Different types of essay writing for college students

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What do you think of essay writing? Is it a fun and creative adventure for you or a daunting task? Essay writing is a huge part of school assignments, tests, and a requisite for university application. Writing a good essay involves evaluating data and information, persuasion, and expressing your thoughts clearly.

The best approach to understanding essays is getting to know the different types of essays. We will discuss some of them in this article.

Expository essay

An expository essay serves the purpose of explanation. It uses facts and evidence to give a clear and objective view of a certain subject or process. It maintains a neutral tone to give a fair view of the issue.

An expository essay makes a coherent and logical argument on a complex issue without proving a point or providing the writer’s opinion. Expository writing is used in diverse fields including; science, journalism, and business.  

Analytical essay

This type of essay provides insight on analysis on a piece of art, current events, scientific research, politics, philosophy, etc. Most information in an analytical essay is contextualized and explained in basic terms for the reader to understand.

Analytic essays help students improve their writing skills and have a better understanding of a particular subject. Analytical writings enable readers to understand expert opinions on certain fields such as economics, architecture, culture, etc.

Descriptive essay 

A descriptive essay offers clear details of an object, place, event, or even an abstract occurrence such as an emotion. It gives the writer a right to employ creativity and self-expression.

Descriptive essays use figurative language to give vivid details about a particular subject. A good descriptive essay is well organized, highly detailed, and focuses more on evidence than opinion. The fundamental element for writing descriptively is by infusing life to your subject for your audience.

Narrative essay

A narrative essay tells a story about an experience you had. It tests a writer’s ability to narrate experiences in an interesting and creative manner. A narrative essay has one main characteristic. It contains a main motif or theme that the story revolves around. All the dialogue, events, and characters of the essay revolve around this particular motif.

Elements of a narrative essay include:

·         Character – this is the totality of qualities that define the people in your essay. They include activities, thoughts, emotions, etc.

·         Theme or motif – stated in the thesis statement of an essay. The theme is broken down and discussed in the body of the essay.

·         Dialogue – used to demonstrate conversation between the characters. Without dialogue in a narrative essay, characters lose their dynamism.

Persuasive essay

Persuasive essays are rhetoric in nature. This means that they employ the art of convincing when writing. As a writer, you should convince your audience to agree to a particular point of view or take certain action steps.

A persuasive essay needs good research, awareness of reader/writer bias, and a firm comprehension of the issues at hand. It should not only demonstrate why your stand is correct but why the opposing opinion is incorrect. The main purpose of this kind of essay is to persuade rather than inform. It is widely used in marketing. `

Steps to writing a good essay

Preparation, writing, and reviewing your essay are the main steps to writing an essay. Time, effort, and technique spent on these steps, however, slightly differ depending on the type of essay to be written. These steps can further be divided into:

Preparation

·         Pick a suitable topic for your essay

·         Research on the topic you have picked or the topic assigned to you by your instructor

·         Gather sources for your topic

·         Create a thesis for your essay

·         Create an outline for your essay

Writing

·         Write the introduction and include the thesis statement

·         Write the body of the essay with each point in a different paragraph

·         Write the conclusion

Revision

·         Assess the organization of the essay, i.e. order of events, logic, etc.

·         Proofread for grammatical errors

·         Review and adjust the content of each paragraph

As demonstrated in the above article, essay writing is a very enjoyable and fulfilling task. It allows you to explore their creativity and at the same time develop writing and analytic skills.

 

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