Every student will agree that essay writing is one of the hardest academic tasks to go through because it requires hard work, complete understanding of the issues presented and analytical thinking. Essays often weigh heavily in any student’s grades that the skill of effective essay writing has become a critical element to the success of a student’s academic future and professional career.

That is why it is also equally critical that when a professor gives a student an essay to complete, the student has to clearly understand the assignment given. The way to do this is to analyse the essay question word by word. Essay instructions that use the words ‘discuss’ and ‘illustrate’ are often interchanged by a student in meaning. This must be avoided at all costs. Each instruction word has a different meaning and a different emphasis and if the student cannot initially figure that out before writing the essay, the student’s output is already bound to fail.

The advantage of identifying what an instruction word emphasises is that the student can already decide what technique of writing to use. The student could either go for a  narrative, descriptive, expository or argumentative technique of writing. Narrative and descriptive essay writing techniques are commonly used in literary essays. Expository and argumentative essay writing techniques are more widely used in academic essays.

Here are some instruction words that basically employ an expository technique of essay writing. What should be emphasised in the exposition will depend on what the word means.

• Analyse – to break down a concept into essential features or components to see how each feature or component contributes to the whole
• Compare and contrast – to present the similarities and differences of two given concepts
• Classify – to arrange or order concepts by classes or categories
• Define – tells what a concept means or what it does by stating its genus (the concept’s common characteristics) and the differentia (what distinguishes the concept from another entity)
• Discuss – to present both sides on a concept or issue; involves close examination of a subject with an interchange of opinions
• Illustrate – to use specific examples to make clear points about a certain concept
• Outline – provide main ideas, and not too much details, on the concept

Another technique that most academic essays employ is the argumentative writing technique. This essay writing technique will use the following instruction words:

• Account For – to give reasons for a certain event or issue; prove reasons to be valid by providing evidences
• Comment On – to state a view or make a critical judgment about a certain event, quote or theory; back up comment with sufficient evidences and examples
• Evaluate – to create an idea of the value or worth of a certain concept or event; include good and bad points that are sufficiently supported by valid justifications
• Interpret – to express what something means in simple terms and draw conclusions from the evidence that has been given
• Justify – to use evidence, examples and reasons clearly and forcefully to support the conclusion given
• Refute – to prove that a certain concept or position is wrong by providing strong evidences
• Review – to summarise and assess a certain concept; pick out and analyse important parts of the given concept