One type of college essay is an informative essay, in which your goal is to share information about a particular topic. The essay we will be working on will be on a humanities topic, everyday life in the English Renaissance, so the documentation format we will use is MLA or the format proscribed by the Modern Language Association. Make sure you have read the review information in the previous section about MLA format. As you have already taken ENG 111 or its equivalent, you are familiar with that style of documentation.
To prepare for Essay #1, you will first read a series of articles about our topic, everyday life in the English Renaissance, and then complete some assignments about the info, sharing your thoughts in a forum, through comp questions, and by completing a short writing assignment. All of these assignments will help you as you begin to plan and write Essay #1.
Guidelines for Essay #1 on Everyday Life in the English Renaissance
Typed, double-spaced, MLA format, using 12-point Times New Roman font.
3-4 full pages, not including Works Cited page.
2-3 sources
MLA documentation format
Microsoft Word
Topic/Purpose: The purpose of this essay is to share any information you have found about your topic with your readers. Our General Topic is the English Renaissance. The Specific Topic of your paper will be some aspect of Renaissance England that you have chosen, such as Renaissance food, weaponry, daily life, religious beliefs, etc. Use the website linked to our Moodle site to investigate different aspects of Renaissance life.
Your essay must have an introduction, body, and conclusion. Do not label these sections, however.
Introduction
- Attention Getter—your first sentence should grab your audience immediately. You may use a quote, a startling statistic or fact, or ask a provocative question.
- Thesis—Statement of your topic in one sentence.
- Indication of main points—in one sentence, state how you will develop your thesis. Do NOT say “In this paper I am going to….”. Indicate how you will expand on your topic.
Body
In this section, you will give any information you have found on your topic that you want your readers to know.
You will also need to give examples from the outside information you have read about your topic, making sure to cite your sources both within your paper and on your works cited page, using correct MLA format.
Conclusion
Your conclusion should do two things: restate your thesis and leave the reader with something to think about, ie. ask a question, give them a quote, encourage them to analyze and think critically about their own lives.
Final Page: Works Cited Page
Using current MLA format (refer to the link on our Moodle site), list all the sources used in your essay.
As with all formal essays, do not use contractions, slang, second person (you, your, yours) or qualifying statements such as “I think”, “My opinion”, “I believe”.
