ESSAY WRITINGPRESENTATION 7

CONCLUSIONS

LOOK BACK• Some people find it challenging to write a conclusion.• Conclusions are your opportunities to look back across the whole essay, and also revise the points you are trying to make.• They are the place where you can bring in strong, thoughtful comment, because your hard work in the essay gives you the right to do so.• If you struggle with the idea of writing a conclusion, here is a 4 sentence approach that will work.

1. RESTATE YOUR ARGUMENT• Restate what your essay has argued.• To write this sort of sentence, go back to the introduction. Have a look at sentence 3 in your introductory paragraph. There you wrote what the argument of your essay was.• This sentence can be the basis for sentence 1 of your conclusion, which you can rewrite in a slightly more interesting way.

This essay has argued that while Europe did struggle from the effects of WW1, these difficulties were not widely felt.

2. DEMONSTRATION OF ARGUMENT • In sentence 2 of your conclusion tell the reader how you showed your main argument in your essay. What did you discuss? You might write something like:

In particular, the essay has shown that while the French and Belgian economies struggled after four years of conflict, areas such as Spain, the Netherlands, and Scandinavia were relatively unscathed.

• Your conclusion is your opportunity to be bold, strong, thoughtful, and provocative about the ideas that you have presented in your essay.

3. THOUGHTFUL ANALYSIS• In sentence 3, bring out the main point in your whole essay.• You can state, of all the things you discussed in your essay, which was the most important and why.• This is the part of the conclusion where you can also make a strong personal response to the question being asked. You may write:

Trade was a vital factor, and the fact that industry and production in non-combatant nations rose to 150 per cent of their pre-1914 levels enabled a rapid economic recovery in these areas.

4. STRONG STATEMENT• Finish with a strong comment to end your essay on a bold note.• You have presented a logical, thoughtful piece of writing that is well written and full of good evidence.• Having done all this hard work, you have earned the right to make a strong statement about your topic at the end of the essay.• Sometimes, it is appropriate to restate the question that was originally asked, putting your particular approach on the question.

Conflict, while fulfilling nationalist desires to enlarge territories and influence, ultimately proved disastrous for the economic stability of Europe.

LAST WORDS• Be creative in your conclusions: talk about what you found convincing, what was compelling, what showed little merit, what surprised you, what intrigued you.• This is your opportunity to write thoughtfully, considering your whole topic.