Yes, this blog post is about Introductions and Conclusions. Have I hammered you enough about these little essay bits? I hope so, because I want you to understand a few things about them that will make your essay writing life a little easier.
Here they are:
- Introductions make it harder for your professor to identify your thesis
- Introductions and Conclusions are not necessary parts of a great essay
- Conclusions are repetitious and make you break your head over how to write them without being redundant
- Introductions and Conclusions are purely decorative – they don’t add intellectual quality to your essay
- Many professors and instructors are aware of all these facts
So, what are you to do, then?
Well, simply not writing your Introductions and Conclusions ever again may not be the best idea, and I’ll tell you why. You see, many professors, institutions, and standardized tests require you to include them in your essays. So, the questions is, how do you know when to write and when not to write them?
The answer is simple – just ask. Approach your professor or instructor at the end of class and simply ask her if she prefers her essays to include Introductions and Conclusions. It’s as simple as that. She will answer in one of the following ways:
- Yes, you should write both an Introduction and a Conclusion
- I don’t care about Introductions, but a Conclusion is necessary
- I don’t care about the Conclusion – just write the Introduction
- I don’t really care if you include any of these, as long as your essay is otherwise well-written
The answer you get will tell you exactly what to do. Also, simply approaching your professor and asking her this question will most likely make her see that:
- You are serious about her class
- You are serious about essay writing
- You genuinely enjoy the subject of the course
- You simply care
I hope you can see that these realizations can’t hurt your success in the course. 🙂 And now – the sweetest part:
If you get the answer that your professor doesn’t care if you include either an Introduction or a Conclusion, or both, then you’ve just saved yourself some pain associated with writing them – in 1 easy step.
So – don’t be shy and approach your professor about this. It’s a simple step that takes about a minute after class, so just do it. And feel free to let me know the results. And, by the way, in case you are asked to include an Introduction and a Conclusion, I’ll be posting some ideas on how to write them quickly and painlessly in future posts.
Happy Writing Life,
Tutor Phil
Questions? Comments? Post here.
