Paragraph to Essay

                                     Paragraph to Essay

          After you write a paragraph about some topic, it is easy to change that paragraph into an essay. Paragraphs are made up of sentences. Every paragraph has three main parts; an introduction, body and conclusion. Every essay also has three parts; an introduction paragraph, three or more body paragraphs, and a conclusion paragraph. So if you have already written a paragraph, all you need to do is expand the sentences into paragraphs and you will have an essay. The essay will have more information and details than the paragraph, but remember that the essay will have the same three main parts that a paragraph has--introduction, body and conclusion. When we start learning to write, we start with paragraphs because they are the basic "building blocks" that writers use. After you know how to write a good, well organized paragraph, it is easy to write essays with five or more paragraphs. It is kind of like learning to crawl before you walk, or learning to walk before you run. In conclusion, writing essays is easy after you know what you want to write about and after you know how to write good paragraphs.

Paragraphs and pyramids

          Strong paragraphs, like strong pyramids, are based on the number three, and have certain similarities. First, paragraphs have three parts--beginning, middle, and end--and pyramids have three sides because the sides are triangles, not squares or rectangles. Writers know that strong paragraphs need to have three parts, and engineers know that pyramids are strong structures because they are based on triangles with three or four sides. For instance, writers know that if they leave out any of the three parts of a paragraph, it will not be strong.  And engineers know that a pyramid will support more weight than a typical four-sided structure. Second, you might say that both paragraphs and pyramids have a body. The body of the paragraph is the biggest part, between the beginning and the end. You could say that the inside of a pyramid is the "body" of the pyramid, and the biggest part, too. Finally, paragraphs and pyramids are both pleasing to read/look at because they seem complete. If you read a paragraph with no conclusion, you feel it is missing something. In the same way, if you look at a pyramid without triangular sides, you would say, "That's not a pyramid at all."  In conclusion, the structures of paragraphs and pyramids are similar because they are both based on the number three, and that basic characteristic makes them strong and well formed.

Topic and conclusion sentences in paragraphs

     Just as an essay has an introduction and a conclusion, each body paragraph of an essay has a topic sentence (introduction) and a conclusion sentence. The topic sentence tells the reader what the paragraph is about, and the conclusion sentence concludes and wraps up the paragraph before moving on to the next paragraph. An effective way to write the conclusion sentence of a body paragraph, wraps up the paragraph and points to the next paragraph. In that way the conclusion sentence functions as a transition, helping the reader move from one paragraph to the next.  Every sentence in a paragraph should follow from the topic sentence.  If not, it is off topic, and should be deleted or moved to another paragraph. So just as essays have a beginning and an end, paragraphs do, too. You could say that a paragraph, like an essay, has three parts, introduction, body and conclusion. The parts of the essay are paragraphs. The parts of a paragraph are sentences.

Writing Basics: From paragraph to essay

If you have been writing paragraphs, and your writing instructor asks you to write an essay, you might try the following method. Think of an essay as an expanded paragraph. Like a paragraph, an essay has an introduction, body and conclusion. In a paragraph those parts are sentences. In an essay those parts are paragraphs; an introductory paragraph, two or more body paragraphs, and a concluding paragraph. In an essay, the introductory paragraph usually begins by "setting the stage" about your topic, provides interesting information to grab the reader's attention, and ends with a Thesis Statement, which tells the reader what your essay is about and your perspective on the topic. Essays usually range from four to six or seven paragraphs, depending on how many body paragraphs your essay will have.

Essays can be fun to write if you take the time to think about what topic you want to write about and what you want to write about that topic. Many colleges require students to write a five or six paragrph as part of the application processs. They want to find out how well you write since writing is such an important skill for academic wrrcess.

An Opinion Paragraph

Here is an example of a paragraph that my English-as-a-Second Language writing class wrote as a group project. It is an example of an opinion paragraph, providing several reasons, each with supporting examples, to support an opinion.


Indianapolis: A Great Place to Live

Indianapolis is a great place to live for three main reasons. First of all, it is a very safe place. The city has a lower crime rate than many U.S. cities. The city has a lot of police, especially in the downtown area. Second, it is a very clean place to live. There are city employees who clean the streets downtown every day. You never see old cars parked on the streets because the police tow any cars that are left for more than a day. Finally, Indianapolis has excellent educational institutions. For example, Ivy Tech Community College is a good place to study for not a lot of money. IUPUI is another good university where you can study and get a degree from Indiana University or Purdue University. I believe that everyone should come to Indianapolis to see what a great place it is to live.