This document provides guidance on how to write an effective illustration essay. It explains that an illustration essay uses examples, details, anecdotes, statistics, expert opinions, personal observations, and specific evidence to support and explain a thesis. It advises selecting the strongest, most relevant, dramatic, accurate, and representative illustrations to develop sufficiently using specific details. Examples should be organized spatially, chronologically, or from simple to complex. The essay is best written from a first or third person point of view.

1. 
What is an illustration essay?
Facts
 Examples
 Details
 Anecdotes
 Statistics
 Expert opinion
 Personal observations


2. 
Any phrase that includes words such as
 Provide specific examples to support your answer
 Cite evidence to support this claim
 Base your conclusions on observation or experience



Illustrations make writing interesting
Illustrations make writing persuasive
Illustrations help explain
For example

3. Original: An anti-female bias is rampant in television
commercials. It is very much alive, yet most viewers seem to
take it in stride. Few people protest the obviously sexist
characters and statements on such commercials. Surely,
theses commercials misrepresent the way most of us live.
Revised: An anti-female bias is rampant in television
commercials. Although millions of women hold responsible
jobs outside the home, commercials continue to portray
women as simple creatures who spend much of their time
thinking about wax buildup, cottony-soft bathroom tissue,
and static-free clothes. Men, apparently, have better things to
do than fret over such mundane household matters. How
many commercials can you recall that depict men
proclaiming the virtues of squeaky-clean dishes or sparkling
bathrooms? Not many.

4. 
Select examples to include
Limit to strongest
 Use a variety
 Relevant
 Dramatic
 Accurate
 Representative


5. 


Develop your examples sufficiently
SPECIFIC
Organize the examples
spatial, chronological, emphatic, simple to
complex
Choose a point of view
first or third preferred

6. Many of today’s drivers have dangerous habits.
Children today are not encouraged to use their
imaginations.
The best things in life are definitely not free.
Some of the best presents are those that cost the
least.
A part-time job is an experience that every student
should have.
The Internet has resulted in a generation of lazy
students.
You can tell a lot about people by observing what
they wear and eat.
More needs to be done to eliminate obstacles
faced by physically challenged people.