You have been considering the educational goals of several students. For this assignment, after a quick review of paragraph structure, you will be asked to write two paragraphs about your own educational goals.

I. An easy way to remember the parts of an effective paragraph is the acronym PIE, which stands for point, information, and explanation.

Point = your topic sentence in which you state the main idea of the paragraph

Information = observations, facts, statistics, examples, anecdotes, quotes, and other types of evidence.

Explanation = your reasons why the information supports and explains the point of the paragraph; your discussion of what the information means and how it is relevant.

In the following example the point is highlighted in yellow, the information in blue, and the explanation in green.

Financial know-how is necessary for individuals to become debt-free and learn to grow their wealth. Financial knowledge includes learning how to save and keep a budget. In the article “Tech Your Children the Building Blocks of Finance,” Sherie Holder and Kenneth Meeks reinforce the importance of the practice of saving at least 10 to 15 percent of after-tax income (35). Getting into the practice of automatically saving a certain amount every month will help you grow your wealth. Another part of financial know-how is learning how to manage money, which includes knowing how to avoid getting into debt in the first place. By knowing how to budget your money, you can learn how much money you actually have, which can help you spend within your means. When you spend within your means, you are able to avoid having to use credit cards, which, in turn, will prevent you from having to pay costly interest fees and prevent you from getting further into debt. (Adapted from Green and Lawlor, Read, Write, Connect)

II. Assignment: Use the attached worksheet (or make a similar one in your word processing program or by hand on notebook paper) to brainstorm and then write two paragraphs about your educational goals and the obstacles you may face. When finished upload your work (both the brainstorm and the paragraphs). If completing this exercise by hand, you may scan or photograph your work in order to upload it.

Worksheet (also attached below)

BRAINSTORM AND PROMPT

Brainstorm : What is a specific goal you have as a college student? What obstacles might prevent you from reaching your goal? How might you respond to those obstacles? What could you do to prevent the obstacles or overcome them?