January 22, 2010
Writing with description is often found in all the styles of writing essays. However, a descriptive essay is one that contains very little criticism, persuasion, or dialogue (unless the dialog helps describe the topic, such as a person’s accent). To write a good descriptive essay, a student should start with a focused topic, a person, a place, an inanimate object, or a certain event. One guideline the writer should follow is to organize the descriptions into a clear pattern. Start your introduction with a general detail and work to specifics, and complete the description with a thesis.
For example, “Here is Tom. He has deep brown hair. He wears his hair in a short, straight style because it is thinning at the crown. Tom’s eyes are blue, topped with short brown lashes. His nose is straight and flares only slightly at the nostrils. (more…)
January 20, 2010
How to write a good narrative essay is simply storytelling with good grammar and punctuation. The word narrative derives from the Latin word narrare that means “to recount” or recall the story! Guidelines for students when writing a narrative essay; it should have a plot, usually characters, a setting or location, and a point of view (usually the narrators). The general purpose of a narrative essay is to entertain, although information and persuasion can come through the story. It helps to write a narrative essay from the writer’s point of view, using first person writing style, for example, I, me, we, our. Adding dialogue to the story adds great texture; remember to add quotes around the dialogue. To prepare for the narrative, one good tip is to write down a chronology of the events of the story. Later, you can rearrange it in a flash forward or a flash back, or just a straight timeline. The story should have a high point and then a conclusion that gives the narrative closure. For example, “We drove to California where we met the greatest actor of all time.” This very short narrative contains characters (we) and a location or setting (California), and a high point (where we met the greatest actor). The conclusion might be “We had the best time of our young lives.” The previous example meets all the criteria of a narrative but lacks one essential detail. (more…)
January 13, 2010
To write a good critical essay you need only to understand the guidelines involved. As a student, you may be asked to review another person’s works, for example, a book, a movie, a painting, or poetry. You might ask how to prepare your analysis? It helps to question or understand the purpose of the work you are criticizing while you review it. The purpose is usually either entertainment, information, or an effort to persuade the viewer. Then ask yourself a few questions, such as, who is the intended audience, or how is the material organized? When you understand this, the essay almost writes itself. The first tip is to write a short description of the work, identify the premise for the work, and of course the title of the work. If it’s a book, a story, or a movie, you should write a brief and objective summary of the plot. If it’s a poem state the theme of the verses. If it’s a work of art, describe the form, texture, and materials used. At this point, do not try to include your opinion about the work. (more…)
January 11, 2010
How to write well is an acquired skill but easily achieved by preparing and using guidelines on how to write good essays. Any student who wants to communicate effectively can learn to write a good argumentative essay. It does help to practice. At first glance, students may think a persuasive paper and an argumentative essay serve the same purpose. Typically, the difference is that in an argumentative paper, both sides of the argument are stated, covered, and substantiated as facts. A persuasive paper is an essay, introduction, body, and conclusion. An argumentative essay should contain a claim and counterclaim, rebuttal and refuting and final conclusion.
For example, the debate is whether to paint the exercise room red or blue. You have red and blue cans of paint. You would like the room painted red. Now we have the idea and the purpose, which is to paint the room red and not blue. Next tip provide some substantiation. The color red is often associated with energy and speed. The USDOT reported in 2009 that the police stopped red cars more than any other color car by a 5 to 1 difference. The next color cars stopped for speeding are black and followed by yellow cars. (more…)
January 7, 2010
There are basic steps to help a student to write a good persuasive essay that also applies to all writing. How does a student prepare? You’ll need an idea and a purpose for writing the paper. The idea should be as specific as possible, for example, instead of writing about dog breeding, write about breeding basset hound dogs. The purpose in this case, is to persuade the reader to raise this particular breed of dog. “Breeding basset hound dogs is a good idea.”
In a persuasive essay, you are making a statement (idea) and giving points and facts to gain your readers agreement with your statement. You can appeal to their reason or to their emotion or ethics and sometimes you appeal to all three areas. You present coherent supporting statements, such as, “You can make great money breeding basset hounds. Last year they outsold all other breeds of dogs, and usually for $100.00 more per dog.” Another persuasive example might use a comparison, such as, “The basset hound dog breed have large litters of puppies, unlike the Chihuahua dog breed that only have 1 or 2 pups in their litters.” The two previous statements might appeal to the reader’s reason. (more…)
December 1, 2009
The most typical mistakes in essay writing are often the easiest ones to avoid. Stop writing and do these two things first – go to your MSWord options and turn on your spell checker and grammar/style checker under proofing. In addition, turn on the readability function to understand how you can make your writing sound more professional.
Every time you write anything, use these by going to “Review” and selecting “Spelling and Grammar” to have the MS Word program evaluate your paper for errors. Many students fail to use this function; however, it truly is the best way to avoid the most typical mistakes in essay writing.
Once you have overcome the problems that are easiest to avoid, you must overcome the more complicated issues in essay writing. Another typical mistake found in essay writing is failing to align paragraphs with the topic sentence the essay is meant to cover. (more…)
November 12, 2009
Creating your essay outline is very simple; you start with a basic outline. The basic outline consists of only the Introduction, Body, and Conclusion. From there, you must determine how many words or pages you have to work with to meet the requirements of your course. Remember, some instructors will take away points for greatly exceeding word count as well as failure to reach the word count. You should split your word or page count between the introduction, body, and conclusion. The introduction and conclusion should be of similar length – this is because the introduction will provide information to guide the reader into the paper and the conclusion will only wrap back up on the key aspects covered in the paper. If your instructor requires a five-page paper, you would assign one page to the introduction, 1 page to the conclusion, and give the other three pages to the body of your paper. (more…)
July 10, 2009
There is a lot of information and tips on the web, these days, for how to write a good essay. Mostly it all says the same thing:
• Pick an essay topic,
• Gather any research,
• Write an essay outline,
• Write a thesis statement,
• Write the paper using the proper formatting and references,
• Edit the paper.
However, if that were all it took to write an essay; everyone would be good at it. You must consider your audience. Is the essay designed to be read only to your instructor? Probably; however, your instructor intends it for a particular audience. For instance, you may write an essay of the importance of art programs in schools and colleges aimed towards local politicians or board members attempting to remove funding. This requires professional language, solid facts, and persuasive speaking.
You will find that the grade level of your writing is also essential to creating understanding for your audience. If you writing level is over your audiences’ comprehension or reading level, they will quickly loss interest in your essay. A good essay recognizes the goals of the paper, reaches out to the intended audience with information they will understand and be familiar with, and written on an educational level equal to their needs. A good essay will also not be grade levels below the reader’s own. A scientific essay should be written on college grade level comprehension. (more…)
