<p>I'm kind of stuck right now. I'm desperately trying to improve the level of my diction for my sat essay, but most of the advice deals with structure and good examples.
Something like a list of phrases that sound intellectual and can be plugged in into your essay would be very helpful and life saving. Some sample essays where such phrases are used would be great, too. So in any of you guys can give me a recommendation for this he would really help me out.
Greetings</p>
<p>I know what you mean, I was in the same situation some months ago… My biggest piece advice is: follow the ones you already have!
Let me elaborate a bit more on this. The most effective mindset when dealing with the essay is to assume that graders don’t actually know you are int’l (ok, they do, but they don’t receive specific training to grade int’l essays, so they will simply grade it the same way they would a ‘normal’ one). Believe me, it’s my experience that you will not be penalized (or at least not heavily penalized) for a mistake a native-speaker wouldn’t commit: awkward phrasing, wrong prepositions, and any of the other dozens of traps a native speaker would never fall in are hugely unlikely to hurt you.
Graders will most likely concentrate on the mistakes native-speakers usually commit: the same mistakes that often pop up on the other sections of the writing test! Study for them and you should be fine.
Also, if your mother tongue is a latin language, using ‘big’ words might be somewhat natural for you; the most awkward they may sound in english, do NOT avoid them! This is the kind of word graders look for: although very easy for you to employ, for native speakers using them tend to demonstrate a high level of proficiency in writing! Hope this helps =)</p>