Expository Essays

If you have been asked to write an expository essay, you may be wondering what kind of essay it is. An expository essay definition can be formulated as follows: an expository essay is an essay, in which a writer presents someone else’s point of view concerning some problematic issue. It means you are to write about certain problem or question and the ideas of some well-known person who is familiar with this issue about it. It may look rather difficult to do at the first glance.

However, if you have a little practice and follow several simple pieces of advice, writing an expository essay will not be a difficult task for you at all. The easiest way to compose the expository essay is to imagine you are a teacher and must present the material to your students.

Expository Essay: Writing and Arrangement Tips

• Since you are going to present someone else’s opinion in an expository essay, you should be impersonal. That means you should avoid writing ‘I’. You are also supposed to avoid expressing the opinion of your own.
• It is strongly required that the style of your writing must be formal. You should stick to the style of scientific writing, but do not try to sound too learned and too bookish. Just be natural when composing your expository essay.
• If you want to make a good essay, you should plan your work properly. Start with clarifying your topic, make a survey into the essence of the subject and study the ideas of the person whose opinion you are going to dwell upon and reveal this opinion.
• It is a norm that an expository essay is written in the second person. This means that it is normal to write ‘you’.
• When you have shaped your thoughts and it is clear what you are going to write about, start writing. Begin with the introduction of the problem. It should normally take the first paragraph of three or four sentences. Then introduce the ideas of the person whose viewpoint you are presenting. Continue developing the thought and describing the ideas you are presenting – this will take the major part of your expository essay. Finish it with summing up the information and drawing conclusions to your writing.
• Try to make your expository essay as clear as possible. Separate the thesis and its argumentation, strike the aspects important for the explanation etc.
• Though you can not insert your own ideas into the expository essay, you can express yourself in it as well. Do not be afraid to add a couple of phrases from yourself.