Writing A Strong College Admissions Essay

Writing A Strong College Admissions Essay Writing an essay can be a difficult task, however this module will equip you with the necessary knowledge and skills to successfully write an essay. To outline the method of researching and preparing to write an academic essay. A step-by-step strategy to prepare for, research and write an academic essay. Imagine a reader, then try to predict their objections to your argument, and then demonstrate why they are wrong. A well-structured essay should consist of a series of paragraphs that progress logically through the series of points that you intend to cover. While you are reading, bear in mind what sort of material you are looking for in order to address the assigned topic. Even if you do come across a lot of interesting material when researching for your essay, be selective. Interesting material won’t gain you extra marks unless it is relevant. Good essay writing is a skill acquired rather than learnt. If you feel that you need more help in writing an assignment - then you can get free help at the HELPS unit. We’re located in building 1 level 3 room 8, just across from the Concourse café and the Careers Office. Please feel free to come and visit us and chat to an Advisor about receiving academic language support to complete your assesements. Now let's try and identify the essential elements to a paragraph by looking at an example taken from our assignment question. You’ll notice the first sentence is the topic sentence which clearly states the theme of the paragraph. Here you should summarize what it is that you have said in your essay, stating what your answer to the question is and why. Often, there is no simple answer (which is why you are writing an essay, and not a two-mark answer on a class test), so you should state what the complexities of the issue are. You may feel that you are repeating yourself, as the body of your essay should have made your argument clear already, but the reader will appreciate a good summary. Remember that good essays don’t just give evidence for their point of view, but also demonstrate why opposing views are flawed. Obviously, the difficult part is working out what that order should be. In essence, an essay is an argument, so your structure should be based on the particulars of your argument. Although this may sound obvious, a lot of essays lose marks for containing material that is simply irrelevant. Make sure that you read the assignment sheet thoroughly and are sure about what it asks for before you start reading for the essay. This is followed by the explanation or argument and then substantiated through the integration of evidence and demonstration of examples. Notice that it is important to include some form of critical analysis or observation. Finally, your concluding statement should articulate your voice or opinion. In addition to commencing your paragraph with a clear topic sentence, it is important to use linking words and phrases to create cohesion within and across paragraphs in your writing. The words you see on your screen are what we call transition signals or signpost words, and they can help the reader follow the order and flow of your ideas. We can tell that this is a preview from the use of key words such as “this essay will focus on”. Notice that further into this paragraph, signposting language is used to designate the structure of the essay, for example phrases such as “the first, second and last section”. Notice too that even a preview into the conclusion is mentioned here. This outline of your essay will set up a sort of contract with your reader, explaining what you will deliver to them in the body of your essay. This is designed to orientate the reader and provide them with some sort of context beforehand. It is absolutely critical to prepare your reader with this type of background information-do not immediately launch into your argument. Let’s imagine then, that we have spent some time and worked on our first draft of our essay and have written the introduction to the essay question. We can analyse the text in our sample introduction and look at the elements it needs to contain. In a previous online tutorial video we introduced you to a real-life assignment question and talked about how to structure the introduction and conclusion to an essay. Today we are going to have a look at the structure of a body paragraph â€" these paragraphs make up the most substantial part of an essay, report or case study. HELPS is dedicated to providing English language and academic literacy support to UTS undergraduate and postgraduate coursework students via free con-credit programs and services. This is the third paragraph of our introduction which contains a preview of the essay. This functions as kind of map to navigate the reader. Approaches vary from person to person and will depend on one’s experience in essay writing, almost to the point where a style of writing will be as individual as a signature. The ASK service is run by Student Academic Leaders who have demonstrated abilities in academic writing, research and general all around awesome-ness. If you are struggling to write the introduction, reword the essay question in your own words. Essays are a widely used form of assessment that is used by lecturers. As a student you will need to demonstrate the ability to create a coherent and logical argument that proves that you understood the course work.