed in our class.  The standard MLA convention for both short stories and poems is to enclose their titles within quotation marks, so be sure to do so in your essay.  When you first introduce any literary work, you should always mention its genre (poem, short story, novel, play, essay). For MLA, the first time you mention an author, mention his/her full name. Every other time you mention the author, refer to him/her by last name only.

Langston Hughes Mother to Son
Jamaica Kincaid Girl
Theodore Roethke My Papas Waltz
Robert Haydn Those Winter Sundays
Essay Structure:

Introduction (1 Fully Developed Paragraph)

Your introduction should explain what you believe are 2 or 3 important characteristics or qualities of effective parenting. It should then gradually lead to your thesis statement, which should state which of the works of literature you will be discussing throughout your essay.

Body (Minimum of 3 Fully Developed Paragraphs)

The body paragraphs of the essay should discuss in detail the literary works you have chosen to focus on and how you believe they capture the qualities of effective and/or ineffective approaches to parenting. Use topic sentences to signal to the reader the focus of each individual paragraph. Make sure each paragraph stays tightly unified around the idea established in the topic sentence. Use some direct quotations from the literary works, but avoid quoting too much.

Conclusion (1 Fully Developed Paragraph)

The conclusion should summarize your big points and leave the reader with something to think about regarding your topic.