Archive for January, 2008

The Types of Academic Essays

January 17th, 2008

Essay is a kind of paper presenting the author’s subjective point of view on a certain debatable issue. Academic essay papers can be of different types that will be presented in the given article. Some academic essay papers are longer than the others (for about 2,000 to 5,000 word limit). They usually begin with the short summary analysis on what has been already written on the topic, that is called “literature review”.

Long essay usually consist of the introductory paragraphs where the thesis statement is defined. The list given below enumerates all existing academic essay papers:

  • Descriptive essays – the purpose of descriptive essay writing is to present the events or personalities vividly for the reader to get the image of what he/she is reading about;
  • Compare-contrast essays – the purpose of writing this essay type of papers is to develop relation of 2 or more things, using simile;
  • Narrative essays – the purpose of narrative essay writing is to describe the events from the subjective vantage point. This kind of essay papers can be written in 1st person singular past tense;
  • Persuasive essays – in this essay type of the writer aims to persuade the reader in a certain point of view or agree with his/her own opinion;
  • Argumentative essays – they set the thesis statements and then provide reasons for thinking that this thesis is true;
  • Reflective essays – this essay type of deals with topics of abstract nature, such as habits, ambitions, etc.

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The Art of Concentration on Essay Writing

January 17th, 2008

All essay types need certain concentration. Learning to concentrate when writing any essay type is a skill that will be useful until the rest of life. It is a real art to eliminate any distractions and completely focus attention on essay writing. Some of students just read the material and 20 minutes later they suddenly find out they do not remember what they actually have just read about. It happens because they are not concentrated on the task they are doing. That is why we would like to present you suggestions on how to stay focused on essay writing.

  • Try to find a quite place to study. Nothing should distract your attention, like loud music, noise, TV, Radio, etc;
  • Try to keep to the schedule for you have made. Do the matters planned every day and try not to forget to do what you have planed beforehand;
  • Ask yourself questions on the material you are learning just to get involved into work. It will help you forget about your personal problems and imagine as if somebody is asking you them;
  • Take breaks in order not to be too tired of the work you are doing. But these breaks should last not more than 10 minutes, otherwise, being alone will make you think of your problems again and you will not be able to concentrate again;
  • Read more about the materials you are learning. The more you read, the more you get to know, the more interested you will become in the materials you are learning.

Essay Types: Persuasive Essay

January 17th, 2008

Writing each of the essay types pursue certain purposes. When you write a persuasive essay, your major purpose is to convince the reader to embrace your personal point of view on a certain problem. If you keep this purpose in mind, you will certainly succeed in writing your persuasive essay.

When writing all essay types you should compose a certain plan to keep to. It also concerns writing a persuasive essay. So, let us present the steps of writing a persuasive essay:

  • Determine your point of view or the main idea of your persuasive essay. Your task will be to persuade your reader to accept your opinion;
  • Identify your audience. To succeed in your persuasive essay, try to understand your readers. For instance, is your audience undecided about your issue? Or, perhaps, is your reader hostile to your point of view?
  • Try to identify the strongest supporting points considering your reader for persuasion;
  • Determine the most significant opposing point of view. If you explain and then refute the opposite point of view, your essay will certainly become significant.

All essay types require following the certain structure, and a persuasive essay is not an exception here. Your persuasive essay should consist of introduction, body paragraphs, including evidence to support your point of view as well as presentation of the opposite view, and of course, conclusion.

After your persuasive essay is finished, read it aloud to your friends or relatives. If they are inclined to your opinion, your persuasive essay is a real success.

Essay Types: Narrative Essay

January 17th, 2008

Each of the essay types differ from each other by the requirements and main characteristics. In this article we will consider one of the essay types, called narrative essay. We will also consider the basic qualities of descriptive essay and the steps for writing it.
 
A narrative essay is a paper recreating an experience through time. It can be based on your own experience as well as the experience of people who surround you. Narrative essay should not only tell the story but communicate the main idea or a lesson learnt.
 
When writing any kind of essay types, one should follow the certain system. What steps should you take when writing a descriptive essay? They can be presented as follows:

  • Determine the experience you would like to share with the reader;
  • Try to think about why the chosen fact or even is significant;
  • Spend some time on drafting the recollections in details;
  • Compose an outline of the major parts of your narrative;
  • On the basis of your outline describe each part of your narrative;
  • Instead of telling the reader about what happened, make use of vivid details to recreate the experience for your reader;
  • Try to think of the details that would be the most interesting and exciting to the reader. Remember that the reader will face your story for the first time, so make your narration clear enough;
  • Remember that small details are not always interesting to the reader. Mind that it is not always necessary to tell about everything.

Descriptive Essay

January 17th, 2008

Among the other essay types descriptive essays give a vivid picture of a certain person, place, memory, experience or an object. The writer of this essay type has to describe the object of his/her essay using detailed observations. Thus, what you experienced or perceived can be the focus of the descriptive essay.

Without any doubts all essay types are interesting to write, though, of course, it depends on the person’s likes and dislikes. Still, descriptive essay remains one of the most interesting essay types. Is it not a great creative exercise to write simply about what you are observing. Although, when writing your descriptive essay, you have a specific reason for writing and description. Getting in touch with this reason may help you imbue your language with particular emotion.

What differentiates descriptive essay from any other kind of an essay? Descriptive essay aims to show but not only tell. Let us consider 2 examples:
I stopped talking as soon as I heard somebody’s knocking at the door.

Our exciting conversation was interrupted by a terrifying knocking at the door, that sounded like a thunderstorm on the sky covered with dark clouds.

The first sentence is a dry statement of information when the second one providing the reader with images. Thus, the second sentence is showing. Such kind of sentences enable the reader to imagine or experience something. That is why this type of sentences are preferable to be used in your descriptive essay. if you use them properly, your descriptive essay will obviously be successful one.