Portfolio Entry #6 "A well-written paragraph"

In the following video Alex describes how to structure a well-written paragraph in English. 

Parts of a Paragraph - English Academic Writing Introduction. May 19, 2009 from the site:  "engVid - Free English Video Lessons"

He says that the PARTS OF A PARAGRAPH are:

1)      Topic Sentence

-          It is what you are writing about.  

-          It should be an interesting topic and you should give your opinion about it.

-          Do not give details.

2)      Body

-          It is the heart of your paragraph.

-          It should include supporting arguments or details that support your topic sentences.

-          It should be ordered according to importance or chronology.

3)      Closing Sentence

-          It has two functions:

·         It reminds the audience what you are talking about.

·         It keeps your audience thinking.

      

      EXAMPLES OF TOPIC SENTENCES 

      Many politicians deplore the passing of the old family-sized farm, but I'm not so sure. I saw around Velva a release from what was like slavery to the tyrannical soil, release from the ignorance that darkens the soul and from the loneliness that corrodes it. In this generation my Velva friends have rejoined the general American society that their pioneering fathers left behind when they first made the barren trek in the days of the wheat rush. As I sit here in Washington writing this, I can feel their nearness.

      There are two broad theories concerning what triggers a human's inevitable decline to death.The first is the wear-and-tear hypothesis that suggests the body eventually succumbs to the environmental insults of life. The second is the notion that we have an internal clock which is genetically programmed to run down. Supporters of the wear-and-tear theory maintain that the very practice of breathing causes us to age because inhaled oxygen produces toxic by-products. Advocates of the internal clock theory believe that individual cells are told to stop dividing and thus eventually to die by, for example, hormones produced by the brain or by their own genes.

      We commonly look on the discipline of war as vastly more rigid than any discipline necessary in time of peace, but this is an error. The strictest military discipline imaginable is still looser than that prevailing in the average assembly-line. The soldier, at worst, is still able to exercise the highest conceivable functions of freedom -- that is, he or she is permitted to steal and to kill. No discipline prevailing in peace gives him or her anything remotely resembling this. The soldier is, in war, in the position of a free adult; in peace he or she is almost always in the position of a child. In war all things are excused by success, even violations of discipline. In peace, speaking generally, success is inconceivable except as a function of discipline.