A Complete Student’s Guide to Religious Studies Essays

A Complete Student’s Guide to Religious Studies Essays Religious studies is a popular college class. While religious studies classes are not usually required, taking one of these classes can be an eye-opening experience. Learning about other religions can help students to better understand the culture and values of the religious group members. Occasionally religious studies can also be a high school elective class. For the sake of this article, we will use tips and examples that are suitable for both college and high school religious studies essays. Religious Studies Essays: What’s Behind Them There are four basic types of essays that can be used in high school or college classes: narratives, descriptive essays, expository essays, and persuasive essays. Essays are usually based on a student’s opinion and backed up with facts. Each type of essay can be used in religious studies classes. Let’s take a look at how. The first of these essays are narrative essays. Narrative essays tell a story, usually based on a student’s life. Descriptive language, the use of adjectives and dialogue, helps to make the story more vivid. For this type of essay to be used in a religious studies class, a student could write about their experience with their religion or with people who follow other religions. However, when writing these kinds of essays, it is important to not be derogatory towards people of other religions. Descriptive essays are exactly what they sound like. They involve writing about a person, place, or thing in extreme detail. In these essays, it important to use adjectives. This type of essay is best when you are discussing religious figures or religious artwork. These types of essays are likely to work best as a part of a religious studies essay, rather than the whole essay. Expository essays are concerned with the facts and nothing but the facts. This type of essay is great for religious studies classes when you need to write about historical events, rather than topics based on opinions. While writing these essays, it is best to avoid putting any bias in your paper, as this may make your essay seem less reliable. The last major type of essay is a persuasive essay. With this type of essay, you want your audience to agree with your argument. To do this, you will need to back up your opinion with facts. Make sure to use reliable sources when you do this. One way this could be used in religious studies classes is to write about an opinion you have on a religious matter and explain why your opinion is right by using facts How to Choose the Most Interesting Religious Essay Topics Picking a topic for a religious studies paper can be difficult, especially since religious studies classes often cover a variety of subjects. Below are some topic suggestions with ideas on how to use them in your essay. These topic ideas will work for either Christian religious studies classes or world religion classes. We have put listed at least one topic for every major world religion. Feel free to use any of these topics for your own essay, just make sure to cite your source! Paul brought Christianity to Europe, but he made many changes to the teachings (compared to what Jesus taught). Were these changes for the better or worse?Paul never met Jesus, but he had a dream in which Jesus spoke to him. He often disagreed with Jesus’s apostles who had known him in life. Does Paul’s dream give him the authority to make changes to Christianity or should he have left the teachings of the church to Jesus’s primary disciples? The Five Pillars of Islam help to guide the Muslim faith. How do these pillars compare and contrast to the virtues of other major world religions? Muslims are often prejudged in today’s society. Is there anything in their pillars that make them â€Å"look bad† or are the pillars all positive? How do the pillars affect the way Muslim people should act? Are the pillars similar to virtues in other religions? Discuss. There are four noble truths (four central beliefs) in Buddhism. Are these truths still expressed in Buddhism today? Are they also shown in other religions?Buddhism is an Eastern religion that is practiced in many Asian countries. However, there are several branches/sects of Buddhism. Do all of the branches follow the four noble truths? If so, do they have anything else in common? If not, what are the other branch’s values? Hinduism is one of the world’s oldest religions. Discuss the changes that have occurred in the religion over the years. Are these changes good or bad?Over the centuries, Hinduism is sure to have gone through some changes. How have these changes affected Hindu people? What were some of the primary beliefs of the religion centuries ago and what are they now? There are several Jewish holidays each year. Describe one of these holidays and their significance to the Jewish faith. Some of the most important holidays in Judaism include Hanukkah and Passover. Describe one of these holidays or another prominent Jewish holiday. Write about the history of the holiday and how it is celebrated today. This could make a great expository essay. Writing Tips from Our Experts Now that we’ve discussed some of the types of essays there are and some of the topics that would work well for a religious studies essay, let’s discuss how to actually write the essay. Follow some of the tips below to learn how to organize your paper, write the various parts of the paper, and to learn some editing skills. Pre-Writing The more research and organizing you do before you write a paper, the less time you will have to waste by looking for sources and trying to cure a writer’s block while you are actually writing. There are two basic ways to do this. The first way to save time on your paper is to write an outline for your paper. Outlines are helpful for all sorts of written documents. This includes essays, term papers, and even this very article! This can help you to avoid writer’s block because you will have all of your ideas written out before you even begin writing your essay. When you don’t have to stop to think of new ideas, your writing can flow! You can use this link to be redirected to an essay outline worksheet. This worksheet gives step-by-step instructions to help write an outline. Another thing you can do to make things easier on yourself is to do all of your research and take notes before you even begin writing your paper. Make sure to write down your sources or type up your works cited to save even more time. The more notes you take, the less time you will have to spend rereading your sources later. While this will take up some more time before you start writing your paper, it will save you time in the long-run. One good place to find scholarly sources for your essay is to search by using Google Scholar. Essay Writing: The Importance of Structuring Of course, writing the actual essay is the most important part. There are five basic elements that need to be included in every essay. In this section, we will go over how each of these sections can be applied effectively in your essay. Introduction; Thesis Statement; Body Paragraphs; Conclusion; Reference/ Page. Let’s look at writing an introduction and a thesis statement, as a thesis statement is always a part of the introduction, often as the last sentence in the paragraph. A thesis statement is a one-sentence-long part of the induction that describes what your main argument is and what points you are going to use to support it. An example a thesis statement you could use for a religious studies class is below. ‘The Virgin Mary is an important figurehead in many Christian sects, but women are not always treated fairly in the religion; this essay will discuss the factors, including the role of women in and outside of the physical church.’ To make this into a complete introduction, simply add on a few more sentences (before the thesis statement) to further explain what your essay will discuss. An introduction is usually around four sentences long, with the thesis statement being the main component of the introduction. Keep this in mind as you write your introduction. Body Paragraphs The body paragraphs will make up the bulk of the essay. Most essays in both high school and college classes contain at least three body paragraphs. These paragraphs each have a specific structure that should be followed. The first sentence should work to introduce the main point of the body paragraph. The next two or three sentences should be focused on evidence to support your main point! Make sure to cite your sources! The last paragraph should be a short summary (conclusion) to wrap up the paragraph. Conclusion The conclusion is actually very similar to the introduction. It is only one paragraph long. Instead of introducing the main points of the paper, you are summing up what you already wrote. In this paragraph, make sure to restate your thesis statement and your main points. Once you do this, your paper is almost done! Reference Page A reference page is a vital part of any essay! If you skip this section, you may very well fail your entire paper. This is because if you do not cite your sources, then you can be accused of plagiarism. You are most likely to be required to use MLA or APA formatting with your sources. To learn how to use these citations styles (and more), you can click on this link. The site can also teach you how to use internal sources, which are just as important to have as the sources listed in your reference page. Post-Writing Tips You Can’t Ignore When scheduling time to work on your essay, make sure that you make time for editing your paper. While many students skip this step, editing is the key to improving your overall essay grade. There are a few things that you should always check for when you are editing your essay: spelling and grammar mistakes, accidental plagiarism, and awkward sentence structure. Let’s take a look at how to improve each of these parts of your essay. Whether you are writing your essay in a Word document, in Google Docs, or in a third-party writing program, you are likely to have some sort of grammar and spelling checking system build into the program. While these programs can catch a lot of mistakes, they miss out on a few key features. That’s why it is best to always look over your paper again, or run it through another spelling/grammar checker, like Grammarly. Doing this can help you catch simple mistakes before your teacher does. Next, make sure that you have not accidentally plagiarized. To do this, you will want to make sure that all of your sources are cited both internally and in a page. Read over your paper to make sure you have done this. If after doing this you are still worried, run your paper through a plagiarism checker. One great plagiarism checker for students is Turnitin, which provides free trials of their service. Lastly, look for sentences that just don’t sound right. One of the best ways to do this is to read your paper out loud. Sometimes, when you read in your head, you may skip over awkward lines. Reading out loud can help you to more easily catch these mistakes. You can also have a friend look over your paper, as they might catch something that you didn’t. Well, we hope that these tips can help you to write your religious studies paper. Make sure to check out some of the sources we’ve outlined in this article for additional help. If you follow our tips, you are almost guaranteed to get a passing grade on your essay. Good luck!

How does Charles Dickens create suspense and fear in The Signalman Essays

How does Charles Dickens create suspense and fear in The Signalman Essays How does Charles Dickens create suspense and fear in The Signalman Essay How does Charles Dickens create suspense and fear in The Signalman Essay Essay Topic: Literature Charles Dickens uses many methods to create suspense and fear in The Signalman story. He introduces fear to make the short, ghost story more interesting. Dickens set his ghost story on a railway line, which at the same time has a very modern setting and not a traditional dark, crooked old house. The tale begins with a gripping and dramatic opening line, which instantly grabs the readers attention. The first line introduces the narrator who was left anonymous throughout the story. This instantly builds up tension, as the reader does not know what sort of a person the narrator really is. When the narrator is a character in the story, it makes it easier to know how the person is feeling; this makes the reader more aware of the character and can begin to relate to them. Charles Dickens begins to create fear and suspense in the first couple of lines. The story begins with halloa! Below there! The words were shouted by a mysterious figure standing above the cutting on top of the bridge. It leaves us guessing who had shouted the words; all we know at this point is that it was a figure in the distance. Halloa was an informal welcome in the late 19th century. The actions create mystery, which is effective to create the overall suspense. Also you still havent had any kind of a physical description of the signalman so at this time you dont even know if hes human or not and you cant just make an guess you have to read on. The description of the signalman is also quite fearful as when he describes him with, pale skin, dark hair and eyes, you feel quite scared of him, when they say he has his hand to his chin, that is quite mysterious. You want to know why he has his hand to his chin The signalman is an important character as once they get talking and his actions are very weird to start off with; He stands carefully in the railway with his hand on his chin, not moving a muscle until they are face to face Before he stirred I was near enough to have touched him. Also when they do meet he makes no attempt to start the conversation, instead he looks at the red light Look towards the red light He seems very mysterious and again pretty strange. As they begin to talk again the man becomes slightly threatening and the narrator thinks that he might be a ghost This was a spirit. This is a very tense point in the story because the ghosts identity may have already been given away, but the signalman begins to show fear and asks if they have met before. After their conversation the man leaves and the signalman tells him that on his return journey not call out those words. Halloa! Below there. It builds tension over what these words really mean to the signalman and why he is scared of them. The signalman himself looks mysterious A dark pale man. This would add to the readers suspense and build up the tension, as he gets closer. They go back to the signal box and from his long description you realise that he is quite a knowledgeable man Worked at fractions and decimals. If he is so clever why is he a signalman? He is also a very skilled workman Safest of men to be employed. These questions add mystery to who he really is, which in builds up the suspense. Within their talk, the signalman looks outside toward the tunnel more than once. This creates mystery of whats going to happen, and why does he keep looking out of the box? In the first conversation he tells the man that he is troubled. This makes you ask the question what is he troubled about and does it have anything to do with his weird actions before? Could he be or knows the ghost? These questions make you think about whats about to happen? This also builds suspense. On the mans return visit he is told about the mysterious figure and how it disappeared. It was gone. This long passage describing the ghosts actions adds tension and what is the ghost going to do next? He also clears up his odd actions (when he looked down the tunnel). The ghost says those very same words. We now know that he is not the ghost so some tension is lost but it is now a matter of if the man will see the ghost and what it will say. He also tells the man of the lady who died in the carriage just after he had seen the figure Within six hours after this appearance, the memorable accident happened. You begin to think of the death and the ghosts and start wondering whos next? He is described as seemed to make the place strike colder to me, but I said no more.. This a weird description to give someone, could he be the ghost? As you here about the ghost, the narrators actions are very intriguing,. The man has the same reactions when he hears about the second ghost In the end it is the narrators fault that the signalman dies because if he hadnt called down to him in the first place, the signalman would have looked up as the train came down the tunnel. Below there, look out. The first words of the story are the most decisive words of the story. Could it have been fate? And no matter what had happened between the start of the story and his death, it couldnt have been prevented. The man obviously feels responsible for his death and you feel that if he hadnt called down to the man none of this would of happened. This is quite a mysterious and even more, a scary thought.

The elemments of the funds of knowledge Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

The elemments of the funds of knowledge - Essay Example The information learned from teachers about their students is the student’s funds of knowledge. The paper captures the elements of funds of knowledge. According to this concept, many families had much knowledge that the learning institutions did not know about and were unused. Researchers realized that there were rural households having some technical and entrepreneurial skills. Each family had some knowledge to share with the rest of the families. Therefore, the sharing of information creates a network that when harnessed can be a precious intellectual resource. The concept advocates that the teachers have a role in developing effective instructional approaches that enhance learning. Additionally, teachers must use activities that involve students as thoughtful learners in a socially meaningful task. In conclusion, the researcher behind this concept urges teachers to create their social networks of providing help to one another in taking advantage of the community resources. The student’s reliance on the teacher grows steadily while the resources in the community continuously become scarce. In employing the concept, teachers will have a better opportunity in helping minority and bilingual kids achieve authentic literacy. Hence, they will foster a sense of togetherness in the community and bestow an efficient system of