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Writing Your Personal Essay

“Whatever you write about, what matters most is that you’ve chosen the topic because you aren’t quite sure what you want to think about it. Write about what confuses you, what puzzles you, or what raises itchy questions.”

Introduction

A personal essay may be written for a variety of purposes.  This essay aims to write about your personal feelings, desires, and beliefs.

The initial step is to pick a theme or topic to be written about.  A personal essay may be about a topic of interest or narrative – in the form of a story.

The most important questions in a narrative essay are:

1. What do I remember or see that I would like to think about?
2. Which of these raise the most interesting questions to explore?
3. What do I understand now about this topic that I did not before?

 How to write a personal essay?

The topic for a personal essay may be: Make a list of ten beliefs that you held when you were 5 years old, Are some types of beliefs tied to age?, What changed your personality? One of the key events in your life, The most meaningful person for you, What profession is the most valuable for you? What did you learn from past mistakes? Etc.

  This kind of essay consists of subjective response – most commonly an individual’s reaction to something or someone. The most common causes are an event, person, place, concept etc.  The personal essay is written in an active voice – because it describes the writer’s inner state.

The purpose of descriptive writing is to describe a person, place, or thing in a way to form the picture in the reader’s mind.

Choose the introduction, to begin with, an opening sentence and write from your point of view. Make a personal essay as informative and interesting as possible. In the beginning, write an outline using a variety of library tools (repetitions, metaphors, personifications, etc.).

The organization of an essay

In this kind of descriptive writing, it is advised to use specific adjectives and nouns. To create a vivid picture in the reader’s mind it is necessary to use those words as well as action verbs.

Organize well descriptive writing. It may be through chronological writing (time), spatial (location) and the order of importance. There are several mistakes that you should avoid. The most common are the absence of organization, boring topic, no structure, absence of moral and inappropriate lexis.

The essay structure

The common structure of a personal essay consists of the introduction, main paragraphs, and the conclusion. In the introduction, part begins with a short introduction to the selected topic. The number of main paragraphs depends on the number of topics, usually 3-5. In the conclusion, summarize all the previously written topics and have a brief final concluding statement.

Personal narratives usually do not follow the 5 paragraph essay style. These essays are more in the form of storytelling.  Try to use personal experience and observations to drive inquiry. Apply the exploratory thinking of personal essays in different forms. Identify the characteristics of personal essays in different forms. Apply the invention strategies to discover and develop a personal essay topic and apply revision strategies effectively to follow the narrative story.

What is a 1000-Word Essay?

The essay is a brief narration that describes and analyzes a particular subject.  The essay consists of an introduction, three body paragraphs and a conclusion. The essay aims to introduce itself directly.

 Start by collecting as much data as possible. That way you will have a greater knowledge and to precisely choose the most adequate data for the essay.  The literary work is used to prove or support the understanding of a topic. It provides its own formal interpretation of a certain thesis.

The introduction is the first paragraph of an essay. It includes a hook, initial information and the thesis statement. A thesis statement is the main idea of the essay and is written as one sentence in the form of a statement. The topic sentence is the first sentence of a body paragraph. It introduces the focus of the body paragraph. List the sources you used in the paper, alphabetical order and with complete bibliographical information.

A conclusion is the last paragraph of an essay. It includes a modified thesis and a clincher or challenge to the reader. A parenthetical citation is defined as a material included in parentheses within the paper. You may use direct quotations, paraphrase and avoid plagiarism. Include references to the sources of all quotations, facts, statistics and matters of opinion that are not your own but may occur at the presentation.

Types of essay

There are several types of the essay such as:

• argumentative/persuasive,
• compare and contrast,
• literary analysis,
• reflective/narrative essay.

The argumentative essay requires the reader to have your way of thinking. The compare and contrast essay is used to examine 2 or more subjects and the similarities and/or differences between them. A reflective essay shares something you have read, learned, written or experienced. 

The structure of an essay

To prove the thesis, develop and expand on the topic with the examples and citations from the literary writing task. The body paragraph develops ideas about the topic. The use of quotes means each quote included, must consist of 2-3 lines of explanation.  The first sentence of the conclusion is a restatement of the thesis. Try not to introduce any new information in the conclusion. Summarize the main points of the argument from each paragraph in a way that shows they have been proven. Restate the most important points as a means of bringing the argument to a close.

Formatting means to use the correct title page format, double-space when necessary and correct the grammar mistakes.

Cause and Effect Essay Topics

The cause and effect essay explains why or how certain events happened,  the result, etc. It represents a study of the relationship between 2 or more events or experiences. This type of essay describes why certain things happen and what may be  a result. 

The cause and effect writing provides reasons and explanations for events, conditions, or behavior. The cause and effect essay consists of the introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion.

How to write a cause and effect essay?

There are several steps in the process of writing a cause and effect essay. First, go through all the necessary parameters and plan detailed research on the selected thesis. Choose the main topic and a title. Then, highlight the causes and effects to prove with an outline proposal. This type of essay should answer the question of why.

When developing a thesis, define whether you are writing about causes, effects, or both together. Present the main idea – with the cause and effect terms.

The supporting body paragraphs should be written in the chronological, order of importance or categorical manner. Use the most adequate transition words such as due to, because, for, first, second, consequently, etc. In case of effects, use thus, consequently, as a result, etc.

Essay organization

A cause and effect essay may be organized in two main blocks. The most common are  block or chain organization. In block organization, the first is to discuss all the causes as a block, then all the effects together.

In block organization, a short paragraph separates a major section from the other major section (transition paragraph).  Its main aim is to conclude one section and introduce the other one. In a chain-reaction essay, the audience describes how one event causes the other. 

The initial drafting of the essay determines the cause and effects of the given thesis.

In the writing process, state both cause and effect as precisely  as possible. Try to make sure to show the cause and the effect are closely related. Use words that express cause and effect (why, when, such as why, as a result, therefore, etc.).  In order to write appropriately a cause and effect essay, it is necessary to define both cause and effect. The cause must provide an answer to why something happened, whilst an effect of why something happened as a result.

It is recommended to chronologically write the supporting details so to arrange details in the order in which the events occurred. The order of importance means details are arranged by splitting the topic into parts or categories.

Use appropriate transitions to provide details. Again, for causes, you may use the following: due to, one cause is, another is, because, etc. For effect, use consequently, thus, resulted in, as a result, etc. Thus, to strengthen the essay, use supporting evidence. Define terms, offer facts and statistics, and provide additional examples, as the final advice.