Organize your thoughts. Use a sheet of blank, lined notebook paper to write down your thoughts. Each paragraph should have its own section on the paper. Every section except for the introduction should have the main idea of the paragraph and two or three DRAPES components. The introduction section should contain the topic of the essay, the reasons to back it up, and two or three DRAPES as well. There are six parts required to fully utilize the DRAPES, one for each letter:
Use dialogue. Use a professional's opinion. This could be anyone, such as a doctor, your parents, or The President of the United States. You can use either a direct quote (i.e. "In a recent interview, Doctor Smith said 'Hats help prevent disease!'"), or reword the statement into the sentence (i.e. "Doctor Smith said that hats are good for people.") If you use a quote, be sure to put it in quotation marks.
Use rhetorical questions. These are questions which can make the reader think, but not one they have to answer, such as "How could someone refuse a free television?". The idea is the statement makes the reader think, and if it is at the beginning of an essay, they will probably want to read on. These are good to have in an introductory or conclusion paragraph.
Use analogies. Use similes and metaphors to emphasize your point. A simile compares two things with "like" or "as", such as "The water is as clear as glass". A metaphor says that something is something else, such as "The mean dog is a demon". You can also improve your essay by slipping in a few Anecdotes, or short stories that convey your message.
Use a personal experience. Write about something that has happened to you that is related to the essay's main idea. For example, if you are writing about why divorce is terrible, you might say that you had divorced parents, and this made you depressed. The experience should be strong enough to bring the reader to agree with you.
Use examples. Write examples of your position of the essay to make it look good, and use example which make opposing positions look bad, especially in a persuasive essay. Examples and personal experiences often are written together.
Use statistics. Use percentages and ratios to support your position. Remember to tell where these statistics came from. For example: "According to a recent poll by students at Harvard, hats are 16% more popular than watches on campus.