What are the "do's and dont's" of an introduction of an essay?

Hi all,

I have a really exciting paper to write.... (/sarcasim) on...
Define portfolio investing and describe what constitutes a well-diversified portfolio. Using examples, discuss some of the factors that might affect the management and performance of an investment portfolio.

Can anybody guide me to anything which is related to the "what not to do" section of the web? I'm completing a set of papers in the aim of becoming a certified financial adviser, so all papers are Commerce/Business/Finance related. My previous essay I didn't have too many issues with the opening paragraph, however this one I find myself saying "in this essay I will discuss etc etc". I always thought that that style of writing is a bit of a no no? It's effectively a 100 level paper, so no opinions can be of my own... I'm new to these forums, is there a thread somewhere already tha I could view?

Sorry, being kinda vague. Given this is an essay forum, I'm also a bit paranoid of my own post grammar...!!

then you should do the traditional essay intro of stating your thesis/hypothesis. define words you need to (i.e. portfolio investing) and give a general statement about this issue/argument

and no you should never write "in this essay i will discuss" as you know you must always find more subtle ways of saying so.

i'm not sure about other posts dealing with similar issue of yours

Yes.... Never say "In this essay, I am going to tell you......"! If I were a teacher, that error would already take you down to a C! Sorry.

I would start with the basic five paragraph essay and elaborate into however many paragraphs you need.... I would do something like this

Paragraph #1: Introduction of thesis
Paragraph #2: Explain and define any words or phrases you may use in the paper
Paragraph #3: Issue 1
Paragraph #4: Issue 2
Paragraph #5: Conclusion of thesis

You cannot go wrong with a format like that. Of course, if your paper is two pages, you may not want five paragraphs; similarly, if you paper is 100 pages, you will want more than five paragraphs. Normally, if I have a paper that is more than ten pages, I will create subheadings to let my reader know the topics.

Good luck!

I HATE that rule about not saying, "In this essay I am going to ..." I mean, I think it is really nice to have the thesis highighted by a sentence, like that. Sometimes, I write, "This paper is intended to show that blah blah blah...

I like the directness, and I challenge any teacher to give me a good reason why a student should not state the thesis outright. Why be subtle about the thesis? I never understood that rule....

yeah thanks team. I never liked the idea of talking about your essay/thesis. But I hear you Kevin, I guess you're not allowed to mention you're writing an essay!?

Yea... I don't understand the rule, and I definitely don't make them, but I have written that in a paper before and got CHEWED OUT by a professor about it. :( Learn from my mistake! :P

Like Kevin, I like directness!

The rule is really more of a guideline. Old-style university formats practically insisted you start your thesis statement with "I will discuss," but this became less popular with the rise of Modernism, which insisted on conciseness as a virtue in and of itself.

More to the point, that sort of beginning really isn't necessary in shorter essays of the sort you have to write in high school and your undergrad. There, the papers are so short that your reader should be able to follow your argument on its own without extra guidance. It's sort of like the "never use I" rule. That rule eliminates a lot of unnecessary "I believes" and "in my opinions," from novices, but is universally ignored by most published academics, who have to carefully differentiate between their opinions and those of others they are citing. In short, it is a convenient way of cutting out a lot of bad writing at the lower levels of academia, but is foolish if adhered to slavishly at higher levels.

good topic i always wondered that same thing