Writing an Essay - Introduction, Body and Conclusion

In this essay, we will learn how to write a classical style essay that is mandatory to learn for high school and university exams. This type of essay consists of three parts: the introduction, the body and the conclusion. By understanding the structure of an essay, the content of the essay is easily written and highly organized.

First, let us look at the beginning of the essay. The first paragraph of an essay is called the introduction. The introduction consists of three to four sentences that introduce the topic of discussion. The first sentence should explain what the essay will be about and should draw the attention of the reader, or hook the reader. The second sentence includes a quick summary of what the reader should expect to read. The third sentence summarizes how the essay will help the reader and tells the reader what he will learn by reading the essay.

After writing the introduction, we can begin writing the second part of the essay which is called the body of the essay. The body of the essay consists of a minimum of three paragraphs that are composed of three to five sentences. Each paragraph of the body should include a numerological sequence for the reader to follow. These include starting the paragraph with first, beginning, to begin with, the first, firstly and so on. Each paragraph following the first must contain the next number in sequence to continue the numerical logic of order such as secondly, next, second and so on.

In addition to the numerical reference in the first sentence of the paragraph, each paragraph’s content must support what was written in the introductory paragraph. In this case, we are discussing the body of the essay and have broken it down into what must be included in the content. The body provides the information that supports what is stated in the introduction and in the first sentence of the paragraph. The paragraph is not a summary of what you are writing about, rather, it is in support of what you are writing about.

Finally, the last paragraph of the body provides the support for the last reason you listed in the introduction. The content of the body is important as well as how the sequence of thought is written. With proper content that is organized logically, the reader will be funnelled into arriving at the same conclusion that you will be presenting in the final part of the essay. The ordering of the supporting facts is very much like that in a debate – you choose what you believe, you let the opponent know, you research and provide the facts, you support the facts with examples and, finally, you provide a conclusion based on the facts and examples.

This brings us to the final paragraph of the essay: the conclusion or summary. The final paragraph consists of three to five sentences and sums up the entire essay. The first sentence will contain in conclusion, in summary, finally, lastly and so on to indicate that the essay is about to finish. The second sentence summarizes all the paragraphs by finding a commonality that ties them together. The last sentence states your conclusion and includes thus, I conclude, therefore, based on the above facts it can be concluded, I will, you will, they will and so on. Now that you have the basic structure and understanding of the content that needs to be provided in each paragraph, you will now be successful at writing a classic styled essay for reports and exams.

© June 6, 2010

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