The Art of Essay Writing with SYNTHESIS

On November 5, the Visual Armenia Development Foundation hosted a special Essay Writing Workshop as part of its SYNTHESIS non-formal educational program.

Participants not only explored the structure and essence of the essay genre in depth but also had the rare opportunity to engage directly with two distinguished experts: Seda Kocharyan, Chief Methodologist of the WorldView educational content and an international education specialist, and Tigran Zakaryan, historian-linguist, World History Editor of WorldView, and professional with extensive international editorial experience.

The event became a platform for inspiration, learning, and intellectual growth, offering a deeper journey into the world of essay writing.

The workshop’s first segment examined the essay from a philosophical perspective, while the second part – through questions, examples, and live analysis – helped participants strengthen their grasp of the essay as both a subject and a literary genre. One of the key focuses was understanding the “skeleton” or main body of the essay, where participants were introduced to the C-E-E-R formula – Claim, Evidence, Explanation, and Reference.

Under this approach:

• Claim – one sentence that presents a conclusion based on fact.
• Evidence – concrete data or examples supporting the claim.
• Explanation – clarification of how the evidence reinforces the claim.
• Reference – one closing sentence that summarizes the section’s key idea, tying back to the claim and evidence.

Students were also encouraged to go beyond this structure by introducing subject-specific concepts – for instance, analyzing the claim from a cross-disciplinary perspective or linking it to phenomena observed in daily life.

Essay writing has become a cornerstone of the Foundation’s training philosophy, as it cultivates critical thinking, structured argumentation, and analytical skills among learners. Writing an essay requires distinguishing between essential and secondary information, separating facts from opinions, and evaluating the credibility of sources – an indispensable skill in today’s world of abundant information.

📋 To register for upcoming workshops, please visit: https://forms.gle/ggf361B8rfPK5aKWA
Join us and don’t miss this unique learning opportunity offered through the SYNTHESIS program.