<p>I am an AP English student who does very well in the class, even though I admit that math is my best subject by far. I was not the best writer in my junior year AP English class, but I was solidly in the top 5 of only 15 people who opt to take the class. Throughout the year, we wrote 2-3 essays a week, in and out of class, some timed, and I consistently scored very highly on them, and my peers would sometimes set goals for themselves of getting a higher score than me. </p>
<p>However, I seem to have an inability to show the same skill on standardized tests. In May, I took the SAT and got a 9 on my essay. In June, I took the ACT, felt extremely confident about my essay, but got only an 8. Now I have just received my AP scores, and on AP English Composition, I got a 3. My teacher expected me to have a solid 4, since no one last year got a 5, and since I am one of his strong students. Coming out of the test, I felt a little weak about one of the essays, but the other two I felt were very strong. </p>
<p>I can't figure out why tests make my writing retrogress about five years. I don't get particularly nervous, and I do well on the rest of the test. I budget my time pretty well, and I never ran out of time, except for slightly on the last AP essay. I don't get why this happens! Help!</p>
<p>on the SAT essay, I was able to make it a very mechanical, relatively non-thought requiring process by having around 10 history/literature examples that I was able to adapt to any prompt. This helps tremendulsy in toning down the time pressure you may feel. On my SAT essay, I managed to write two full pages with this method and still have 5 minutes to check my work. AP essays are another issue as they cannot be as mechanicly mastered as the SAT essay.</p>
<p>I know that neither you nor your teacher wants to hear this but your teacher isn't good at teaching AP English.</p>
<p>Some people are genuinely bad at taking tests, but the more likely reason for your average scores is the inability of your teacher to closely match the AP rubric when grading.</p>
<p>If she was a decent teacher, then somebody would have got a 5 last year.</p>
<p>On the other hand, you could argue that English is an innate talent and is extremely hard to teach in the first place. Whatever the case, your AP English teacher grades too easily. On CC, you will notice tons of kids with a 4.0, but many of these kids go to schools that are not very rigorous.</p>
<p>I, on the other hand, go to a competitive, rigorous public school with a 3.8 GPA with most of my B's from honors English courses. How did I fare on the SAT? 780 on writing with an 11 essay. My critical reading was 680 though.</p>
<p>How can I explain this? I'm lazy but write well. Most of our grades in English class come from papers that take weeks to write and I jsut don't feel like putting much effort into it. However, in a timespan of only 25 minutes, I can write a good essay.</p>
<p>In conclusion (gah! I hate these 2 words), there are 4 types of writers:
-good at writing timed essays
-good at writing papers
-bad at writing
-good at writing papers and timed essays</p>
<p>Either you are the "good at writing papers type" or your teacher is bad. I'm going to bet it's the latter since your teacher didn't have any 5's last year and AP English classes have timed essays.</p>
<p>You need to find someone who writes well to be your mentor. </p>
<p>My English teacher marked virtually every paper I wrote last year with, "A+." </p>
<p>On the other hand, my correspondence course instructor for an English related class rejected everything and demanded re-writing for syntax improvement. He forced me to improve, </p>
<p>My English teacher at the high school did her best. I do not believe that her BA from a State school with an unknown GPA prepared her to teach honors classes well. </p>
<p>The correspondence professor had a doctoral degree. His suggestions were challenging and insightful. He read my papers carefully and provided constructive feedback.</p>
<p>If you can find someone skillful with words to help you, that would be great.</p>
<p>Remember, also, to study the grading rubrics.</p>
<p>I have a similar but different problem. (paradox, anyone?)</p>
<p>I was lucky to scrape out A's on my Eng AP essays as my teacher was a hard grader and gave few people in our very competitive high school an A...</p>
<p>Well, I still considered myself a fairly good writer, until...</p>
<p>I got a 6 on my ACT essay (?!?!) and an 8 on my SAT essay...</p>
<p>but then....</p>
<p>a 5 on my AP English Lang test.</p>
<p>So I'm thoroughly confused as well. :)</p>
<p>(I'm retaking the ACT basically only b/c of my essay score...)</p>
<p>It isn't the teacher. I don't know why last year's class missed a single 5, but the teacher is probably not the reason. He has been voted the best high school teacher by the seniors for four years now, and not just because of popularity. He is not an easy grader, and the mode grade of practice timed AP essays was 6 (on a 2-9 scale). He only gave one 9 to one student on one essay for the whole year, and 8s were rare. </p>
<p>I would agree that I am a much better paper writer than timed essay writer. It also seems that when I write as opposed to type, my writing becomes stilted and juvenile. For example, if I write a first draft of a paper, I have to perform major surgery on it before it can be acceptable. However, if I type my first draft, I generally only have to change a few things here and there. Now, on these tests, I obviously can't type, so how do I transfer my typed-writing skills to handwriting something?</p>
<p>I took an SAT essay workshop at my school. Our 10th grade English teacher used to be an official SAT essay evaluator back when she lived in the US. These are some of the things that she pinpointed and that may help you on your next essay...</p>
<ol>
<li><p>The prompt will usually ask you a question in where you may adopt 1 specific position. Avoid standing 'in the middle'... 25min barely gives you time to put together a strong argument, so better place yourself on one side of the issue. Think about what your stance is as you read the prompt so that you start writing right away.</p></li>
<li><p>Solid thesis statement and good examples: evaluators love it when you provide examples related to literature. AVOID USING THE BOOK '1984' AS AN EXAMPLE, IT'S WAYYYY TO OVERUSED, evaluators hate it when you mention it... (In other words, avoid clich</p></li>
</ol>
<p>SAT Writing is very mechanical. Pick a few subjects that relate to a general thesis, and write lots in a very subject-per-paragraph format, and you'll fare well. SAT Writing Essay is a joke and hardly tests writing ability.</p>
<p>Many students miss a higher score because they fail to explain why the example proves the thesis. They may spend 6 or 7 sentences giving the background of the example, but they fail to say "This proves my thesis because...". It's the difference between two whole points on the 12 point scale.</p>
<p>I had a teacher who graded very easily my freshman and sophomore years. Then, junior year, I had a teacher who made me devestated when he graded my papers so harshly. My grade went down nearly ten percent from my lower-classman years. I felt like I wasn't being prepped for the SAT at all.</p>
<p>Then I took it and got an 800 W and a 770 CR.</p>
<p>You'll often find that the best friends are the teachers who will grade you harshly. For example, when I sent my harsher teacher a college essay recently, I couldn't even read his response through all at once, because I thought he hated the paper. I sucked it up and did some revisions, and sent it back twice more. Now, I LOVE the essay, and I am so thankful to him for helping me out and being harsh. Keep in mind, my writing has been published since I was in seventh grade, nationally then and internationally by the time I entered high school. I am not a poor writer. But the best tool is a teacher who grades harshly. I would recommend having your essays read by someone qualified who does not know you well, and getting his feedback. Have your practice SAT essays graded by other adults at your school. Study the essay-writing tips and take them to heart. :)</p>
<p>Mstr, it goes into your SAT writing score. However, it is reported as Writing: score and then Sub scores: MC: Essay:. Some colleges use the two sub-scores (MC and essay) independently for placement.</p>