How to write an essay? Essay

Writing an essay Define the context of your essay. The context is the scope of the essay. What are you being asked to write about? The context can include multiple parameters including: Topic. Sometimes your teacher or professor will give you a prompt that you’re required to use. If you do get an option to pick your own topic, then choose something that you genuinely want to become an expert about or something you feel passionate about discussing. Format. The length of the essay, the way the pages are put together and the presentation all matter. Follow the rules exactly as your teacher gives them to you so that you don’t lose points. Audience. With whom are you trying to communicate? Do you want to persuade your teacher, your peers or a college admissions committee? You’ll need to tailor your writing to the correct audience. Types of Essays Narrative Narration is telling a story from a certain viewpoint, and there is usually a reason for the telling. All narrative essays will have characters, setting, climax, and most importantly, a plot. The plot is the focus of the story and is usually revealed chronologically, but there are sometimes flash forwards and flash backs. In writing a narrative essay, remember to: Include sensory and emotional details, so the reader will experience the story, not just read about it Have the story support the point you are making, and make reference to that point in the first sentence. Write in the first or third person Descriptive Descriptive essays have text which describes traits and characteristics of people, objects, events, feelings, etc in intricate detail. Whatever is being described will be thoroughly examined. For example, if you were describing roses, you would explain: Where they come from What they look like What colors they are How they grow and smell When you write a descriptive essay, you want to involve the reader’s senses and emotions. For example, you could say, â€Å"I got sleepy† or describe it like this, â€Å"As I was waiting for Santa, my eyelids began to get heavy, the lights on the tree began to blur with the green branches, and my head started to drop.† The second sentence gives vivid details to make the reader feel like he is there. Exposition Expository essays can compare, explore and discuss problems, or tell a story. An exposition essay gives information about various topics to the reader. It: Informs Describes Explains In writing an exposition, the text needs to: Be concise and easy to understand Give different views on a subject or report on a situation or event Explain something that may be difficult to understand as you write your essay. Remember that your purpose is to explain. Argumentative In an argumentative essay the writer is trying to convince the reader by demonstrating the truth or falsity of a topic. The writer’s position will be backed up with certain kinds of evidence, like statistics or opinions of experts. The writer is not just giving an opinion, but making an argument for or against something and supporting that argument with data. To know how to write an essay in an argumentative way, you have to research and backup what you say in the text. Learn by Example When learning how to write an essay, sometimes the best way to learn is to look and analyze essay examples. Following are excerpts from narrative essays: â€Å"Looking back on a childhood filled with events and memories, I find it rather difficult to pick on that leaves me with the fabled â€Å"warm and fuzzy feelings.† As the daughter of an Air Force Major, I had the pleasure of traveling across America in many moving trips. I have visited the monstrous trees of the Sequoia National Forest, stood on the edge of the Grande Canyon  and have jumped on the beds at Caesar’s Palace in Lake Tahoe.† â€Å"The day I picked my dog up from the pound was one of the happiest days of both of our lives. I had gone to the pound just a week earlier with the idea that I would just â€Å"look† at a puppy. Of course, you can no more just look at those squiggling little faces so filled with hope and joy than you can stop the sun from setting in the morning. I knew within minutes of walking in the door that I would get a puppy†¦ but it wasn’t until I saw him that I knew I had found my puppy.† â€Å"Looking for houses was supposed to be a fun and exciting process. Unfortunately, none of the ones that we saw seemed to match the specifications that we had established. They were too small, too impersonal, too close to the neighbors. After days of finding nothing even close, we began to wonder: was there really a perfect house out there for us?† The following is an example of a famous narrative written by John Updike, â€Å"Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu†: â€Å"The afternoon grew so glowering that in the sixth inning the arc lights were turned on–always a wan sight in the daytime, like the burning headlights of a funeral procession. Aided by the gloom, Fisher was slicing through the Sox rookies, and Williams did not come to bat in the seventh. He was second up in the eighth. This was almost certainly his last time to come to the plate in Fenway Park, and instead of merely cheering, as we had at his three previous appearances, we stood, all of us, and applauded.† Following are excerpts from descriptive essays: â€Å"Like his twisted feathers, his many scars, the reliable old owl chose the gnarled, weather-beaten, but solid branch often—it being a companion to the wise alone with the night and the last branch to creak in the heaviest wind. He often came to survey the fields and the clouds before his hunt, to listen to the steady sound of the stream passing through reeds under the bridge, while combing his feathers for the unwanteds—whatever they might be.† Here is a descriptive essay about a first visit to a favorite diner written by a student at Roane State Community College:†When entering the door at Lou’s, two things are immediately noticeable: the place is rarely empty and seems to consist of a maze of rooms. The first room, through the door, is the main part of the restaurant. There is another, rarely used, dining room off to the right. It was added during the oil well boom of the seventies. Through the main dining room is yet another room; it guards the door leading into  the kitchen. This room contains the most coveted table in the place. The highest tribute Lou can bestow on anyone is to allow them access to seats at this table. This table is the family table; it is reserved for Lou’s, and her daughter Karen’s, immediate family and treasured friends.†