Personal essay paragraphing

Good paragraphing also greatly assists your readers in following a piece of writing. You can have fantastic ideas, but if those ideas aren't presented in an organized fashion, you will lose your readers (and fail to achieve your goals in writing). The basic rule of thumb with paragraphing is to keep one idea to one paragraph.

The key idea of the paragraph should be stated in the opening sentence of the paragraph... Use a variety of methods to develop your topic sentences ... Finally, use connectives between and within paragraphs to unify your writing..." (Lisa Emerson, "Writing Guidelines for Social Science Students," 2nd ed. Thomson/Dunmore Press, 2005)

"Long paragraphs are daunting—rather like mountains—and they are easy to get lost in, for both readers and writers. When writers try to do too much in a single paragraph, they often lose the focus and lose contact with the larger purpose or point that got them into the paragraph in the first place.

The way you start a paragraph will determine the quality of your essay. Therefore, you need to be careful when choosing words to start a paragraph. The use of transition words to start a paragraph will make your text more engaging. These transition phrases will tell the reader that you know what you are doing.