Video: Can I improve my essay about Humanism?

﻿Hello everyone, and welcome to our next RE lesson. My name is Miss Harrison. And this is actually going to be our final lesson in the unit of humanism. Now, I have really enjoyed learning about humanism with you. And I hope you've really enjoyed learning about that nonreligious worldview of humanism. And last week, we achieved something amazing. I set you the challenge of writing an essay all about everything you have learned on humanism. And I bet you've done an absolutely wonderful job. Now, we can always improve on our writing. And so that's exactly what we're going to be doing today. Today, our learning question is, can I improve my essay about humanism? And we're going to have a look at these three things. Firstly, we're going to learn how to improve our essays grammatically, so thinking about the grammar we've used in our writing. The second thing we're going to focus on is how to write a closing statement for each paragraph. If you don't know what a closing statement is, that's okay. I'll let what that is a bit later in our lesson. And then the thirdly, we are going to get going on editing and improving our work. So, before we get started, you are going to need in front of you a piece of paper or a notepad. And you're also going to need your essay that you wrote last lesson. You're then going to need a pen or a pencil. And I advise you to have a coloured pen or pencil at hand, if you've got one, because when I'm editing my work, I find it really easy and helpful to do it in a different colour, so I can see the things that I've added or changed in my work. And of course, as usual, you need your amazing essay-writing brains with you today. So firstly, we're going to look at how to improve our essays grammatically. And we're going to do that in three ways by focusing on three different things. Firstly, we are going to focus in on capital letters and full stops. So remember that you always need a capital letter for a proper noun. So that's the name of a specific place or person or the name of a specific religion, needs a proper noun. We need capital letters at the start of sentences and we need a full stop at the end of every sentence. So that's one thing we're going to look out for. The second thing we're going to look out for is having commas after fronted adverbials. And those could be fronted adverbial phrases, which don't have a verb. For example, all of a sudden. Or fronted adverbial clauses which do have a verb within them. For example, when the thunder growled. I'll show you a little bit more about what I mean in just the moment. And then the third thing we are going to focus on are commas to separate clauses. And that means we're going to look out for conjunctions, such as, but, as, which, who, because, therefore. And those were all separate clauses, so we'll need a comma near those. So, I'm going to show you how I would go about editing one of my paragraphs. So here's a paragraph that I've written. I'm going to make it bigger so that you can see it clearly. Now, there are some mistakes that I've made in this paragraph. So as we go, I want you to see if you can point to any mistakes that I've made as I'm reading. Humanists identify as atheist or agnostic, which means that they do not believe in a god or gods or that they do not think there is enough evidence for us to believe a god exists. Firstly, unlike many different world religions, such as Christianity and Islam, humanists do not believe that humans were created by a divine power. Instead, they believe that humans evolved over millions of years. Although this is something that many religious people also believe, many religious people might argue that a god provided the conditions for evolution to happen. Furthermore, humanists always look to science and evidence to support their beliefs. They do not believe things purely based on faith without proof. Now, I wonder, did you manage to spot any mistakes that I had made? I wonder. Let's have a look closely together. So, firstly, I'm going to look out for those capital letters and full stops. Now, there were quite a few capital letters that I missed out. So, the first thing I'm going to do is I'm going to put in those capital letters so you can see them highlighted in blue on your screen. So, I've checked that I need a capital letter at the beginning of sentences, like my very first sentence, as well as the sentences beginning instead and although. And I also need a capital letter for the words, Christianity and Islam, because they are both proper nouns because they are the names of certain religions. So, I've gone through. I've read carefully and I've found where I need to put my capital letters and full stops. You're going to have a go now with your essay. So look at your essay that you've got in front of you and check if there are any capital letters or full stops missing. Pause the video now and have a go. Okay, fantastic work. So now let's look at the second thing that I'm going to focus on. And that's having commas after fronted adverbials. So fronted adverbials are either phrases or clauses at the beginning of a sentence that are always followed by a comma. So here I've got my text and I need to look out for those commas that are missing after the fronted adverbials. Now, the first one is going to go here. So you can see in that second sentence I've said firstly, unlike many different world religions, such as Christianity and Islam, humanists do not believe that humans were created by a divine power. So there where you can see my pink circle, I needed to have a comma after firstly, because firstly is an adverb and it's at the front of the sentence. So it needs a comma after it. My next one is going to come here after instead. So again, I've got a comma after the adverb at the beginning of the sentence because it's a fronted adverbial. And then I've got one in my final sentence, furthermore, humanists always look to science and evidence to support their beliefs. So have a check. Look particularly at the beginning of your sentences. Whenever you've used a fronted adverbial phrase or fronted adverbial clause, you need to make sure that there is a comma after it. Have a look in through your own work now. So look in through the whole essay and put in those commas after the fronted adverbials. Pause the video now and do that. Okay, fantastic work, everybody. Let's now look at my third grammar focus for today. And that was commas to separate clauses. So, here I've got my paragraph and I need to look out particularly for those conjunctions, so connecting words like, and, but, therefore, because, however. And I need to put my commas in there. So you can see firstly in my very fast sentence, humanists identify as atheist or agnostic, which means they do not believe in a god or gods. I need to have a comma after agnostic and before the conjunction, which, because it's adding on another clause. So, which is the start of my next clause, so I need to have my comma there. The next comma that I'm going to add in is here after god or gods, because actually this is a relative clause, which means that they do not believe in a god or gods. So it needs to have a comma at the beginning and a comma at the end. Then you can see after, it says world religions. So, firstly, unlike many world religions, such as Christianity and Islam, I need to have my commas. I need to have a comma after religions because I'm adding in some extra information, such as Christianity and Islam. So then I need my comma again after Islam, because that's the extra information that I've put into that sentence. And then I've also got a comma after believe. So, instead, they believe that humans evolved over millions of years. Although this is something that many religious people also believe. And then I've got my comma to separate that clause. So the next clause, many religious people might argue that a god provided the conditions for evolution to happen. So I'm separating those two bits of information within the sentence with my comma. So, I now want you to read through all of your sentences carefully. And wherever you've got two separate clauses within your sentence, so two different ideas within your sentence, and if they're connected by a conjunction, then you need to add a comma in to separate those two clauses. Pause the video now, read through your work really carefully and have a go at doing that. Okay, awesome work everybody. So the next thing we are going to focus on is how to write a closing statement for each paragraph. So, a closing statement links two paragraphs together. So it goes at the end of your paragraph to link on to the next paragraph. So, they summarise the information in the paragraph written and... Sorry, they summarise the information in the paragraph written and introduce the information in the following paragraph. So you're summarising what you've said already, and then you're introducing and linking that on to your next paragraph. So, if I take the paragraph that I have just edited, and we've just edited together, it's all about where humanists find their beliefs and how they get them from science and evidence. So you can see in blue that I've added on a closing statement at the end, this need to base their beliefs on evidence and proof also impacts on the way that humanists decide on what's right or wrong. So you can see within that sentence, that's in blue at the bottom, I have summarised the belief system of humanists, the fact that they need to base their beliefs on evidence and proof. And then I am linking it onto the next paragraph, which is going to be deciding on what's right or wrong. So I've summarised what I've written already and I've linked it to the next idea that I'm going to explore in the next paragraph. So, for each paragraph that you have written, I would like you to write a closing statement. Now, remember it only needs to be one sentence that you add onto each paragraph. It needs to link the two paragraphs together. So summarise the information that you've already written in that paragraph and then introduce the new information that's coming in the next paragraph. So, at the end of each of your paragraphs, write your closing statement now. Okay, fantastic work, team. So, all that's left to do is to make sure that you have edited and improved your essay. So read through it really, really carefully all the way through, check for all of those different grammar points, check that you've got a closing statement at the end of every paragraph, and check that it all makes sense and you've included all of that information from your plan and from the lessons throughout this unit that we have learnt. Wow, what a fantastic job you have done throughout this unit. We have learnt so much together, maybe about something that you hadn't heard of or you hadn't learned about before. So, hopefully you found it just as exciting and interesting as I have. Well done for all of your hard work throughout this unit. The only thing left for you to do is to complete your end of unit quiz, which will come up after the video. Now, if you are super proud of the work that you've done, and I hope you feel really, really proud at your edited and improved essay, and if you would like to share that work with the Oak National team, you could ask a parent or carer to take a photo of it and upload it to social media, tagging @OakNational and with the #LearnwithOak. That way, some of your Oak teachers might be able to see the wonderful work that you've been doing at home. And I would love to see any of your amazing essays. So, Well done for being fantastic students throughout this unit, and I will see you soon. Bye.

Exit Quiz: Can I improve my essay about Humanism?

Completed: Can I improve my essay about Humanism?

In this lesson we will be looking at ways we can improve the essays we have written about humanism, by improving the grammar and adding in a closing statement for each paragraph.

Religious Education

Can I improve my essay about Humanism?

Video

Final Quiz

Lesson Complete