How To Write A 5 Paragraph Essay

How To Write A 5 Paragraph Essay Structured, critical thought and communication are crucial to master during your degree. Regardless of your plans after, being a good writer and clear thinker will give you a leg up your competition. Writing Essays takes you through the whole essay writing process â€" from preparing and planning to completion. You may already be quite comfortable writing essays and if so, you will have a definite feel for what works for you. You should pay special attention to Section 4.3 on stylistic conventions, as there is little scope for flexibility on these matters within a particular academic discipline. Plan and structure the body paragraphs of your essay into topic sentences with bullet points for each paragraph. Michael recommends that you begin writing your essay by expanding your plan. One of these points is that you are writing an academic essay, and as such, are required to use a reasonably formal style of writing. This does not mean that you should be obscure, or use impossibly long sentences with multisyllabic words, but you should avoid being overly colloquial. More importantly, your plan will ensure that you actually answer the question. Everything you write must be related to the question, and without a plan it is all too easy to lose focus and write irrelevant nonsense. This will be immediately obvious to anyone reading the essay and gain you a few marks. First and foremost, you must fully understand what you're being asked and in how much depth you're required to answer the question. Michael says that one of the biggest problems students face when it comes to essays is squarely addressing the topic. This is without doubt the most vital part of writing an essay. It is your plan that determines what approach you take to answering the question. If you have written your plan properly, you will know exactly what your answer is going to be â€" this is not something that should be decided while you are writing your essay. 'You may find it helpful to write the conclusion first, especially if you know exactly what it is you want to argue,' he adds. 'This can help you to clarify your ideas and also give you something to work towards. Writing essays is structured progressively and I recommend that you use it in this way. However, you will see from the sidebar that the guide is divided into a number of main sections. Often you will be given a word limit, or suggested length for an essay. Use this information to gauge the level of detail, and degree of coverage that is expected. Obviously, an essay of 1500 words will have a narrower focus and will require greater summarizing skills than one of 3000 words. Note that markers will penalize essays that are too long. Keeping to the limit tells the marker that you understand what is important in your argument. Read the question several times to make sure you understand what it is asking. Essay writing is a skill worth perfecting as the techniques you need to master in order to write good essays generalize very well to the world outside academia. Components of a good essay also relate to other communicative skills, such as giving talks or presentations. What constitutes “good style” is one of the hardest things to state explicitly, and is perhaps the criterion most open to personal variation. But there are some points that you should bear in mind. Planning your essay makes the writing process quicker and easier. You'll be able to focus on expressing your ideas while remaining within the word count, rather than having to organise your thoughts as you write, which often leads to waffling. The key to a well-written essay is providing your reader with a clear thesis, coherent supporting paragraphs, and a smooth conclusion in your final paragraph. If you plan your essay with these components in mind you will find that it enhances your ability to think critically.