An essay is a short piece of article or writing that focuses on a particular subject. There are different types of essays and hence different ways to write an essay. An essay has a high weightage in your English exam paper. If you score well in the essay section, it will create a significant impact on your overall marks. An essay not only enhances your creative writing skills but also shapes your thinking skills. You need to have the skills to put your ideas into words in a way that is understandable to the reader.
CBSE recognizes the NCERT English book as the standard book for the English exams. NCERT books are designed according to the syllabus. In literature, understanding prose and poetry is easy but to understand the sentiments of the author and express them in the right words is not easy. Students can use Vedantu NCERT solutions for class 8 English Honeydew to understand the best way to write the answers. Here, we discuss simple tips that will enhance your essay writing skills.
- Understand the essay assignment or question: The first step to writing an essay is to understand the goal of the essay. The essay should highlight the objective mentioned. This is the first and crucial step of writing an essay. This is because sometimes, students deviate from the objective even though they write a good essay. The objective of writing is not fulfilled and hence, you might lose marks. Therefore, it is important to understand what the examiner wants you to write about. You must read the question carefully. Sometimes, the question is written in the form of a paragraph or an image. Observe the sentence carefully. Highlight the keywords in the question itself. Even though it takes a few minutes, do not skip this step. If you are asked to write an essay based on an image, analyze every aspect of the image. Write down the keywords that come to your mind. Once you have understood the question, try to identify if there are some indirect questions. You need to put some amount of thinking to link your learnings in class to this essay. Once you have noted down all the important points from the question, start brainstorming. You will get a lot of ideas. Write them down roughly. Another important point to note is the word count. Students get deviated and write beyond the assigned word limit. You will not gain any benefit by writing more than asked for. Try to not deviate a lot from the word limit. Understand the different types of essay styles.
- Create a thesis statement: You can start your essay with a thesis statement. A clear thesis is one that encapsulates your idea of the essay. It focuses on central intent and gains the attention of your teacher. There are two types of thesis statements. One is the persuasive statement, which argues the points about your essay, and the other one is an informative sentence. The informative sentence states the purpose of your essay. The purpose of a thesis statement is to guide your entire essay and give the idea of your essay in brief at the beginning.
- Use an essay outline: Do not directly start your essay. Plan an outline to follow for essay writing. This will prevent you from going off-topic. And you will get an idea of how many details to include and in how many words. Ideally, an essay should have an introduction, a middle part or main body, and a conclusion. While making an outline for your essay, ensure that all the important ideas are included briefly. Do not stretch your essay, else you will write beyond the word limit, and you will find it difficult to conclude your essay. For the conclusion part, remember to write your idea briefly.
- Vocabulary: To write a good essay, you should be good at vocabulary. If your vocabulary is good, you can replace long sentences with a few words. This looks decent and clear. You need not remember complex words to make your essay decorative. The idea is to convey your thoughts in a clear and better way. The best way to improve your vocabulary is by reading newspapers and magazines. This will also give you some knowledge of current affairs and general knowledge. Make a habit of learning 5-10 new words daily. Memorize some words and their application every day. You can make notes for the same.
- Use credible sources: Some essay topics aim at checking your general awareness. The best way to be updated about things going around in the world is through reading newspapers and articles. For example, if you are asked to write on “impact of coronavirus on employment”. To be able to write on such topics, you must be aware of statistics and data. You need not memorize them, but you should have an idea of a rough estimate of the figures. Make it a habit to refer to credible sources only. There are many news articles, blogs, magazines, ebooks, etc., that will enrich your knowledge.
- Do not fake it: If you have not understood the topic, you might write an irrelevant essay. There is no point in writing such an essay if it deviates from its objective. You must be clear about the idea. Read and re-read the topic to understand what the examiner demands. It does not matter how long your essay is.
- Proofread your essay : Once you have written your essay, you must proofread it and look for mistakes. Go through your essay thoroughly and look for grammatical mistakes. Look for unnecessary details that might make your essay long. Also, make sure to correct all the spelling errors. Make sure that your essay stays to the point.
- Practice: Many students avoid practicing essays since it takes time. But you can practice writing essays on common topics twice or thrice a week. The more you write, the better you will understand the structure and flow of an essay. You can pick up topics online or from your exercise questions in your book.
you will understand the structure and flow of an essay. You can pick up topics online or from your exercise questions in your book.
