Introduction
Have you got an assignment to write a short essay from college? Want to prevent your mind from the burden of how to write it? No issues. Find the perfect solution in this article.
Whether it’s for college or school, short essays are something about which students need more knowledge. Short essays are more tricky compared to long or regular-length essays.
In regular-length essays, you can provide complete information on the topic by covering all the aspects. But in short essays, you have to ensure giving out the primary information while keeping in mind that it doesn’t get too long.
Hence, if you want high marks in your short academic essay, you should know the correct way of writing it and then write it perfectly. But, you should know that you don’t have to throw in all your ideas from a broader perspective in a short essay.
You have to keep your essay concise, precise, and to the point. You may think that it will be easier since short essays are short in length. But that’s not true.
In reality, the complexity of short essays is more than long-form papers. But don’t slap your head there! This article has got the knowledge and tips that you would require to write an effective short essay.
What Is A Short Essay?
As the name suggests, a short essay refers to a paper that is short in length. There should be a high level of preciseness when writing a short essay. You should draft the concepts and ideas related to the topic adequately prepared to maintain the flow effectively.
When talking about the guide for writing a short essay, it’s similar to that of the regular extended essay. The significant difference between the two is that short essays are written in a short length.
You can follow the basic essay writing guidelines and structure similar to that of the extended essays that professional essay writers follow. You have to compose a proper outline of your essay. You can elaborate on your ideas, but they should be based on the word length.
Whenever you write a short essay, ensure that you write only the relevant and most important points of your essay. It implies that you have to filter your essay. You can also cut it short after writing it since it will give you an idea of what should be deducted.
Now that you know what a short essay is let’s get to how you can write one.
How To Write A Short Essay?
Whether you are assigned to write any short essay- narrative, informative, or argumentative, you should follow some basic guidelines which help you write a short academic essay effectively. Let’s take a view at how you can write a short essay effectively:
Explore Your Topic’s Depth
Once you know the topic, you can explore its depths by researching it effectively. First, determine the type of your essay. Then you can identify the critical points of your topic and create an outline for an effective result.
It is essential to pay attention while researching and coming up with ideas on your essay topic.
Brainstorm Ideas
Once you are done with the research, you have to brainstorm ideas and develop how you would like to present your essay. You have to stay focused and ensure that all your sentences in the essay are precise and to the point.
Your lines shouldn’t wander off-topic. You can think of ways to structure your ideas into a paper and how each point can relate to each other in your essay. All this will help you have a clear idea of what you will write in your short essay.
Begin Typing Out The Words
Now that you know your main points and how you will structure the same, you can begin writing the essay. Work as per the format and outline that we will be discussing further in the article.
You have everything you need to write an essay. Hence write your short essay while keeping in mind that it’s a short essay, so you need to be precise and concise.
Add Final Touches To The Essay
Once you have written the short essay, you can start moderating it a bit to make it better. Ensure that you add the points from the most important to the least important in your short essay.
Proofread Your Essay
When you’ve written everything, added any required information, and removed unnecessary lines on your short essay, it’s time to recheck it. Editing and proofreading your short essay are very important.
It helps you to ensure that your short essay is error-free. Moreover, it can also help you ensure that you don’t get bad marks because your paper has grammatical issues. Since it’s a short essay, it won’t take long to read it all and point out your mistakes.
Structure Of A Short Essay
When writing a short essay, you also have to consider the short essay layout. It’s crucial to prepare a proper outline for your paper to organize your essay perfectly. It will help you to write down your main topics effectively. There are three parts that you have to notice when preparing a short essay structure, which includes:
Introduction
An introduction is the most significant part of any essay, even for a short essay. It can determine whether your reader will move forward in your essay or not. But how to write an essay introduction? It’s simple. Your introduction section shouldn’t be more lengthy than one paragraph since it’s a short essay.
Ensure that you start with a clear line in the introduction since it means creating the first impression on your reader. It will give them an idea of your essay topic.
The purpose of your short essay introduction would be to attract your readers to read the entire essay. Here, you have to create a hook sentence. You can write your introduction within 4-5 sentences to be as per the short essay limits.
- Start with a hook sentence.
- Ensure writing crisp and hook-worthy sentences.
- Ensure that your topic’s main point is covered in the introduction.
- End your introduction with a thesis statement.
Thesis
The thesis statement is the last part of your essay. It acts as a statement that can make your readers understand what your topic is all about in one sentence. While writing a thesis statement make sure it covers the primary aspect, problem, or issue that your essay will cover.
You should pay attention to writing specific lines to give a clear idea of your topic. It should motivate the readers to know more about it.
Body
The next part of your short essay structure is the body. You should ensure that you aren’t adding more than three paragraphs in your short essay body since you are writing a short essay.
In this part of your essay, all the details and analysis need to be appropriately addressed. Here, you have to mention the main points with some crucial supporting sentences.
You should start with the most to the least essential points of your essay topic. You can take references from trustworthy sources to find content related to your topic.
- Ensure that you write facts and information regarding the topic.
- Don’t wander off-topic.
- Discuss one part at a time.
Conclusion
Next comes the conclusion of your short essay. In this part, you can present the result of your analysis of your essay topic. Ensure that you sum up your entire short essay in a single paragraph.
You can show how your thesis statement in the introduction connects to the main points of your short essay topic. You may think of it as the summary, but it’s the answer to your thesis statement and your arguments.
You should ensure that you finish up all the confusion of your readers in this part so that they can be satisfied with the essay at the end.
- Rephrase your thesis statement with a new perspective.
- Provide answers to the points/questions discussed in the introduction part.
- Conclude your short essay.
Short Essay Format
Before writing your short essay, ensure that you format your essay correctly. It makes your essay look organized and readable. It will help your teacher understand your paper better, enhancing your chances of getting high marks. Thus, ensure that you make your essay well-formatted.
Usually, the format of your short essay can be anywhere from three to five paragraphs, including the introduction as the first paragraph and the conclusion as the last paragraph. Even though the length of this essay is short, it’s crucial to convey the topic properly.
When talking about a short essay format, one more thing that comes to view is the format style of your short essay. Like any other academic essay, your short essay can have any format style assigned by your instructor.
If you haven’t got any specific format, you can go with either APA or MLA style. In any of these styles, your short essay font needs:
- 12pt font size.
- Times New Roman font style.
- 1″ margins at all sides.
How Long Is A Short Essay?
One of the things that students often get confused about while writing short essays is the length. In terms of pages, a short essay should be 2 pages when using double spacing and 1 page when using single spacing.
In terms of words, your short essay should have words anywhere from 400-500 words. Usually, you should keep it to 400 words. But, if it’s not suitable for the topic, you can go up to 500 words.
You can make your short essay more credible and attractive if you follow all the guidelines and tips for short essay writing. Let’s get to some tips that you can follow while writing a short essay.
Tips For Writing An Effective Short Essay
The below-mentioned tips can assist you in making your short essay perfect.
Select A Fascinating Topic
If your teacher has given you the liberty to choose your topic, that makes things easier. You can select a topic that interests you. If you are interested in the topic, you will be able to research and write more effectively.
Ensure The Relevance
You shouldn’t add irrelevant information in your short essay as it makes your essay look unorganized. Moreover, useless extra information isn’t suitable for short essays since the aim of short essays is to provide brief and relevant content.
Know Your Target Audience
Think of who your audience is before penning down your ideas. For example, if your teacher is the primary audience, he knows the basics, so the recap is unnecessary. Otherwise, you can have broader and simple concepts to ensure that the readers don’t get confused.
Use Active Language
Students often make the mistake of writing in passive sentences. It is wrong in terms of short essays. Moreover, it turns out to be short and more direct to the readers. For example:
- Active voice: The trees give oxygen.
- Passive voice: Oxygen is given by the trees.
As you can see, the active voice is shorter and more direct compared to the passive voice.
Avoid Distraction
Distractions are a part of everyday life and what matters is how you deal with them. Focus is the key. Thus, you have to focus on your writing and complete it without using your phone, watching TV, or any such distractions.
Use Online Grammar Tools
Before proofreading your short essay, you should check the document in an online grammar check. It will help you to ensure that you are delivering an error-free essay. Also, check for plagiarism if necessary.
Conclusion
The task of writing a short essay might seem easy to you at first. But know that it’s tough to write a short essay if you aren’t aware of the proper ways to do it. Moreover, if you don’t concentrate and focus on writing your short essay properly, it would take you loads of time.
However, it doesn’t mean that you can’t write a short essay perfectly. If you know the right way, then you can effortlessly write one.
Hence, this article provides you with all the tips and guidelines for writing a short essay. If you’ve read the entire article, then you can quickly draft your short essay. You only have to research well, ensure the guidelines, and pay full attention while writing.
