Writing: Essays

These sites focus on writing descriptive essays for Junior High and High School students. There are lesson plan and activity ideas, possible essay topics, advice for improving writing skills, tips for avoiding clich?s, and many examples of descriptive writing. Includes links to eThemes resources on research papers, persuasive writing, and 6+1 writing traits.

Grades

Links

Online Writing Assistant: This is an in-depth online resource that provides help with organizing, editing, and revising different styles of writing.
Types of Essays and Student Samples: This is a series of guides to different types of essays, including preparation tips, research advice, features of the different essay types, and examples of student writing. NOTE: Reading level is for older students.
Descriptive Essays: Descriptive writing should contain enough detail to help the reader form a mental image of the subject. This page describes several things to consider as you write your descriptive essay and illustrates them with examples.
Writing Topics: Read through this list of possible writing topics organized by grade level. NOTE: This site includes a submissions page.
Descriptive, Narrative, and Persuasive Prompts: This 33-page PDF file is excerpted from “Blowing Away the State Writing Assessment Test” by Jane Bell Kiester and contains numerous writing prompts and possible topics for all grade levels.
Using Senses for Sensible Writing: This lesson plan provides five prompts for writing descriptions based on the five senses. NOTE: This site contains sponsored links.
Figurative Language: In these activities, students are encouraged to identify three types of figurative language: similes, metaphors, and personification.
Literary Devices Paper: In this exercise, students can use similes, metaphors, and hyperbole to write a character analysis of someone they know. Students can experiment creatively to describe a person of their choice.
Perfect Vacation: Where in the world would you most like to go? What would it be like? In short exercise, students can write a descriptive essay about their idea of the perfect vacation.
Descriptive Writing: An online resource for English teachers, this site offers an index of lesson plan and activity ideas on descriptive writing. NOTE: This site contains ads, a discussion forum, and links to sites with ads and message boards.
Online Writing Lab: Writing Descriptions: This page defines and explains the principles, conventions, and strategies of purely descriptive writing.
Scholastic: Descriptive Writing with Virginia Hamilton: This site offers advice from a professional writer on how to write descriptively. There are also samples of other kids’ writing, organized by age. NOTE: There is a submissions page where students can submit their own written work.
Improving Descriptive Writing: This animated PowerPoint presentation discusses ways to improve your descriptive writing by using visual imagery and avoiding clich?s. There is a poem with many clich?s that students can use to practice re-writing. Contains audio files.
Elements of a WOW! Description: This page defines the elements of a standout description, one that makes the reader say “Wow!”
Fact Monster: Homework Center: Writing Skills: This guide outlines all of the skill necessary for good writing. It includes tips for writing different kinds of essays, advice on other types of papers, how to write a bibliography or citation, and sample papers.
BBC: Key Skills: Writing an Essay: This online tutorial from the UK follows a student named Becky as she goes through the steps of writing a long essay.
Writing Tight: Once students have advanced enough to master basic writing skills, this page offers twenty tips for making their writing better, clearer, and more concise. NOTE: Reading level is for older students.
Oreo Response Writing: In this short activity, students are encouraged to write responsively. Students can eat an Oreo cookie while they perform this exercise.
Writer's Guide: This online handbook covers all of the major components of writing, from research essays to sentence mechanics. There is a glossary of literary terms and an explanation of common marking symbols. NOTE: Reading level is for older students.
Essay Planner: The questions on this printable worksheet are intended to help students organize their thoughts before they start writing their essays.
Six + 1 Traits: This hypertext handbook covers not only the 6 + 1 Traits of good writing, but also paragraph structure, commonly mixed word pairs, and other style elements.
eThemes Resource: Writing: Research Papers: These sites focus on the steps involved in writing a research paper. Learn how to brainstorm a topic, organize information, use transition words, and write bibliographies. There are tips and handouts on how to evaluate online sources, plus links to child-safe search engines. Includes links to eThemes Resources on online resources and graphic organizers.
eThemes Resource: Writing: Persuasion: These sites focus on persuasive and argumentative writing for middle and high school students. Learn about the persuasive techniques used in letters, essays, and advertisements. There are suggested hands-on activities, graphic organizers, writing prompts, and assessment sheets. Includes a link to an eThemes Resource on debate.
eThemes Resource: Writing: 6 + 1 Writing Traits: The 6 + 1 Writing Traits Model gives students and teachers a common language for talking about writing. The following sites have definitions, descriptions, rubrics, and exercises to help students become familiar with the characteristics of good writing. There are many interactive features so students can practice their own writing and learn how to evaluate effectively. There are video clips, prompts, activates, and examples of writing at different levels of accomplishment, as well as eThemes Resources on grammar, narrative, and text structure.