19+ Essay Templates in PDF
Your elementary school teacher asked you to make 5 paragraphs about your pet at home or your favorite animal at the zoo. High school came with English compositions that required reading the sort of books you probably wanted to avoid at first, for their difficult, challenging language. Then college happened and naturally, you can’t go through it without turning in one academic paper after another, be it research work, essays or written analysis for your literature and history courses.
- 25+ Essay Outline Templates
- 29+ Outline Templates in PDF
In a nutshell, this is your life in the academy It’s made up of papers and more papers. It’s littered with writing tasks to prepare you for life within, beyond, and after the academe. Whether you like it or not, you will be required to write an essay, one way or the other, in school and wherever life takes you after school, so it’s imperative to learn all that you can in writing essays that are, at the very least, worth reading, even if they may not be contest or top class material. You may also see word essay templates.
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But for those who are considering writing as a profession, the essays that you have written and those that you will still have to write, will of course help make that possible, if only for developing your passion, creativity and skills when it comes to self-expression using the written word, for what better way is there to express yourself and communicate your thoughts, than to write them down? You may also see sample analysis essay templates.
For most students, essay writing often seems to be such a dreaded task, whether it is for next week’s English class, a scholarship grant or in some cases, a contest. True, it can be overwhelming if you are a student, especially if you are asked to write about a specific topic you have zero interest in, but while writing an essay means a heavy workload when you’ve got plans for the weekend, there are some steps and suggestions you can find useful whether you like the idea of essay writing or writing in general, in which case you should, because it takes up quite a big chunk of your student life. You may also see essay outline templates.
There are ways which would help break it into manageable parts, although useful essay writing suggestions can admittedly be hard to come by. Before making a draft of your essay, experts say the following tips are useful for you to score points and hit the mark. You may also see personal essay templates.
Understand the question
This part right here can sound rather banal but it remains to be true that failure to properly get the idea or understand the question being asked is one of, if not the most common reason behind getting a C minus for essay writing. You need to settle and cover your bases. For example, is this meant to be a critical evaluation of some author’s work? Is it a compare and contrast sort of thing that you need to write an analysis of? Are you being asked to evaluate something critically? Are they all of the above? When it comes to essay writing in the general sense, you never know. You may also see descriptive essay templates.
Choose a topic
Again, your instructor may have assigned a particular topic or you may be just as quickly and easily be given the freedom to write about a subject of your choice. If it’s the former, you should consider the type of paper that you want it to end up as. Do you think a general overview will give it justice, or is your aim to come up with a specific analysis? Narrow down your focus as necessary. You may also see scholarship essay templates.
In the event that you’re given free reign over what topic to choose, it’s safe to say you also have more work to do. Then again, try looking at it as a great chance to pick a subject you’re comfortable writing about or something you feel so strongly for. Something that may be really important and relevant to you. You can only do that if you know what your purpose for writing this essay is. You may also see college essay templates.
What do you mean to achieve? Is this a story you think deserves to be told, no matter how trivial it seems? Is your purpose to inform or to persuade? This would also help you use the appropriate tone of voice in your writing. Once you’re sure about your essay’s purpose, You still have some researching to do. It’s better if you make a shortlist of topics you find extremely interesting or controversial. Find something you think is worth sharing. You may also see sample persuasive essay templates.
You can start by thinking about your life. What are your interests? What challenges you, what motivates you? List these subjects or questions down and evaluate your options after. If the goal is to educate, choose a topic you’ve studied or are familiar with. If it’s to persuade, you obviously have to choose something that you’re passionate about. Whatever your purpose is, make sure that your topic interests you enough to provoke your thoughts or inspire you. You may also see sample personal essay.
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Structure, flow, and focus
How the argument is presented nearly holds the same importance as the argument itself. This means you should make sure that your essay should be structured logically. Perhaps one of the classic techniques of doing this is to “tell it three times.” Tell your audience, then tell them again and then tell them what you told them right after telling them. Sounds confusing? You’ll get the hang of it soon enough because this also follows for almost any type of academic writing. You may also see simple informative essay templates.
The concept of telling what you want to tell your audience three times is made up your introduction, getting to the body of your essay and the conclusion as your essay’s proper structure. Furthermore, only by having a logical and organized structure can your essay maintain focus and doesn’t stray from the main points. Each phrase paragraph and sentence should contribute something to the argument you’re trying to present. It’s often advisable to take one step back, reflect and ask yourself what value does a part of a paragraph add to your point whilst writing. You may also see literary essay templates.
How does it connect to the main argument? Does it provide sufficient answers for the question being asked at all? If you ail to get these questions answered, there’s a good chance that you have already deviated from your main points and you may have to reconsider where you are currently in writing your essay. You may also see printable reflective essay templates.
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Essay Questions
Here are some of the most common questions for essays, with each one having different set of expectations. If for example you’re being asked to provide an evaluation of a certain theoretical approach, you have to understand not only the theory but also the common approaches that goes with it. You must evaluate them against each other, listing down each of their strengths and weaknesses to arrive at a conclusion that is well-justified. Ask yourself if the theory is good and check its flaws. What are the areas for improvement? You may also see expository essay templates.
If however, you are required to evaluate the usefulness of something, you don’t need to break down into as much depth in critical analysis, although you should still recognize other options such as a different approach, as well as consider some strengths and weaknesses, but majority of the task must put emphasis on concepts for practical usefulness. The best way to do this is perhaps to read case studies where the theory in question had been used and the results. Did the theory’s application reveal any set of flaws or strengths and weaknesses?
Meanwhile, compare and contrast essays are essentially a cross between the previous two discussed, so you need to do this with a critical approach and evaluate the literature but your focus should remain on the certain theories that you have been tasked to compare and contrast. You should also be able to show in your writing that you understand both or all core theories enough, especially on a theoretical and application level. You may also see evaluation essay templates.
The wording of the essay question will be able to tell you essentially the manner in which it should be written. It will also define where the main point should lie in gathering the information you need and in writing your essay. You may also see college essay templates.
Prepare an outline or diagram of your ideas
Coming up with a successful essay should be half as tough if everybody knows how to properly organize their thoughts. Often the best way to do it is through creating an outline and writing down what’s in your head, on paper so that you’ll be able to easily detect connections between your ideas better, and in turn, develop a structure that serves as a good foundation for your essay. You may also see argumentative essay templates.
Try using either an outline or a diagram to list down your ideas and organize them later on. Creating a diagram should start with the topic at the top or center of your page. Draw about five lines tying the topic to the main ideas and thoughts you have formed from these ideas. You may also see five paragraph essay templates.
If you’re more comfortable with an outline, write your topic at the top of the page. From there, start listing your main ideas and making room under each one. In this space, make sure to list other “sub” or smaller ideas relevant to each main idea. This will allow you to see links, especially with arguments or points and will help you write a more organized and clearly-thought-out essay. You may also see narrative essay templates.
Plan and schedule
Understanding the question may be your first step in developing a great essay but it is just as important to make use of spare time. Most often than not, Students underestimate the amount of work and dedication it takes to write a good essay which could only give them two results: (1) spending late nights at the library or the internet or both and (2) a failing if not frustrating marks. You may also see sample leadership essays.
If your intentions are to gain a good grade, you should start planning your essay the moment you receive the essay question because it is only by setting deadlines for yourself with the conviction to commit and stick to it would you be able to ensure that you went be left cramming and doing a lot of work when you’re near the date of submission. It is also crucial to leave enough time, ideally a day or two, for going through your essay, checking for errors, finalizing your first draft and proofreading.
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Be critical
Theories and any academic approach, no matter how effective they prove to be, are rarely perfect. The clear majority of arguments, theories and studies are not necessarily devoid of errors. You can be descriptive if you want an easy way out, but if you want an impressive, well-thought and carefully researched output to get a higher grade, you need to go beyond your literary skills and show that you can rise above and be just as effective in critical reasoning for academic materials just as you are creative in assignments that are purely for compositions. You may also see best scholarship essay examples.
All theories have limitations. What are yours? Describe how this was dealt with in the literature. How do they affect the quality and weight of the arguments presented and what is the extent of the limits in an audience’s understanding of what you’re trying to study? What alternate explanations might offer additional depth? You may also see analytical essay outlines.
Anyone can be descriptive if they wanted to, but it is only through critical thinking that one’s essay can stand out from the rest of the pile. It shows the professor or marker that you aren’t just banking on authors of what you have researched for arguments that they have fed and presented and that you can for your own by actually engaging with the theories you have studied, in a manner required and expected by the academy in its general concept. You may also see outline templates in a word.
A good way of practicing this is to pay close attention when going through literature reviews in published articles because these reviews are also borderline, if not critical analysis of well-recognized materials, so that you will see that authors don’t simply repeat, echo and summarize previous points and arguments in previous studies, but offer a critique leading to a gap for what would necessarily become their own research. You may also see outline templates.
After thinking through it and checking what you have come up with, make sure that all the parts of your essay make up a comprehensive, organized and logical whole. It’s also important to observe proper transitioning from point to the next so that you will not lose your readers and make them wonder how you arrived from point A to point C. You may also see formal outline templates.
Students have a tendency to present essays with a list of arguments with little to no thought of how they relate and fit together which not only lead to a lower grade but also results in a material that’s very haphazardly done. Make sure to involve your reader in the transition of arguments, why they are presented in the manner you have chosen and how each argument help clarify a particular area of your essay’s discussion. You may also see research outline templates.
Read widely
There are six rules to writing like a pro they say. Read, read and read, they say. Then write, write and write some more. It’s not that simple though, because if you have noticed, writing may be the core task but reading is equally invaluable. Oftentimes, reading should come first because before starting to write, you should read a broad list of relevant reading materials to learn more about the question being asked, or the subject. It takes a great amount of skill and academic interest to learn how to sift through a great amount of information. You may also see thesis outline templates.
We live in the modern times so you would naturally start searching through extensive databases like Google Scholar. This is where your ability to put in keywords that would give you the search results for the right materials will be tested and come in handy. Once you find relevant literature that seems promising, make sure to read through the abstract to really check that it is indeed helpful for the topic you’ll be writing about. You may also see paper outline templates.
Libraries. Oh, good old libraries, how could you forget them? Reading through related research and material in the library can never be underestimated. Google may not be overrated and you may then it’s your ultimate research ally but it isn’t foolproof. You may also see research paper outlines.
To make sure that you have read enough material and gathered enough information that you would, later on, consolidate to help you form your own arguments, going to the library and reading archives, different types of reference, especially past research conducted by people who explored topics that are relevant to yours, is still very important. Google or not, you should make sure that every article you have used for your piece are solid and has enough relevance. You may also see reverse outlines.
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It’s not over ’til it’s over
You may think this task ends when you reach your conclusion but that’s where you’re easily wrong. Bfore considering this as a done and dusted work, you must pick your paper up, read it and pay close attentions to from the smallest to the most important details. Often the academic and artistic value of a written work is jeopardized just because of minor errors that were overlooked and could have been avoided. Don’t let this be one of those. You may also see thesis outline templates.
Check the order of your paragraphs. Your stronger points should, of course, be presented first and last within the body, with the rest of your arguments highlighted in the middle. Make sure that your paragraph is in its proper sense and order, especially if it’s an essay about a topic that should be presented in its correct order. If you feel I’m necessary, review the instructions given to you and check if you were able to comply because there are many professors who are particular with formats and forms and you must, therefore, double check that what you have written follows the instructions given to you when it was assigned. You may also see story outline templates.
Finally, read your essay and read it again then read it one more time just to be sure. Once you’re sure, you’re ready to submit your piece and be confident that you have given it your best shot so whatever the mark is, you’ll know that at the end of the day, the effort and dedication you have put in writing your essay is more than good enough. You can’t expect it to be treated and be considered as a perfect piece of work, but you can very much consider it as a job well done. You may also see biography outline templates.