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Teaching Essay Writing in High School: 8 Methods

If we talk about an “essay,” it is rather a presentation of one’s own experience about something. In addition, essays are objective and subjective. Before starting work on an essay, you should make sure that you understand exactly the essence of the task and can choose the right approach. After choosing a topic, you need to collect material and narrow down the circle of your statements. But what is next?

Teaching Essay Writing in High School: 8 Methods

What Is an Essay?

It is a small (in terms of volume) size text, presented in free form. It expresses the author’s opinion, experience, and thoughts on something. It is not uncommon for students to write an essay as one of the tasks. These papers can be divided into two main areas. These are:

  • Objective — they set out personal thoughts in a specific direction, supported by something;
  • Subjective — consider a personal point of view, albeit on a specific problem, not supported and not claiming to be true.

Essay content can also be divided into several subcategories:

  • Philosophical;
  • Critical;
  • Literary;
  • Historical;
  • Artistic, and others.

The essence of the essay is a very broad direction. The author’s opinion or observation is the only thing that remains unchanged.

Also read, Top Essays on the Importance of Education (Learn to Write the Best Essay Now).

How to Write a Good Essay?

If you want to write a good essay, you should follow eight rules:

 

1. Skip the long intro

You are writing for a prepared reader (probably the one who gave you the topic for the essay). There is no need to talk about the problem’s relevance and its importance. Start right away. The same goes for the conclusion. Don’t waste the reader’s time.

 

2. Brief information about the author

What inspired the author to write the work? What did they say about it? What issues did you raise in the text? Don’t forget that the material you want to include in the essay must be relevant to the stated topic. Don’t write too much. Remember that you just need to present your arguments.

Also read, 8 Tips to Do a Paper in MLA Format

 

3. Your text must have structure.

At least some. Make an essay plan. No matter how much we deny it, we must admit that nothing really works without a clear plan. How should it look?

  • Introduction. Here you can tell details from the author’s biography or the history of the creation of the work, mention the historical context or other works that tell about this problem.
  • Formulation of the problem. Smoothly sum up the introduction to this part and indicate the problem stated in the topic of the essay.
  • Comment on the problem. Here, it is necessary to indicate the problem in the text and modern society.
  • The position of the author. It is necessary to get acquainted with literary criticism and historical manuals to highlight this point. Only a full understanding of the context will help you get the most accurate idea of ​​the author and work.
  • Personal opinion. Here it is recommended to express your opinion on this problem. However, don’t devote too much space and time to this part of the essay.
  • Literary arguments. Recall works with similar problems to build connections and logical chains.
  • Conclusion. Summarize what has been written.

Also read, Essay Writing Tips

 

 4. Use Templates

In any other situation, a template is bad. But here, it helps save time and maintain the rigid structure of your essay. When creating an essay, a template can be a hint for you: where to start and how to end a paragraph, how to make the transition from one thought to another, and most importantly, how to fill the introduction and conclusion.

So, for example, you can use the following phrases in the introduction:

  • “This topic has been worrying humanity for a long time,”
  • “More than one author has thought about this problem, and (you) are no exception.”

In conclusion, it would be appropriate to say:

  • “This piece teaches us…”
  • “Summing up, we can say that…”, etc.

Feel free to use expressions like:

  • “I fully share the author’s point of view.”
  • “The author’s position is…”
  • “This topic shows that…”, etc.

However, don’t forget that your position is of much less interest than presenting specific facts and views of eminent critics of literature.

Also read, Pros and Cons of Getting a Ph.D. in Marketing 

 

5. Prepare in advance

It is worth starting to prepare for writing essays in advance. The sooner you start reading the information and analyzing texts, the better. You can even start a separate notebook to enter plot collisions and character names into it schematically. Train your hand and bring the process to automatism.

 

6. Divide the text into paragraphs

Nobody is interested in your ability to keep a thought in a paragraph on a whole page. Make your text reader-friendly. Also, each part is usually started with a paragraph for ease of perception. Details are important only if they help get the point across. If a sentence or phrase doesn’t improve the thought or affect the overall perception of the idea, it is better to delete it.

Also read, Tips to Become an Impactful Writer in 2020. Where to Start

 

7. Take notes when working with sources

When studying information, you should keep detailed records and fix ideas that interest you and questions that need to be studied. If you are going to use such information in your work, then write down the details for citation to correctly format the references. Try taking notes on separate cards or in a word document on your computer to easily copy, paste, and rearrange text passages. Next, categorize your notes to find specific ideas quickly. For example, you can group notes by topic or character to analyze a book.

 

8. Re-read the text and pay attention to obvious problems

When re-reading, first of all, pay attention to the main problems. Try reading aloud to catch points that your eyes might miss. Spot problem areas but don’t try to fix the situation right away. Pay attention to the following points:

  • Redundancy of words;
  • Insufficiently clear explanations;
  • Related or unnecessary information;
  • Unclear transitions or insufficiently logical organization of the text;
  • Spelling, grammatical, stylistic, and formatting errors;
  • Inappropriate speech or tone.

If possible, show the work to another person. If you devote a lot of time to writing, then the brain begins to “think out” the endings of words. As a result, it is easy to miss even obvious mistakes. Writing an essay develops the skill of expressing one’s thoughts. Having mastered it, you can always argue your point of view.

If you need to write an essay and don’t know how to do it right, the best way is to turn to the cheap essay writing service. AffordablePapers’ online experts can write an essay urgently and inexpensively. So, ordering custom help from them means getting a 100% quality work guarantee.

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