Whether you love or abhor the practice of writing essays, we will move step-by-step in a logical progression through selecting a topic, brainstorming, outlining, drafting, writing, and revising. Students will complete two essays over the course of four weeks and will receive detailed instructor feedback and an evaluation on all submitted work. Parents are also welcome to request grades for content, style, and grammar. 

The ideal student has written a five-paragraph essay previously. The focus of this class will be on using the structure of an essay to become better writers: We will work on transition between paragraphs, strengthening the thesis, choosing strong words, avoiding repetition, and expressing our thoughts clearly. 

We will also work on rewriting sentences in class to be more complex. To this end, students will be required to show certain grammatical and stylistic elements in their body paragraphs, such as a dependent clause and alliteration. 

Essay 1: Classification. This essay will require some critical thinking as we categorize items, places, people, and animals into categories. The purpose of this essay is to perfect organization skills but also to focus on writing with clarity and succinctness. 

Essay 2: Definition. For this essay, students will choose one term such as "love," "laziness," or "equal rights," and will create an essay that gives not just the standard dictionary definition but also the historical use, etymology (if applicable), and their personal interpretation. This might sound simple, but there will be an emphasis on using and citing sources and on expressing thoughts without being repetitive. 

Week 1: What is classification? We'll cover that as well as an overview of essay construction and the writing requirements. Students will receive numerous worksheets/informational sheets after class covering the writing requirements, plagiarism, citations, essay structure, and outlining. The homework is to write the three body paragraphs for the classification essay. 

Week 2: We'll finish those classification essays by revising the body paragraphs and then writing an introduction and conclusion. Students will receive a rubric to aid them in completing the essay. 

Week 3: This week, we'll start our definition essays. As a class, we'll brainstorm words and phrases that we might define, and students will pick their topics. The homework will be to write the body paragraphs. 

Week 4: We'll revise the body paragraphs and complete the essay with an introduction and conclusion.