Term paper Vs Essay Vs Research Paper: Is a term paper an essay

The most common assignments in academic institutions are term papers, essays, and research papers. They are assignments that cannot be avoided in one’s school life. However, these assignments are difficult to differentiate.

Therefore, confusion and fear sometimes arise with students not knowing how to handle them. It is important for students to know these three types of assignments. Besides, what they are required to do in each.

People Also Read: How to avoid Distractions while Studying at Home or Online

Is a Term Paper an Essay?

A term paper is an extended essay. It is an academic paper that students are required to write at the end of the school semester.

It tracks and evaluates the knowledge of students on what they have learned in a semester.

Also, it can be referred to as a research paper because it requires students to dig into a lot of information and technical writing expertise.

It requires students to thoroughly research, analyze, organize and write the assignment. This is the best way that a student can portray the knowledge learned in the whole course.

People Also Read: Writing a 400 Word Essay: Length and How to write it Well

Term paper Vs Essay Vs Research Paper

Essay

Essays are the most common assignments in all academic institutions. An essay is a form of writing where students demonstrate their cohesion, comprehension, and critical thinking skills on particular topics.

The essay is designed to have three parts; the introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion. The details and complexity of essays depend on the level of study. For example, university and college essays are more complex than high school essays.

There are different types of essays. Some of the common ones include narrative essays, argumentative essays, comparison essays, descriptive essays, and philosophical essays. These different essays follow the same structure.

Students can only add their touch to the structure to stand out and get better grades than others

Research Paper

A research paper is an essay in which students or writers are required to explain what they have learned after in-depth exploration and analysis of a topic.

These papers are meant to access the analytical skills of students. This is as a result of the wide range of information that the student must display to show competence in a certain topic.

Information in research papers must also be backed up by statistics, data, graphs, facts, and other verified forms of information.

Research papers also have a different structure compared to essays. For example, research papers must have a title page. In this page all personal details of the student are included. An abstract page is the summary of the paper. And the introduction is where the reader is given a glimpse of what to expect in the paper.

Also, the paper must have a background where the literature on the topic is reviewed. Body paragraphs where the main points of the essay are discussed and a conclusion where the main points are summarized.

Acknowledgments where people who had input in the essay are thanked, and references where all sources used in the paper are cited.

Term paper

A term paper is a research paper that students are required to do at the end of the semester to test their knowledge of courses learned in that period.

Term papers are very important in determining the final scores of students in different courses. The structure of these papers matters because you will not get lost in the variety of information and you will likely write a good paper.

This structure includes a title page, abstract which is optional, table of contents, introduction, body paragraphs, conclusion, reference, and appendix which is also optional.

People Also Read: How to Censor Words in an Essay: Bad Words in Academic Papers

Difference between Term Paper, Essay, and Research Paper

To start with, essays are shorter than research papers and term papers.

The structures of essays require an introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion while the structure of the other two requires additional information such as background information, abstract, and appendices.

Next, essays mainly show students’ points and views while research papers and term papers present views and opinions of other people.

Also, essays do not require in-depth research compared to the vast amount of research required in research and term papers.

Additionally, essays are mainly meant to test the students’ knowledge and writing skills while term papers and research papers are meant to focus on the students’ ability to deeply analyze matters.

Moreover, familiarity with the topic is not required in essays but in research and term papers understanding of the topic and sources is required.

As you can notice already, term papers and research papers have a lot in common. Their structure and format are the same making them more similar. However, there are some differences between the two.

First, in research papers, you may be allowed to cover topics that are outside the general subject matter while in term papers you only focus on topics that are related to the course done in a semester.

Secondly, research papers can be assigned at any time of the semester while term papers are assigned at the end of the semester.

Thirdly, arguments in term papers must be supported with facts taken from a variety of sources while arguments from research papers should answer theoretical questions.

Fourthly, even though the structure of both is mostly similar, term papers can have different structures that research papers cannot. For example, term papers can take a question-answer structure or be an annotated bibliography, article, review, or even a research paper.

On the other hand, research papers can only be research papers. They do not change.

Fifthly, research papers can take days and months to be completed but term papers have a limited amount of days for submission before the semester ends.

People Also Read: How to Write an Ethnography Essay or Research Paper

Is a Research Paper the Same as an Essay?

Research papers are not the same as essays but you can call them long essays. They have a different structure compared to essays.

Additionally, essays are shorter than research papers. Also, essays present the writer’s opinion with supporting arguments while research papers are more complex and require a deep understanding of the topic and presentation of expert opinions as well as the writer’s thoughts.

Lastly, essays are not tied to a specific writing methodology but research papers are.