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Writing A Synthesis Essay

The document provides guidance on writing a synthesis essay. A synthesis essay combines information from multiple sources on a topic and presents it in a coherent manner. The document outlines the steps to take, including reading sources thoroughly, identifying relationships between viewpoints, forming a thesis, organizing an outline, drafting the essay while citing sources, and revising.

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13 views

Writing A Synthesis Essay

The document provides guidance on writing a synthesis essay. A synthesis essay combines information from multiple sources on a topic and presents it in a coherent manner. The document outlines the steps to take, including reading sources thoroughly, identifying relationships between viewpoints, forming a thesis, organizing an outline, drafting the essay while citing sources, and revising.

Uploaded by

setouanimaghrib159
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Writing a Synthesis Essay

A synthesis essay is quite different from regular types of essays. In the synthesis essay you are supposed to
write your interpretation of things that you have studied, seen or felt. It could be from two or more sources
and you are required to provide your understanding of the things you have studied, felt or witnessed, the
source of which can be from a varied range of other sources.

Synthesis essays appear to be a bit difficult to write as combining of the summaries from two or more sources
should be logical and have at least some meaning in it. The whole idea behind the synthesis essay is to present
the ideas gathered from multiple sources in one single source in a coherent and easily recognizable manner.
Students must have the ability to assimilate as much information as possible for writing the synthesis essay. In
addition to assimilatory powers, students must be able to recall all they have assimilated and they should also
have that much organizational ability so that the recalled information is put in a coherent and organized way.

Synthesis essays could be of various kinds; you should properly identify and categorize them before starting
on the actual essay. The major kind of synthesis essays fall into three main categories: explanatory or
background synthesis, argument synthesis and review. Whatever may be the type of the synthesis essay, the
question needs a persuasive agreement and you should try to keep your argument as much persuasive as
possible. The sources which you are using in your synthesis essay should be reflected in your own voice and
not as those of the authors or writers of the original source. Before writing the actual synthesis essay, you need
to make a preliminary task which is:

1- Read the sources thoroughly and with good detail.


2- Note different opinions, thoughts and viewpoints of different sources and identify the relationship
between them.
3- Make a thesis. It should be based on the relations that you have identified above.

4- Finally, you should try to support the thesis in your own words.

Steps in Writing a Synthesis Essay

1. Make an outline of a thesis structure. It could be developed in a formal outline structure. An outline
forms the skeletal framework for the actual essay.

2. Read and understand the various sources with a detailed eye. Look for matching issues in each of the
sources. Try to reflect on those issues by noting down your own ideas that come out from your mind.

3. Try to think of a topic that will join or unify your essay. You have to note down the key points from
each of the sources you have read/seen. In addition, you should also write down the thesis from each of
the sources that you have studied/read.

4. Now make your own thesis for the synthesis essay. It should be linked directly with the sources you
have studied just a while ago. You may find that there might be some agreement or disagreement in
the sources that you have read. You need to build up on these in writing your own thesis.

5. After this, you need to organize the essay based on the thesis you have chosen.

6. Write a first draft based on the points you have kept in your mind. It should be based on the thesis
that you have earmarked for writing the essay. You can mention the names of the writers or authors
that you have read as a part of the original sources. You can also include some quotes and passages
from the sources to highlight your own point. You must always cite the original author if you are using
the quotes/passage from the original source(s).
When thinking about how to use your sources as support for your argument, you should avoid a couple
mistakes—and do a couple of things instead.

Don’t summarize the sources. For example, this would be summarizing your source:

BAD: “Source A indicates which houses the Death Eaters belong to. It shows that evil wizards come from all
houses.”

Do analyze the sources. Instead, write something like this:

GOOD:“Although many Death Eaters are from Slytherin, there are still a large number of dark wizards, such
as Quirinus Quirrell and Peter Pettigrew, from other houses (Source A).”

Don’t structure your paragraphs around your sources. Using one source per
paragraph may seem like the most logical way to get things done (especially if you’re only using three or four
sources). But that runs the risk of summarizing instead of drawing relationships between the sources.

Do structure your paragraphs around your arguments. Formulate various points of


your argument. Use two or more sources per paragraph to support those arguments.
7. Make a thorough revision to the first draft so that you make corrections and amend it accordingly
before writing the actual final essay.

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