<p>I'm an AP Eng. Lit student and classic procrastinator... so anyway, the test is sort of coming up and despite the fact that my teacher is a pretty hard grader my essays suck. </p>
<p>My problem isn't analysis. I can read a prompt...open, prose or poetry, figure out what the meaning of the work is (whether it's of my choosing in the open or the one they give me) address the question and use lit devices...usually tone, diction, point of view, imagery..and my personal fav--irony... to prove my theme. My problem is openings and conclusions. Somewhere along the line I had a bad English teacher and now my teacher doesn't get that I don't know how to write a good structured essay and so is extremely vague and unhelpful when I ask her how I should start or end. </p>
<p>I usually open with my thesis, but then just sort of ramble on until my intro looks long enough, and then hurry to the body paragraphs, where the real meat of my essay is. Then my teacher once told us to conclude with why the work matters, relating the theme to people's daily lives or something...but when I do that it doesn't work and takes too much precious time. So usually I try to end with just a sentence or so of restating the theme, without bothering with another paragraph. Should I waste a whole concluding paragraph explaining the theme? </p>
<p>Any other AP LIT students out there? What do you guys do? I was told it looks really bad if you don't have a conclusion...like you don't have good time management.</p>