Writing an effective Essay
Steps and samples.
Writing an essay involves several steps, from understanding the prompt or topic to revising and polishing the final draft. Here’s a general guide to help you get started:
Understand the Prompt or Topic:
Read and comprehend the essay prompt or topic carefully. Make sure you know what is expected of you – whether it’s an argumentative essay, a descriptive essay, a comparison, or something else.
Brainstorm and Research:
- Gather your thoughts and generate ideas related to the topic. Jot down key points, arguments, or concepts that you want to include in your essay.
- Conduct research if necessary. This could involve reading books, articles, and reputable online sources to gather supporting evidence and examples for your points.
Thesis Statement:
- Develop a clear and concise thesis statement that summarizes the main point or argument of your essay. This should be a central idea that guides your entire essay.
Outline:
- Create an outline to organize your essay’s structure. Divide it into introduction, body paragraphs (usually 2-3), and conclusion. Each body paragraph should cover a specific point or argument.
Introduction:
- Start with an engaging hook – a captivating anecdote, a surprising fact, a thought-provoking question, or a relevant quote.
- Provide some background information to give context to your topic.
- Present your thesis statement, outlining the main argument of your essay.
Body Paragraphs:
- Each body paragraph should start with a topic sentence that introduces the main point of that paragraph.
- Present evidence, examples, or arguments to support your topic sentence. Use specific details and references where appropriate.
- Analyze and explain how your evidence supports your thesis.
- Transition smoothly between paragraphs to maintain the flow of your essay.
- Counterarguments (if applicable):
- Address opposing viewpoints if required by the prompt or if it strengthens your argument.
- Refute those counterarguments with strong evidence and reasoning.
Conclusion:
- Summarize the main points of your essay without introducing new information.
- Restate your thesis in a slightly different way.
- Provide a broader context or implications of your argument.
- End with a thought-provoking statement, call to action, or a final insight related to your topic.
Editing and Proofreading:
- Take a break after writing the essay before you start editing. This helps you approach it with fresh eyes.
- Check for grammatical errors, spelling mistakes, and punctuation errors.
- Ensure your sentences are clear and concise.
- Review the flow of your essay and make sure your ideas are well-organized and connected.
Citations and References:
- If you used external sources, make sure to properly cite them according to the citation style required (APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.).
Peer Review (Optional):
Have someone else read your essay to get feedback on its clarity, coherence, and overall effectiveness.
Final Draft:
- Incorporate any feedback or revisions you’ve received.
- Proofread the final draft one last time before submission.
Remember that practice makes perfect. The more you write, the better you’ll become at crafting well-structured and compelling essays.
Sample 1:
Alternatives for Incarceration
With the current increase in prison populations, the judges are increasingly considering alternative methods to impose punishment on the criminals. This paper discusses the alternative approaches considered to correct behavior among criminals while providing examples.
Reducing the number of inmates is associated with economic and historical benefits. For instance, this move helps the state minimize the costs of maintaining the prisoners, reducing the tax burden on the citizens. Such is meant to reduce the tax burden on the citizens while maintaining sanity in society. Further, alternatives allow first-time criminals to realize their mistakes and the potential harm they cause to the victims, hence correcting their behaviors for fear of incarceration (Stefani, Freeman & Lloyd, 2016). Besides, it increases the number of options available to the courts since crimes are different and unique, requiring different approaches. This enables the judges to tailor a cost-effective punishment method suitable to the offender and the offense.
The alternatives include probation or community correction, which keeps the offender in the community but under restrictions from movement. Some conditions are associated with this alternative, including staying indoors during some parts of the day and remaining drug-free. Electronic home monitoring (EHM) is another alternative whereby the offenders must remain in their homes. The offender is placed on an EHM by wearing an electronic device that signals the authorities to monitor the offender’s movements (Stefani et al., 2016). Violation of these conditions subjects the offender to imprisonment. These offenders take random drug tests and contact probation officers daily.
Alternatives for imprisonment such as sanctions play an essential role in the lives of the individual offenders and society. The sanctions allow the offenders to remain with their families while they serve their punishment. In other words, they help to retain the liberty and dignity of the offenders. As in the case of imprisonment, the separation from the family induces severe emotional suffering to the offenders (Webster, 2017). Notably, some offenders have young families who also suffer emotionally at the arrest of their family members. Therefore, sanctions are crucial to minimizing this suffering.
Further, sanctions protect the offenders from possible illnesses contracted in the prisons. The prisoners are deprived of basic amenities such as proper diet and medical attention. Besides, the prisons are overcrowded, which poises vulnerability to diseases, whereas poor medical treatment is administered to the offenders (Webster, 2017). Therefore, sanctions prevent the offenders from contracting these diseases and yet access basic amenities as they serve their punishment. Further, the alternatives ensure that the offender continues to interact with the community people and hence eliminate the cases of stigma when the inmates are released from prison (Gabrysch et al., 2019). In other words, the community retains the individuals and evades the shock of dealing with ex-prisoners who they fear may still be harmful.
Generally, alternatives to prisons are ideal approaches to handle criminal cases efficiently. The paper discussed three significant alternatives used by juvenile courts: probation, electronic home monitoring (EHM), and fines.
References
Gabrysch, C., Fritsch, R., Priebe, S., & Mundt, A. P. (2019). Mental disorders and mental health symptoms during imprisonment: A three-year follow-up study. PloS one, 14(3), e0213711. https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0213711
Stefani, G., Freeman, R., & Lloyd, G. (2016). Alternatives to imprisonment in Europe: promising practices and tools: a training package. https://discovery.dundee.ac.uk/ws/files/8532738/TRAINING_PACKAGE_COMPLETE.pdf
Webster, D. (2017). Benefit sanctions statistics: JSA, ESA, Universal Credit and income support for lone parents. Child Poverty Action Group [http://www. cpag. org. UK/david-webster], accessed, 6. http://www.mostewartresearch.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/17-11-Sanctions-Stats-Briefing.pdf
Sample 2:
Evidence-based Practice in Nursing
Evidence based practice is whereby nurses use critical and science proven evidence in providing health care that is quality to a particular population. The goal is however hindered from being achieved by several barriers. Individual barriers like lack of knowledge and skills, personal attitudes of the nurses and lacking professional characteristics hinder the implementation of evidence-based nursing (Shayan et al, 2019). Majority of nurses are found to be unaware of the concept, tools and application of evidence nursing hence do not apply it in their practice.
Most of them view it as a new concept that was introduced later during their practice and is hard to change towards adopting it. They also do not consider research as an important component of their practice hence do not embrace the practice which is centered on research. Organizational barriers like limited resources and lack of supervision and support also affect the implementation of evidence nursing in a great way (Duncombe et al, 2018). It has been reported that nurses in most organizations lack the appropriate resources and material to make some of the interventions. Staff shortage among nurses, lack of computers and proper internet connectivity affect evidence nursing. Lack of direction and authority from the leaders in implementing evidence nursing is a great barrier.
Ways of Addressing the Barriers
Nurses should be trained to equip them with the appropriate knowledge and skills in implementing this practice. They should be provided with information enough to change their attitude towards research as a pillar of evidence nursing (Fry et al., 2018). Administrators and leaders in nursing should support the nurses by providing adequate material and human resources. They should also carry out supervision adequately to facilitate implementation of this practice that translates to improved quality of health care. Changing towards evidence-based nursing practice is not easy and takes willingness from both the nurses and the administration to implement it effectively.
References
Duncombe, D. C. (2018). A multi‐institutional study of the perceived barriers and facilitators to implementing evidence‐based practice. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 27(5-6), 1216-1226.
Fry, M., & Attawet, J. (2018). Nursing and midwifery use, perceptions and barriers to evidence-based practice: a cross-sectional survey. International journal of evidence-based healthcare, 16(1), 47-54.
Shayan, S. J., Kiwanuka, F., & Nakaye, Z. (2019). Barriers associated with evidence‐based practice among nurses in low‐and middle‐income countries: A systematic review. Worldviews on Evidence‐Based Nursing, 16(1), 12-20.