Preview

Writing a Critical Essay from wikihow

Satisfactory Essays
Open Document
Open Document
492 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Writing a Critical Essay from wikihow
How to Write a Critical Essay http://www.wikihow.com/Write-a-Critical-Essay Edited by Rob S, Ben Rubenstein, Jeffry, Bo and 24 others
Whether you're an English major or just completing your college requirements, knowing how to write a critical essay will give you an edge throughout your academic and professional careers. Writing critical essays enables you to develop critical skills including close and careful reading, technical research, scholarly writing, referencing and proofreading. Learning these techniques will help you enter into academic conversations and gain tools to think and communicate in more profound ways.
Steps
1. 1
Learn your paper topic as soon as possible to help plan your research.
2. 2
Find research information from a wide variety of sources including journal articles, books, encyclopedias, and news sources. Gather more information than you expect to actually reference when writing your paper, but don't gather too much this can distract from the main point and you will end up putting it in your essay simply for the reason you researched it. Do not use wikipedia for everything, and do not copy and paste peoples replies; no matter what website you got it from, plagiarism will be found out.
3. 3
Skim through your sources to separate the interesting research from the irrelevant material. Interesting research can be from books, york notes, and published critical essays on your specific topic. otherwise don't research things that aren't relevant ie. researching witches when your question is on monarchy
4. 4
Reread the relevant material thoroughly and critically.
1. Highlight, underline, or otherwise mark any journal articles or books you own. Use different color post-it notes to direct your attention to critical details from library books.
2. Summarize or otherwise annotate each source after you've read it. Note a few important details and the source's main argument for future reference.
5. 5
Brainstorm a thesis by reviewing your

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    The initial Article Sequences id utilized from mathisfun.com (2016). It is about sequences, which are taught is Algebra I. In conjunction, the strategy used on this article will be that of REAP (Read, Encode, Annotate, Ponder.) In 2004, Janet Allen talks about REAP in her book titled Tools for Teaching Content Literacy. REAP a strategy used to facilitate greater comprehension in the reading of students. Steps for the students, of this process, are in the following bullet list.…

    • 364 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    4.When you choose a resource, be sure that you're not just 'going over' familiar information... you need to be accumulating information sufficient to cover all aspects of the topic, as shown on your concept map. Remember that this concept map is a 'work in progress'. As you research you can add and amend information/sections so that your coverage of the topic is comprehensive. The more you work on this (in combination with your annotated bibliographies), the better prepared you'll be for writing your essay.…

    • 515 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    7. Research the ‘big picture’ topic, the more specific topic, and then write the introduction/background to your study. Don’t forget to include your aims.…

    • 922 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Com/155 Week 6 Dq

    • 1011 Words
    • 5 Pages

    You need to fully understand your subject matter to be able to balance between your analysis and your source materials. That is why you need to do research before you start writing. Master your topic. Then create your thesis statement. The central idea presented by your thesis statement must come from your own analysis, the source materials are used to back up and support your arguments (McLean, 2011). Hence, the source materials are the raw data and your analysis is how you process these data to come up with a useful and meaning conclusion. Create your outline; at this point, you can start balancing where you will insert ideas from your sources and ideas from your analysis. Make sure that you credit your source materials correctly. Any ideas that do not come from you must be cited to avoid plagiarism.…

    • 1011 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Furthermore, your paper will have to support your main point (thesis) with factual details, not just impressions, beliefs, feelings, or widely held assumptions.…

    • 1215 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    4 Rephrasing key point highlight or underlining essential material and then rereading it ,and creating visual will all help you recall the information you’ve read.…

    • 272 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Mpo Assignent Guideline

    • 4597 Words
    • 19 Pages

    critical thinking and essay writing skills in relation to the objectives set out at the beginning…

    • 4597 Words
    • 19 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    The election of 1860 was among four candidates: John Breckenridge, a Democrat, John Bell, Constitutional Union Party, Stephen Douglas, a Democrat, and Abraham Lincoln, a Republican from the North. When election day came and all votes were in Douglas had twelve electoral votes, Bell had thirty-nine, Breckenridge with seventy-two, and in the lead, Lincoln had 180 electoral votes (Peters and Woolley). Lincoln had won the election, but he had not won everything yet. The South would succeed into a new country called the Confederates and start a war over slavery. Lincoln would need some help to win the war, but what could give him the advantage? The solution were three new inventions. While many innovations were…

    • 1488 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    Carefully read the following six sources, including the introductory information for each source. Then synthesize information from at least three of the sources and incorporate it into a coherent, well-written essay…

    • 1629 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    APUSH Outline

    • 10247 Words
    • 41 Pages

    USE YOUR WORDS: To show you understand the material it is crucial that you summarize your sources, NOT MERELY COPY THEM. I have read the text numerous times, and I…

    • 10247 Words
    • 41 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Make sure your argument is central; use the sources to illustrate and support your reasoning. Avoid merely summarizing the sources. Indicate clearly which sources you are drawing from, whether through direct quotation, paraphrase, or summary. You may cite the sources as Source A, Source B, etc., or by using the descriptions in parentheses.…

    • 1732 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Reviewing and revising an essay is an essential part of writing. Reviewing allows me to rewrite and make changes in the essay’s content, organization and sentence structures. It allows me to add, remove, move or substitute words to make sure it communicates effectively the purpose of the essay. The task of reviewing the essays I wrote for this course allowed me to learn and improve my writing skills; as a result my essays have evolved into more stylish and fluent pieces of writing.…

    • 1540 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Study Notes

    • 828 Words
    • 4 Pages

    1. Do a first close reading that uses underlining, annotation, and summary to make sure you understand what the writer is saying. Go back to any sections that need clarification. Chapter 2 can help you do a close reading.…

    • 828 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Strayer University

    • 265 Words
    • 2 Pages

    The best approach I usually do research is, first of all understanding the purpose of writing. When I decide what I want to write about, for whom, and what my audience should gain after reading my paper, I can begin the research. I ask myself if I know anything about the subject and where I can find more information about this matter. Next, I have to determinate what sources can be useful and how creditable they are. I try to think “out of the box” in order to find other ways or perspectives of looking at the topic. I may even make some personal interviews to get the feeling, what other people may think about it. This approach usually leads me to finding out additional sources of information. Researching for me is basically reading, listening, gathering information, taking notes and then evaluating them. It is a very important step in the process of…

    • 265 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Choose one of the following prompts to complete your annotated bibliography and final research paper. The prompt you choose now will be the same one you complete for both assignments. Do not wait until the last minute to begin your annotated bibliography. You will not do well, and this, if done correctly, is a huge part of your research paper. A good annotated bibliography results in the bulk of the work being finished for the research paper.…

    • 575 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays