Essays
TYPES OF ESSAYS:
A. ARGUMENTATIVE ESSAYS: a piece of writing that takes a stance on an issue. In a good argumentative essay, a writer attempts to persuade readers to understand and support their point of view about a topic by stating their reasoning and providing evidence to back it up.
B. DISCURSIVE ESSAYS: A discursive essay seeks to explain all possible views and positions on a given topic, subject, or issue at hand. This type of essay intends to present both sides of the argument. It acknowledges and analyses arguments both for and against any given topic.
Essays are always written to be read by a teacher.
They are FORMAL, academic text types.
Essays should have:
a title (it is highly advisable to give essays a title)
an introduction:
body paragraphs: developing the arguments: each body paragraph should have
a "topic sentence": a sentence that summarises what each body paragraph is about
supporting sentence(s)- these should provide evidence/examples for your argument
a sentence that closes the paragraph- closing sentence
conclusion
Ideas and supporting arguments should be clearly organised into paragraphs- in a logical manner.
SEE EXAMPLES OF ESSAYS ANALYSED BELOW 👇- SCROLL DOWN
(Subtitles are available)
GRAPHIC ORGANISER (My own take on the "hamburguer graphic organiser"):
https://natalialzam.wordpress.com/2019/03/24/writing-useful-expressions-for-an-essay/
https://natalialzam.wordpress.com/2019/11/30/signposting-language-for-essays/
https://natalialzam.wordpress.com/2016/11/19/na2-writing-an-opinion-essay/
https://natalialzam.wordpress.com/2021/10/12/ways-to-refer-to-data-in-studies-and-surveys/
Trinity ISE- guidance on writing genres (ISE III-C1)
Sample discursive essay- analysed
Would you like to practise writing an essay independently? Try this AI bot 🤖