By Peter J. Francis, HGPublishing Editor
The Free Essay Writing Help is divided into four sections. Section 1, of which this is the first page, is focused on general essay writing tips, a page about the thesis, and a page describing the structure of an essay. Section 2 focuses on the types of essays. Section 3 contains articles about essay writing. Section 4 contains questions and answers about essay writing.
This is Step 1: Essay Types
First decide what kind of essay you are writing. Remember, in all writing, you must be aware of your purpose and your audience. Your audience shouldn't be just your professor or teacher, but you should be thinking about what person might read an essay like this. Is it an educated person, is it a literary person? You have to let the reader know what you are writing about. Don't start an essay by saying "in the novel we read, the hero goes on a quest." You have to mention the name of the novel and the author. Usually you do this in the first sentence: "In Lord of the Flies, by William Golding, boys stranded on a tropical island revert to savagery in an exploration of humanity's darker side."
Types of Essays
There are several types of essays, generally separated into:
- Research Finding information about a topic and evaluating that information. This is often the essay assigned in a history class, or political science. You can't fake it here. You will need to read and cite from experts, using APA or MLA style to format your citations;
- Persuasive Taking a stand and using logic to get others to agree. Essentially all essays are about persuading someone to believe your point of view, but the persuasive essay is often assigned in high school, to practice the art if persuasion about current events or controversial topics;
- Demonstrative How to do something;
- Response Your thoughtful reaction to a work of art. This is an essay where you get to say if you like or not, but it's important to say why. You need to have some kind of standards by which to make a judgment;
- Review Your critical analysis of a work of art. This is not so much about whether or not you like it, it's about what it means and how it might relate to other similar works;
- Science Lab Report Your steps to evaluate a scientific principle or experiment.
- Admissions essays are special kind of personal narrative. You want to persuade the admissions officer that you are the right person for their campus.
For most kinds of essays, you always need to do a little reading before writing. You can't write an essay about something you haven't read or a topic you know nothing about. If you are writing a literary essay and you haven't read the work, or you simply want some extra insight, try visiting eNotes.com to download a plot summary and some notes. As you come to understand the material, you should be closer to defining a thesis for yourself. A thesis is simply one way of explaining what you have read, or explaining how the material relates to other material. But don't worry if you don't have a thesis at first, that's what brainstorming is for! The thesis is step 3 and we're only at step 2, Brainstorming.
Click here, if you want look at how to structure the essay: Structure.
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