Writing Book 5 · Lesson 31

Explanatory — Draft the middle

Each box of the road map becomes one paragraph with its own topic sentence.

What it is

The middle is where the explaining actually happens, and it is built from your road map: one point becomes one paragraph, in the order you numbered. Each paragraph makes its point, then supports it. The most common failure is a paragraph that states a point and moves on without proving it.

Watch it built

1
Take point 2 from your road map.
the root comes first
2
Write the point as the paragraph's first sentence.
Before anything shows above the soil, the root grows down.
3
Add the support: how it works, and one example.
It has to, because the plant needs water before it needs light. In a bean, the root appears two days before the shoot.
Remember
One point per paragraph. State it, then prove it.
Ask yourself: “Does this paragraph have one idea, and is it the box's idea?”

Remember

One box, one paragraph.

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