Nova A.
Nova A.

Learn How to Start an Essay Like a Professional

6 min read

Published on: Jan 3, 2023

Last updated on: Jan 3, 2023

How To Start An Essay

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The struggle to find the right words to begin your essay is real. Every student in his academic career gets to write multiple types of essays. Unfortunately, people often confuse writing an essay with writing a book, poem, or research paper. Essay writing is different from them and must not be confused by other kinds of assignments.

And not everyone is aware of starting an essay like an expert.

Do not worry! We have got you covered! This blog provides you with steps, ways, examples on how to start your essay or the introduction of your essay.

Read this blog to learn how to start an essay like a professional and impress your readers.

Let’s start reading!

How to Start an Essay - Beginning the Introduction

The introduction is the first section of an essay that your reader will read. A well-written introduction is an important section of an academic essay. It prepares your argument and hints on the upcoming content to the reader.

The main goal of an essay’s introduction is to:

  • Grab the reader’s attention
  • Provide background information related to the topic
  • Present the thesis as the main point of your essay.

While starting your essay, make sure you incorporate all the points mentioned above to make your introduction informative yet catchy.

The first step of starting an essay is to choose a good topic. Therefore, go through some good essay topics and choose one for your essay.

Let us discuss how to start an essay like a pro by discussing the main steps in detail:

1. Hook Your Reader: The first sentence of your essay is crucial as it sets the tone for the rest of your essay. Therefore, avoid beginning your essay with long and dull sentences, instead use catchy and concise phrases to attract your readers.

Multiple types of hooks can be used to attract the reader. You can use any of the following hooks depending on the topic of your essay:

  • Story hook
  • Interesting question hook
  • Quotation hook
  • Statistic hook/fact
  • Simile hook/metaphor
  • Description hook
  • Declaration hook/strong statement.

You can also find other kinds of hook examples and use them to begin your essay.

2. Provide Background Information: The next step of writing an introduction is to provide the readers with the background information. This will help the readers understand what is being discussed in your essay.

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Consider the following elements while providing the background information:

    • Geographical, historical, or social context
    • A summary of relevant research or theories
    • An outline of the arguments
    • Defining the key terms.

3. Thesis Statement: Present your thesis in a sentence or two. The thesis statement will be in the form of a statement to explain your essay. Do not just state a fact in the name of a thesis statement. Instead, add a brief explanation with evidence to validate your thesis statement.

4. Present a Sketch of Your Essay’s Structure: If your essay is long, you must concisely give your reader an idea of the upcoming details of your essay. You can do this by mapping your essay’s structure to let readers know what the essay is about.

5. Proofread and Revise: Proofreading and revising are crucial steps of starting an essay. Once you have written the introduction, make sure to revise it and remove the errors.

‘How to start a paragraph in an essay?’

Start the paragraph with a topic sentence that will express your paragraph’s main point. Move forward by explaining that main point or idea of the paragraph. Every paragraph has three main parts - the topic sentence, the main explanation and the conclusion. Make sure that you add all these parts in each paragraph.

How to Start an Argumentative Essay?

Starting an argumentative essay is the same as starting any other essay for a college class. However, we have provided you with some of the ways to start an essay like a professional:

  • Introduce the Topic: This is one of the widely used ways to start an essay. Just introduce the topic to the reader without getting into many details of your thesis statement.
  • Start Your Essay with a Quote: It is always a good idea to start your introduction with a quote. It will provide a creative opening to your essay’s introduction. First, however, make sure that the quote you use is relevant to your topic.
  • Create Curiosity: Naturally, human minds are designed to satisfy curiosities. Once you have provided a mystery initially, the reader will be hooked to read until the end or until the mystery is solved.
  • Narrate a Story: Consider yourself as a story director and play with time, characters, mysterious objects, or conflict and create an opening scene.
  • Start Your Essay with “I”: Begin with an “I” as you have to take responsibility for what you write.
  • Open Your Essay with a Question: Introducing the question, in the beginning, will ask the reader to think about the topic and hence will keep him engaged. This will also readers want to wonder how you would answer the questions.

Here is an example of how to start an argumentative essay.

How to Start an Essay About Yourself?

Writing an academic essay about yourself can become challenging at times. However, the real challenge is how to start an essay about yourself.

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Before writing an introduction, remember that it is the first text your reader will read and get an impression about you. Therefore, you have to write the opening of your essay attractive enough to keep the reader hooked from the start till end.

Consider the following elements to write a killer introduction about yourself:

  • Start the introductory paragraph with a hook. It should keep the readers interested in reading till the end.
  • Present an impressive incident or your life’s story in the very beginning. Keep it precise.
  • Provide interesting details with sensory information to keep your readers engaged.

In this essay, you will be discussing a relative life story that has contributed to your personality in one way or the other. Therefore, it is better to write an introduction once the other parts of your essay, i.e., body and conclusion, are completed.

To write a brilliant opening of an essay, a writer should:

  • Think about a story to write in the essay
  • Think about the central point to share (the main message)
  • Decide on the traits that make a life’s story interesting and unique.

Examples of Different Types of Essays’ Introduction

Mistakes to Avoid While Starting an Essay

  • Neglecting Professors Instructions: Before starting an essay, ensure you have read the institute’s or your professor’s instructions properly. This is to avoid making errors in your introduction.
  • Irrelevant Information: Do not incorporate any unnecessary arguments in your introduction. This irrelevant information will confuse the reader.
  • Definition: Try not to start your essay with a definition. Your essay is not a dictionary. At the beginning of your essay, a simple definition will make your readers yawn.
  • Avoid Spoilers: Do not add too many arguments and information initially. Just give a hint of the upcoming content. Divide your arguments into the paragraphs of your essay wisely.

Hopefully, this blog must have helped you how to start an essay. So, follow this blog completely to start writing a great essay. However, if you need any help regarding essay writing, you can contact YourEssayWriter.net and get help from our essay writing professionals.

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Frequently Asked Questions

How many sentences should be in a paragraph?

On average, a paragraph is usually constructed of 5 lines:

  • 1 line for the hook
  • 2 or 3 lines for the overview or summary
  • 1 line for a thesis statement.
Nova A.

WRITTEN BY

Nova A. (Literature, Marketing)

As a Digital Content Strategist, Nova Allison has eight years of experience in writing both technical and scientific content. With a focus on developing online content plans that engage audiences, Nova strives to write pieces that are not only informative but captivating as well.

As a Digital Content Strategist, Nova Allison has eight years of experience in writing both technical and scientific content. With a focus on developing online content plans that engage audiences, Nova strives to write pieces that are not only informative but captivating as well.

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