Handout: Essay Writing Process
Prewriting
There are many excellent tutorial on the web that explain, among things, the essay process. I am referring you to what I consider an excellent tutorial on prewriting: Gallaudet University's English Tutoring and Writing Center. Prewriting

Prewriting, basically means developing ideas to use in your essay.  The tutorial at the Gallaudet Writing Center explains and illustrates various ways for you to develop and collect ideas.

 
Outlining
Most of you are already familiar with outlining. It is used to :

1. Organize the information you have collected in the prewriting stage.
2. Detect any gaps in data you may have overlooked or missed during your prewriting.

 The pages at Gallaudet University provide an excellent explanation and example of how to do it. Outlining
First Draft
Keeping it simply, the first draft is just that. It is where you now write you your complete essay for the first time. At this point you are not concerned about spelling or punctuation or even how you state thing. This is the time to write thing down realizing you will edit and improve on your writing in the next stage.

Here you will bring all the elements of your essay together:

  • Thesis
  • Introduction Paragraph
  • Body Paragraphs
  • Concluding Paragraphs
  • Transition
Editing & Evaluation
There are many check lists for editing and evaluating your essays. Follow this link to one that you may find useful.
Final Paper
when you turn your final paper it will have gone through the entire process of developing and writing the essay. It should be written and comply to the required format.