The academic essay is an opportunity for you to really connect with your subject and develop the confidence to contribute to academic discussion in your field. Rather than simply conveying information, an essay aims to make the case for a point of view that you believe in and that you can support with evidence.
By the end of this course you will understand how to:
- create an effective outline for essays and other writing tasks
- write academic essays in different styles
- develop an effective thesis
- apply the linguistic and structural writing conventions of the essay genre
- locate additional resources that may help you to continue to improve your writing skills
What does the course involve?
By planning and writing short academic essays, you will come to grips with the fundamentals of the essay genre and develop your writing skills in English. Through a combination of in-class exercises, writing tasks and peer review, you will learn how to develop an effective thesis, present well-structured arguments and anticipate and deal with counterarguments. You also will learn the basics of text and sentence structure, and you will have the opportunity to work on grammatical and vocabulary issues so that your writing comes across as professional.
Teacher
Myrte van Hilten is an academic communication teacher at in'to Languages, where she teaches courses like Academic Writing, Popular Science Writing, and Presentation Skills to students and academic staff of Radboud University. With a background in linguistic research, she knows what it is like to publish and present research to both experts and lay audiences. Based on those experiences and her thorough understanding of language, she helps students and researchers to communicate their work with more impact. Myrte is also active in the field of educational innovation, so you can expect to try out a new tool in her course!
Schedule
The course consists of 4 sessions, which will take place on Tuesday evenings from 18.00 to 20.00.
The course will take place on campus. The Honours Academy and Radboud in’to Languages believe that the best learning happens when we collaborate in the same workspace, so your physical presence is required! If you know that you cannot attend one or more sessions, pick a different course so you can get the most out of this experience with your fellow students.