Why Essay Writing Feels So Hard For Teens —And What to Do About It

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The moment a student sits down to write an essay, what appears to be a simple academic task transforms into a complex psychological experience. As a former high school English teacher, I've witnessed thousands of teens freeze when facing a blank page – not because they lack intelligence or writing ability, but because of something much deeper happening beneath the surface.

What your teen isn't telling you is that when they say "I don't know how to start," what they actually mean is "I'm afraid what I write won't be good enough" or "I've already failed before I've begun." Essay writing requires students to extract invisible thoughts from their minds and translate them into something tangible that will be evaluated – an inherently vulnerable position that triggers anxiety, perfectionism, and a fear of judgment.

The breakthrough comes when we stop seeing essay struggles as a skill deficit and recognize them as cognitive overload. Your teen's mind is already cluttered with social worries, academic pressure, and digital distractions – asking them to compose a structured analysis of Shakespeare while mentally juggling these concerns is like building a sandcastle in a windstorm without proper tools.

The good news? Essay writing isn't mysterious – it's mechanical. Most high-achieving essay writers aren't born with special talents; they've simply learned to play what I call "the essay game." Essays follow predictable patterns and formulas, and when students understand these structures, writing transforms from an intimidating creative endeavor into a manageable step-by-step process.

What your teen needs isn't more pressure or vague encouragement to "just write anything." They need clear systems that make the invisible process visible – sentence starters, paragraph frames, planning tools, and structured support that helps them see writing as a process rather than a performance. These aren't shortcuts; they're essential on-ramps that allow students to join the flow of writing when they've been stuck too long.

Download my free guide "The Five Secret Habits of Teens Who Succeed" from the show notes and join the Essay Clinic waitlist to transform your teen's relationship with writing. Remember, your presence – calm, supportive, and believing – matters more than your editing skills. You don't need to fix your teen; you just need to help them find their way forward, one sentence at a time.

If you enjoyed today's episode, please take the time to rate our podcast. Your rating means the world to us and it allows us to continue to share and grow our message of support to other fabulous humans out there!

For more free resources, check out my guide to the 5 secret habits of teens who succeed. Jam packed with advice, tips and strategies. Yours free!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey there, I'm your host, francesca, a former high
school English teacher, dramadirector, confidence coach and
now your digital guide for allthings teen learning, motivation
and mindset.
And today we're talking aboutone of those topics that makes
parents sigh deeply and teensroll their eyes.
It's essay writing.

(00:22):
And, more specifically, whydoes essay writing feel so hard
for teens and for the parentstrying to help them?
I hear this all the time fromparents who say you're smart.
I know they are, but theyfreeze up the moment they sit
down to write.
And I also hear from teenagerswho tell me I just don't know

(00:44):
where to start.
What if it sounds stupid, Iwrite a whole paragraph and then
delete it because it's not goodenough.
And I see you, the parent,sitting at the kitchen table
after dinner trying to rememberwhat a thesis statement even is,
wondering if you're helping orjust making things worse.
So if you've ever foundyourself in that awkward,

(01:06):
frustrating place where yourteenager is stuck, you're stuck
and it feels like writing anessay has become a full-blown
emotional event you are in theright place, my friend, because
here's the spoiler it's not justabout grammar and, no, it's not
about laziness, and it'sdefinitely not about being a bad
writer.

(01:26):
There's something deeper goingon, something cognitive,
emotional, even identity based,and in today's episode I'm going
to unpack what's really behindthe essay struggle, why it feels
so overwhelming, what'shappening beneath the surface
for your team and, mostimportantly, what you can do to

(01:47):
shift the energy from confusionand dread to calm, clarity and a
sense of I've got this.
By the end of this episode.
My hope is that you'll feelboth relieved and empowered,
because understanding why thisis hard is the first step to
making essay writing easier.
We're not just going to talkstrategies today.

(02:09):
We're going to talk aboutstories, student psychology and
the quiet beliefs your teenmight be carrying that are
making that blank page feelheavier than it should.
So grab a cup of tea or take meon your school run and let's
dig into what's really going onwith essay writing and how to
help your teen find their waythrough it.

(02:29):
Let's jump in.
One of the most overlookedtruths I've learned in all my
years as a high school Englishteacher is this Essay writing
doesn't start on the page, itstarts in the mind, in that mind
.
For most teens, it's exhausted,overstimulated, under-supported

(02:52):
.
It's a swirling cloud ofthoughts, feelings, expectations
and distractions, many of whichhave absolutely nothing to do
with English class.
Let me paint a picture for you.
Your teen walks into theclassroom or sits down at the
kitchen table to do homework andthey've already had a full day,
not just in terms of thesubjects they've covered, but in

(03:15):
terms of mental tabs left open.
Imagine your laptop at homewith all the tabs open.
I'm guilty of this.
I have 100 tabs open on mylaptop.
Well, imagine if that's yourteenager's mind at the end of a
school day.
And here's what might berunning in the background.
Did that text I sent get leftunread?
Was my answer in chemistrywrong?

(03:36):
Why was my friend quiet atlunch?
Did I bomb that science test?
I should be posting on TikTok,but I haven't edited the video
yet.
I hope I don't get called on inclass.
I can't think straight today.
And then, as educators and asparents supporting them in their
homework, we ask them to sitdown and compose a structured,

(03:57):
coherent, persuasive argument onthe representation of power in
Macbeth.
It's like asking them to builda sand castle in the middle of a
windstorm with no shovel, nobucket and no clear picture of
what the castle should even looklike.
And then we wonder why theyshut down.
Now I want to talk to theparents who hear their teen say

(04:17):
things like I don't know what towrite, I can't start, this is
too hard.
And immediately they think butyou've been taught this, you've
done this before.
What's the problem?
Here's what's really going onunderneath those words.
I don't know how to order mythoughts.
I'm scared what I write won'tbe good enough.

(04:39):
I've already failed before.
I've even begun.
Now your teenager is not beingdramatic.
They're not lazy and they'redefinitely not stupid.
They're overwhelmed.
Because here's the quiet truththat no one is talking about.
Essay writing is an act ofcourage.
What, yes, it is?

(05:00):
That requires teens to pullsomething invisible from inside
their minds an idea, a belief, aconnection and translate it
into something tangible,readable and graded.
Now, that's a very vulnerablething to do, especially if they
had bad feedback in the past,especially if they're

(05:22):
perfectionists and especially ifthey believe that a bad
sentence means they are bad atwriting.
So the real block isn't aboutpunctuation or grammar.
It's mental clutter, it'semotional noise and it's the
unspoken belief that they'regoing to mess it up before they

(05:44):
even begin.
And here's where things shiftfor both of you, when we stop
seeing our teenager struggle asa failure of skill and start
seeing it as a sign of cognitiveoverload.
We respond differently.
We go from just write anythingto let's pause, let's breathe,

(06:05):
let's figure out what you'rereally trying to say before we
even worry about how to say it.
Because good writing doesn'tstart with a sentence.
It starts with clarity ofthought, and if we want our
teens to become better writers,we need to help them clear the
mental decks so their ideas canactually land on the page.

(06:29):
Let me tell you something thatmight surprise you and, honestly
, something I wish more teachersand parents would say out loud.
Most of the students who gotA's in my class they weren't
these magical, born with a penin their hand, natural writers,
they didn't walk in quotingShakespeare or crafting

(06:50):
beautiful metaphors from age 12.
They were just regular studentswho, somewhere along the line,
learned how to play the essaygame.
Because that's what essaywriting is in most school
systems.
It's not an artistic endeavor,it's not about having a voice or
style or even being especiallycreative.

(07:11):
It's a game with rules,patterns and formulas.
And once a teen understands theshape of an essay, so how to
start, what goes in the middle,how to wrap it up in a way that
signals to the teacher I'veunderstood the task.
It's when they finally stopguessing and start thinking.
I used to tell my students allthe time an essay is not a

(07:34):
mystery novel.
Your job isn't to keep meguessing, it's to make your
thinking as easy to follow as ayellow brick road.
Because when you're writing anessay, especially for school,
the goal isn't to impress thereader with your originality,
it's to make your argument soclear and well supported that
your teacher doesn't have towork to understand it.

(07:55):
The challenge is most schoolsintroduce the essay format once,
often in year nine, and thenexpect students to remember,
apply, adapt and master itforever.
But writing doesn't work thatway.
Let's make a comparison that'smore honest.
Writing isn't like riding abike, where once you've learned

(08:15):
the basics, you're good for life.
It's more like cooking.
You don't just learn how tocook once and then magically
know how to make every dish.
You follow recipes, you needsteps, you need examples, you
experiment and taste and tweak,and every time you try something
new, maybe a more complex dishor a twist on an old favorite
you go back to those coreinstructions again and again

(08:37):
until it becomes second nature.
And essay writing is the same.
Students need scaffolding.
They need the same Studentsneed scaffolding.
They need the recipe, they needsentence starters, they need
paragraph frames, outlines,planning tools, not because
they're incapable of writingindependently, but because those
tools give their thinking ahome, a structure, a shape.
But here's where the myth reallydoes damage.

(08:59):
When we say some kids are justbetter at writing, what we're
actually saying, oftenunintentionally, is if your
child struggles with writing, itmust mean they're not wired for
it, and that's simply not true.
Most students struggle notbecause they lack talent, but
because they lack clarity.

(09:19):
They've never been shown how toreverse engineer a good essay.
They don't know how to build anargument like a staircase, step
by step, sentence by sentence.
They don't understand that anessay is a machine and every
part has a purpose.
And when we give them thosetools, when we show them there's
a recipe, they don't justbecome better writers, they

(09:41):
become calmer writers, moreconfident thinkers, more willing
to begin, because suddenly theblank page is an avoid.
It's a space with boundariesand it's a space that they've
been trained to fill.
So when we talk about writing,resources like templates or
frameworks or sentence stems,resources like templates or

(10:04):
frameworks or sentence stems,let's stop treating them like
crutches or cheats.
They're not shortcuts, they'reon ramps, and for the teen who's
been stuck at the edge of theroad for far too long, an
on-ramp is the exact supportthey need to finally start
moving forward.
Now let's talk about somethingthat's really spoken about in

(10:25):
classrooms or staff meetings oreven parent-teacher interviews,
but it's something that I'veseen over and over again the
deep, silent shame of notknowing how to begin when a
teenager is starting to write anessay.
It's quiet, it's hidden andit's powerful.
There's that moment, the onethat so many teenagers know all

(10:46):
too well, when they open uptheir laptop and they stare at
the blinking cursor and nothing.
Their fingers hover over thekeys, their brain goes foggy and
that tight feeling creeps inPanic, maybe pressure, but most
of all, shame.
The shame is saying you shouldknow this.
Why is everyone else alreadytyping?

(11:06):
What's wrong with you?
Maybe you're just not cut outfor this?
And that shame.
It doesn't stay at the desk.
It follows them into theiridentity, into the stories they
start telling themselves aboutwhat kind of student they are,
what they're good at, whatthey'll never be able to do, and
before long, that blinkingcursor becomes more than just a

(11:27):
writing tool.
It becomes a mirror, reflectingback every doubt they've been
too afraid to say out loud.
Here's what I want you to knowas a parent, when your teen says
can you help me?
They're often not really askingfor help with the task.
They're asking for help withthe feeling, the stuckness, the
self-doubt, the belief thatthey've already failed before

(11:49):
they've even begun.
Because writing isn't just anacademic skill, it's a
psychological experience.
And that first step, it takescourage, especially when they're
carrying past failures,critical feedback or a long-held
story that they're carryingpast failures, critical feedback
or a long-held story thatthey're just not good at writing
.
So how do we help them?
Well, we don't hover, we don'tedit their first sentence while

(12:11):
they're still forming thethought, and we definitely don't
say just write anything,Because to them it's not just
anything, it's a test, aperformance, a chance to prove
that they're capable.
So what we do instead is this,as parents and as educators we
zoom out, we make writing feelless mysterious and more

(12:35):
mechanical.
I often say to parents andteachers let's make the
invisible visible, let's makethe process something that you
can see, understand and repeat.
It's a bit like following Ikeainstructions, step by step,
picture by picture, untilsuddenly the flat pack becomes a
bookshelf.
We break it into easy parts.

(12:55):
We break the essay into parts.
We give them sentence starters,not just suggestions.
We give them a plan, a flow, amap.
And when they start to seewriting as a process, not a
performance, then the pressurereally begins to lift.
That's why I created the EssayClinic, for example, and that's
why I've built tools like theEssay Booster Toolkit and the

(13:19):
Essay Structure Blueprint.
Not because teens need moredrills or drills or drills, but
because they need a containerfor their thinking, a structure
they can lean on when the weightof their own doubt feels too
heavy.
And these tools give themsomething tangible to hold on to
.
They say you're not broken,you're just missing the

(13:40):
instructions.
This is learnable, this isdoable, you can do this.
And when they finally get thatfirst sentence down, when they
feel the click of clarityinstead of the frack of panic,
it's not just about the essayanymore, it's about trust, trust
in themselves, trust that theycan face a challenge and find a

(14:02):
way through it, and trust thatthey don't have to be perfect to
get started.
Okay, so now I want to speakdirectly to you, the parent, the
carer, the one listening tothis episode while holding
laundry or driving betweenactivities.
Here's what I need you to know,my friend.
You don't need to be yourteen's editor and you don't need
to be their grandma guru, andyou definitely don't need to

(14:23):
know the difference between ananalytical paragraph and a
comparative response.
Do not worry.
What your teen really needsit's not your red pen, it's your
presence.
They need someone calm whenthey feel chaotic.
They need someone who believesin them when they're caught in
self-doubt, they need someone tosay hey, it's okay to need help

(14:45):
.
That doesn't make you any lesscapable.
Your role is not to teach thelesson.
It's to open the door to thelesson, to say here's a tool,
here's a strategy, here's aspace where you don't have to
feel alone.
And even if you feel out ofyour depth like English wasn't
your strong suit or essaysweren't your thing in school,

(15:06):
that's okay.
That's totally normal, becausethis journey, it's not about you
having all the answers.
It's about helping your teenfind theirs.
So if your teen is strugglingwith writing, please hear this.
It's not too late.
They are not behind someinvisible curve.

(15:27):
They don't need to be fixed.
They just need someone to showthem a way forward that feels
doable.
One paragraph, one sentence,one clear thought at the time.
That's what I really believe inhere at the Classic High School
Teacher Not miracle makeovers,but consistent, practical,
confidence building support thatactually meets teens where they

(15:49):
are.
And if you're wondering where tostart, what will help your teen
beyond just writing, I'd loveto gift you one of our most
loved free resources the fivesecret habits of teens who
succeed.
Now, this guide isn't justabout academics.
It's about what's underneathsuccess, like mindset,

(16:09):
motivation, confidence androutines that set students up
for the long-term wins.
I will link it in the shownotes.
It's free, it's thoughtful andit's a really great.
Next step, after this episode,I'll also link the waitlist to
the SA Clinic if you areinterested in taking your
writing support further for yourteenager.
Doors are currently closed, butif you join the waitlist, you

(16:31):
will go on a priority list to benotified when the SA Clinic
opens next.
Thank you so much for spendingthis time with me today and if
this episode resonated with you,please send it to another
parent who might be feeling thesame pressure, that same worry,
that same weight of trying tosupport their teen without
knowing where to start.
You never know who needs tohear you're not alone.

(16:52):
And if you want more grounded,human-centered resources that
actually help, head over to theclassic high school teacher doc
and grab our free guide the fivesecret habits Habits of Teens
who Succeed.
I will also link it in the shownotes, as well as the Essay
Clinic waitlist, because smallshifts can lead to big
transformation.
Until next time, I'm FrancescaHudson, your classic high school

(17:16):
teacher, reminding you youdon't have to do it perfectly,
you just have to keep showing up.
Bye for now.