Showing posts with label essay writing tips. Show all posts
Showing posts with label essay writing tips. Show all posts

Friday, April 12, 2013

How to Write Essays - 4 Easy Essay Writing Tips

f you've been consistently struggling with how to write essays, this article will show you four easy steps to writing consistently high quality essays. The main things you need to focus on are the essay subject, the opening paragraph, the overall structure of the essay, and your essay content and analysis. This article also provides links to two excellent resources for essay writing.

1. Picking a Subject for Your Essay

The first step when working out how to write essays is to decide what your subject or theme will be. Knowing the subject of your essay enables you to focus your efforts. You can immerse yourself in finding out all there is to know about a particular topic without any chance of getting distracted.

If possible, pick a subject you are interested in, because this will make writing the essay much easier. Even if you have been given a topic, try and find an 'angle' to it that has some interest to you. Good resources for essay material are the internet, written or e-books, journals or even interviews of people versed in your chosen subject.

Once you have found your topic, the next thing to focus on is the structure of your essay.

2. Structuring Your Essay

A vital part of learning how to write essays is to understand the importance of structure. Structure helps the reader to understand where your essay is going and what you are trying to tell them. Think of the structure as a 'framework' around which you can build your writing,

Firstly, while researching your topic, write down the main points in dot point form, using only a few words - these will form the main structure for your essay. It doesn't matter much at this stage what order they are in - you can sort that out later.

Under each main point, jot down 2 or 3 sub points that go into a bit more detail about that particular aspect of your essay.

Once you have this basic structure in place, you can start thinking about how many words to write for each part of your essay.

3. Number of words in your essay

This is a very important aspect of how to write essays. Let's say you have 2000 words to write for the whole essay and 5 main points, with 2 subpoints for each. Remember that you will also need an introductory and concluding paragraph, so that makes it about 12 paragraphs in total. This means you will need to write about 150-200 words per paragraph or sub point. Once you start to break it down in this way, you can see that learning how to write essays is not overwhelming - all you have to do is write a short piece of text for each of the ideas you are presenting.

Once you have the structure written down in note form, with the number of words for each paragraph, you can start to work on the details of your essay content.

4. Essay Content and Analysis

Look at what you have read for each of the main points of your essay and work out how you can talk about it in your own words, or in a more informative way. Look at your essay research notes and decide for yourself if the writers have made claims which, in your opinion, lack substance. If necessary, compare different claims and write down which of them is more valid, in your opinion, and explain why to your reader. Remember that each paragraph needs to lead into the next. This 'smooths out' the structure and helps the essay to 'flow' better.

Analysis can be a challenging thing to tackle when you are first starting to learn how to write essays, but it is well worth persevering with because it will make your essays much more worthwhile and readable.

Conclusion

In this article you have seen there are only four steps to writing a great essay. Learning how to write essays is an important part of improving your communication skills. It will be time well spent and there are many tools available to make your task much easier.

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Take Advantage of These Essay Writing Tips

In case you have an assignment to hand in, then you will be very well advised to rely on essay writing tips. Using these tips, you will be able to perfect your essays and ensure that you get top marks once your assignment is returned to you after grading. This way, your chances of getting that 1st Class Honors or graduating Summa Cum Laude are greatly enhanced.

Most students are of the view that essay writing is one of the hardest tasks in college. Others view it as being trifling and boring. Therefore, as a result they end up getting the lowest grades since they are intimidated by writing. However, using the tips you will learn, chances are high that you will give better essays to your lecturers and get better marks as a result.

1. Essay Types

The first thing you need to note is that there are different kinds of essays. This means that you should consult your writing tips to differentiate between these essays. Each essay kind comes with its own detailed description and peculiarities. The structural parts are also different as are the expectations of the lecturers.

2. Writing Stages

You should also keep in mind that there are a number of stages through which any written work- colleges included- have to pass through before they can be considered to be complete. It is highly recommended that you ensure that you do not miss any stage. All stages must also be accorded the necessary attention. This way, you reduce your chances of making errors and your writing will turn out to be efficient and faultless.

3. Common Subjects for Essays

There are various kinds of subjects into which all essays fall. All of these subjects are different and unique in their own way. They also require different approaches and logical organization skills which can be scrapped up from the writing essay tips.

4. Formatting Style

On the other hand, every essay that you will be required to research on, write and submit has its own formatting style. For you to hand in perfect essays, you will be wise to ensure that you use writing an essay tips to discover the kind of format that any given essay should follow. This way, your will avoid making errors.

Finally, once you submit your essay, it will be perfection personified. Lecturers often review the essay even before they mark it to check the formatting. Therefore, ensure you order your work well to raise your chances of wining over the marker.

Friday, September 7, 2012

Essay Writing Tips - 6 Steps to Writing a Great Essay

If writing an essay seems like a daunting experience, then learning how to break the process down into a number of easy steps will give you the confidence you need to produce an interesting, high quality piece of work. This article provides 6 essay writing tips that will take you from an initial idea through to the finished product.

1. Select your topic carefully

If your topic has many different aspects, then a very useful essay writing tip is to narrow it down to one specific area, and make sure you explain this in your introduction. This will make for better reading than if you try to cover everything, and will definitely improve the quality of your work. If you get to choose your own topic, make it something you are interested in. This way the research will become much easier and your enthusiasm will 'rub off' on your readers.

2. Do Your Research

Another useful essay writing tip is to make sure you spend sufficient time looking into all the aspects of your chosen topic. Read as much relevant material as possible, and make notes along the way so you don't forget anything. Also note down where you have got your ideas from; i.e. author name, book or article title and page number.

3. Write Down the Main Arguments

Once you've researched your subject, summarise the main arguments and ideas you have read. Do not copy other people's words, just choose the important points and summarise these in your own words. This is a highly important essay writing tip - whatever you do, make sure you don't plagiarise another author's work.

Prepare the basic structure of the essay in dot point headings, using only a few words to describe each main point. Play around with the structure until you feel that the sequence is right. Put the most important point first, followed by the next most important point, and so on.

Then paste your research summaries under each heading (you can delete these later).

4. Fill Out the Body of the Essay

This is where you discuss in detail your thoughts and ideas on the chosen topic, and 'fill out' the summaries you wrote earlier. Under each main point, introduce the evidence supporting your theories, together with arguments and any other points you wish to make. A good essay writing tip is to make sure these are thought provoking and interesting, as well as informative.

End each paragraph or section with some type of conclusion, or 'lead in' sentence to the next paragraph.

Now that you have written the main body of the essay, you can go back to writing the 'Introduction', followed by the essay 'Conclusion'.

5. Write Your Introduction

In some ways this is the most important part of your essay. One of the best essay writing tips is to use the introduction to grab the reader's attention and give them a 'taste' of the information to come that will make them want to keep on reading.

Describe briefly what the essay is about, and your research sources, and explain what the reader will get out of reading the essay. Finish the introduction with a clear explanation of your point of view, or of the main essay idea.

6. Write Your Conclusions

Start this section by briefly summarising the results and conclusions of your research. Tell the reader what your main conclusion is, and why. Make sure you have also checked and formatted your references that will go at the end of the essay.

A great essay writing tip is to end the essay with a memorable, thought provoking statement that in some way 'sums up' your findings.

These essay writing tips will help you to produce a well structured essay, but don't forget to edit and proof read your work thoroughly to ensure there are no spelling, grammatical or punctuation errors.