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Moving Beyond the 5 paragraph Essay

Whats wrong with the 5 paragraph essay?


The five-paragraph approach has ONE major problem. First, the approach produces extremely simple essays.
The five-paragraph essay structure can ONLY articulate a very simple form of argument, involving a major claim and three supporting claims.

The Essay
* An essay is a written defense of a position (a thesis) on a topic. A good essay-topic will motivate thinking. It is extremely important to make sure that the topic is focused. The thesis of your essay should be framed in relation to your topic. * The topic asks a question; the thesis answers the question. The essay is organized to explore the question and support your answer or opinion.

Paragraphs
Essays are made up of paragraphs, so let's look at what makes up a paragraph. There are four main types of paragraphs: introductory concluding developing transitional Most of us are familiar with introductory and concluding paragraphs, but let's look at the other two more closely in the next two sections

Transitional Paragraphs
Transitions carry the reader from one idea to the next; in other words, transitions link your ideas or your sections. Transitional paragraphs summarize what has just happened and introduce what will happen next. So while developing paragraphs may have a transitional sentence at the end, at the end of a section of an essay, it may be appropriate to have a transitional paragraph, summing up the previous paragraphs, before moving on to the next section of the essay.

Developing Paragraphs
As the name suggests, developing paragraphs "develop" your ideas. Generally, every developing paragraph does four things (not always in this order): Topic Sentence: introduces the one idea that this paragraph will develop Evidence: presents the evidence that supports the topic Discussion/Explanation: shows how your evidence supports the point made in the topic sentence answers the question, "So what?" Conclusion/Transition: sums up what your paragraph has shown or discussed and may connect it to the next paragraph

Organizing the Essay


When you were taught to write a five paragraph essay, you were taught to have three body paragraphs. An essay should be more flexible than that. An essay may have three body paragraphs, but it may and should have more. It may be useful to think in terms of sections of an essay, rather than paragraphs. Forget about the number three. You will need as many sections as you will need.

Example of an Essay Outline


So, an essay may look something like this: 1. Introduction 2. Major section 3. Major section. 4. Major section 5. Major section 6. Conclusion

How your essay should look?


Each section will contain paragraphs, maybe one, two, three or four. Not every section will have the same number of paragraphs. One section, after all, may be more important than another and require more paragraphs to do it justice. Whether an essay is five paragraphs, or has many more, each kind follows the basic shape of the essay and has the three basic building blocks: introduction, body, and conclusion. The body section is just much more flexible than you may have been used to thinking of it. Don't worry about this. It is, in fact, freeing. You are free to support and develop your thesis in the best possible way.

Example
Topic: Why I like apples. 3 sections: SECTION A) Apples are delicious. SECTION B) Apples are healthy SECTION C) You can use apples in many different types of foods. So, even though you have a three part-essay, it will be much more than three paragraphs.

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