Page 168 - ESSAY WRITING - 4 September 2019

move from direct contact with plants, and the less distinct our knowledge of
botany grows. Yet everyone comes unconsciously on an amazing amount of

botanical knowledge, and few people will fail to recognize a rose, an apple, or
an orchid. When our Neolithic ancestors, living in the Middle East about
10,000 years ago, discovered that certain grasses could be harvested and their
seeds planted for richer yields the next season, the first great step in a new

association of plants and humans was taken. Grains were discovered and
from them flowed the marvel of agriculture: cultivated crops. From then on,
humans would increasingly take their living from the controlled production

of a few plants, rather than getting a little here and a little there from many
varieties that grew wild – and the accumulated knowledge' of tens of
thousands of years of experience and intimacy with plants in the wild would
begin to fade away.

Taken from:
http://www.cvauni.edu.vn/imgupload_dinhkem/file/ThanhHa/A%20colection%20of%20TOEFL%20Reading%20Com
prehension%201.doc

Exercise 5 Reading a student essay

Read the reaction essay below as a response to the article of Botany.

The study of plants, or known as botany, is one of many knowledge that
has been circulated around in a human history. This article about botany,
which is taken from cvauni.edu.vn, describes the history of the study of

plants and shows how the study of plants develops through times, starting
from the ancient age where human ancestors started discovering the
knowledge of plants. It also explains how the human’s knowledge of plants
diminishes throughout the years caused by the controlled production of few
plants. Reading this article raises my thought to respond to some of its

aspects.
Firstly, I think that this article has a good organization. The two
paragraphs of the article have topic sentences. The first paragraph discusses

the importance of the study of plants in human history. The content has
well-elaborated the topic sentences; discussing how and why the study of
plants is important for human. The second paragraph’s topic sentence talks
about the distinctness of human knowledge about botany. This idea is

further explained through its supporting sentences which cover the

166 Reaction Essay