托福独立写作中,很多人都会在开头或者结尾使用模板。但是网上的“托福作文模版”,其内容大多泛泛空洞,很难真正针对托福作文题目达到“切题”“扣题”的效果,因此在评分标准中无法满足“切题。

　　比如独立写作我们很多同学经常用到的开头段能写60字左右的模板是这样的：

　　Nowadays there is a heated debate about+(独立写作题干中的topic)。Some people believe+ (题干中的正面选项)。Others believe+(题干中的反面选项)。But in my opinion, I believe+(题目中的正面或反面选项)。Here are my reasons.

　　这个模板看起来字数很多，但实际上并没有表达任何的实际内容。我们观察这几个选项，能够看到，除了咱们模板自己的内容，这种文章的开头是把题目里面的信息抄了四遍而已。这种开头，看似说了一些什么，却其实什么都没说，恰好命中了官方指南里面已经说明的“评分者不希望看到的无意义开头”。所谓无意义有两个方面，是字数很多却没有任何的展开说明，在这个模板里面，体现为 “仅仅把题目抄了几遍”。无意义的第二个方面，就是这种开头可以 “不加思索” 地用在每一篇文章，也就是说，不涉及任何“产生内容”的“写作能力”。这种开头段是会被扣分的。当然，确实有一个流派的考生不爱写开头段，他们只在开头段表达自己的立场。他们的写法是：

　　I do not agree/I agree with the statement that ..., for the following reasons.

　　或者再加一句话描述一下对立方的观点

　　Many people believe .... However, I argue that ....

　　这种展示双方观点的冲突的写法，写成第二种格式已经到头了。对比前面的开头我们发现，第二种写法只要只要遣词造句得当，也是能在读者的理解中囊括所有我们最开头那个把题目抄四遍的模板的所有信息的。换言之，开头那种模板扣分的原因是 “本来能够以更少的字数说明白的事情写了更多更冗长，意味着作者的写作能力不强”。

　　托福写作，甚至一般的英文essay的开头段都需要出现的内容，如果要认真写，都会包括如下的内容↓↓↓

　　1. 如果题目给出的问题比较笼统，那么我们需要在开头段把笼统的问题进行细化。

　　2. 如果题目给出的问题比较明确，我们可以在开头段对“为什么这个问题值得写一篇文章讨论”这个问题进行一个简单的背景情况分析。

　　3. 在对题目的大话题进行解读以后，Some people think... Other people think 这种对双方观点的说明的句子不是不能写。但是如果写，必须有一定的简单的解释说明，说明每方观点的为什么同意的大概理由。展开尺度大概就是论证段的开头句尺度，千万不能多写，因为我们要把大量的论证留给我们的开头段。在这里介绍双方的观点的目的是为了吸引读者注意力，或者给读者进行一些论证的预热。告诉他，咱们的文章接下来会在这个大的方向上进行详细的论证。

　　4. 当然，并不是所有的文章都需要介绍双方观点。但是所有的文章都必须在开头段都必须出现我们的文章的立场。这里面的立场就可以，在我们对题目中提出的问题进行解读了以后(使用1中或者2中的策略，取决于题目的问题是不是足够详细)，顺带着写下去，I believe that ....

　　下面我们看几个开头段示例：

　　案例一：2016-9-3. What is the most useful action for people to help environment in their local communities?

　　-Plant trees and create parks;

　　-Persuade local shops to stop providing plastic bags for consumers;

　　-Increase access to public transportation (such as buses and trains), and reduce the automobiles on roads.

　　开头段：

　　Many people who work in Beijing today drive between home and work, as illustrated by the huge traffic jams during rush hours. The private cars have become the major culprit of the environmental problems that we have here in Beijing. Not only are they emitting polluting gases, but they also occupy too much space, which would otherwise be used to create public parks or gardens, as parking lots. Therefore, I think, to help improve the environment of the local community, we should increase access to the public transportation to reduce traffic on the roads and the pollution in the air. The other two options, planting trees and creating parks, or persuading local shops to stop providing plastic bags for consumers, are either partially effective orcompletely irrelevant to the problem.

　　观察到 help environment 比较笼统，所以这里开门见山先提出详细的我们论证中需要出现的问题(使用了1中的“定义问题”的写作手法)。其中句话是时代和地点大背景，第二句话开始是对环境问题的简要描述。从 Therefore 开始是我们的观点，里面大概说了一下，在我们定义的环境问题下，几个选项分别有什么程度的有效性。注意，我们并没有做大概的展开，而是仅仅对他们简单进行了评价，因为论证的大头在后面。

　　案例二：2016-10-16. Many schools require young children (aged 5-11) to work t**ether in a small group instead of working alone to learn many activities. Do you think this is a good idea?

　　开头段：

　　There is something particularly interesting to know about China. The kids who were born after the year of 2000 often are the only child in their families. As a result, when they grew up, they did not usually have the chance to work with others. What they did most was just play, rest, and study alone. Therefore, if the schools require the young students to work t**ether, the students will have the precious opportunity to start to practice team working, which is the essential skill when they grow up and want to seek for a satisfying job.

　　这篇文章提出的问题比较详细了，所以我们直接细化问题到中国目前的独生子女现状(用到了2中的“背景情况设定”写法)。在接下来的论证段中，我们就有了具体的举例的落脚点，就不怕没有细节可以写了。

　　案例三：2016-3-11. Do you agree or disagree with the following statement? Students do readings by their own personality is as important as, or more important than readings assigned by teachers.

　　开头段：

　　As young students go college, they will face an entirely new situation that they have never experienced in their previous educational institutions. In college education, rather than listen to the instructors' lecturing alone, most students will have to acquire new pieces of knowledge by reading intensively. As a result, the books that the students choose to read will have a great impact on the quality of such acquisition.

　　But how do they know what books to pick up? Some people argue that the professor should assign readings to students because, as experts in their fields, the professors will always give students the best books available. But other people contend that it is only when the students are highly motivated that they will have the best learning result, and such motivation can be achieved by allowing students to choose the books to read according to their own personality. However, I do not think the two views are contradicting. I believe that the former is as important as the latter, for the following reasons.

　　这个开头段中，我们使用了更复杂的结构。开头段写了两段(开头段可以写两段，这个大家都没疑问吧?这么长的开头如果写成一段，不论是读者还是考官，读起来都会感觉眼睛不适的)。

　　开头段段仍然使用了我们前面的1和2的写作技巧，对论证的社会大背景进行限定(进入大学)，然后说明了“这个问题为什么值得拿出来讨论(读什么书决定了我们的获得的知识的质量)”。然后这里我们没有强硬采取3中的“双方观点解读”。而是灵活了一下采用了“两个选项的特点分析”。在开头段仅进行分析而不进行论证是一个比较讨巧的方式。因为我们可以在到了具体的论证段中，不再有太多的铺垫压力。同时开头段可以内容比较丰富，不会显得全文“头轻脚重”。到了论证段以后，也可以减小铺垫的压力，对开头已经展开过的内容进行一个快速的总结型复述，进入论证过程。

　　这篇文章经过特点展开后，我们发现两者其实哪个选项都没有对另一个选项有“压倒性”的优势。这里我们就顺势而为，写成“平衡展开”型的中立观点(“as important as”)。这时我们需要说清楚的是两者分别在什么条件下能够相辅相成使学生在学校的学习能够更有效果。中立观点最不能写的就是两个观点“各说各话”，最终导致全文失去了coherence，变成了一篇不知所云的拼贴文，或者让人感觉到是两篇文章的开头段。平衡展开(中立立场)是一个比较复杂的话题，今后有机会会在其他文章中单独说明。

　　同学们可以试着在这几个开头段之下，试着找出开头段已经暗示给读者的各段立场，写出两个分论点(题有三个分论点)。感觉一下是不是这样的开头以后，论证段的展开会更有聚焦更好写了?

　　这几个开头段，如果格式熟练以后，大概写作用时会在6-10分钟左右。同学们可以根据这个时间估算自己论证段几个论点大概各需要多久写完。

　　以上内容希望对你托福写作有所帮助，更多托福干货敬请关注新航道托福考试频道。