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How to Write an Essay
Essays are common in middle school, high school and college. You may even need to write essays in the business world (although they are usually called "reports" at that point). An essay is defined as "a short piece of writing that expresses information as well as the writer's opinion."
7 Steps to Writing an Essay
For some, writing an essay is as simple as sitting down at their computer and beginning to type. But, a lot more planning goes into writing an essay successfully. If you have never written an essay before, or if you struggle with writing and want to improve your skills, it is a good idea to follow a number of important steps in the essay writing process.
For example, to write an essay, you should generally:
Decide what kind of essay to write
Brainstorm your topic
Research the topic
Develop a thesis
Outline your essay
Write your essay
Edit your writing to check spelling and grammar
While this sounds like a lot of steps to write a simple essay, if you follow them you will be able to write more successful, clear and cohesive essays.
1. Choose the Type of Essay
The first step to writing an essay is to define what type of essay you are writing. There are four main categories into which essays can be grouped:
Narrative Essay: Tell a story or impart information about your subject in a straightforward, orderly manner, like in a story.
Persuasive Essay: Convince the reader about some point of view.
Expository Essay: Explain to the reader how to do a given process. You could, for example, write an expository essay with step-by-step instructions on how to make a peanut butter sandwich.
Descriptive Essay: Focus on the details of what is going on. For example, if you want to write a descriptive essay about your trip to the park, you would give great detail about what you experienced: how the grass felt beneath your feet, what the park benches looked like, and anything else the reader would need to feel as if he were there.
Knowing what kind of essay you are trying to write can help you decide on a topic and structure your essay in the best way possible. Here are a few other types of essays:
Argumentative Essay: Take a position on a controversial issue and present evidence in favor of your position.
Compare and Contrast Essay: Identify similarities and differences between two subjects that are, typically, under the same umbrella.
Problem Solution Essay: Describe a problem, convince the reader to care about the problem, propose a solution, and be prepared to dismantle objections.
If you've been assigned an argumentative essay, check out these Top 10 Argumentative Essay Topics.
