How to score 10 on the essay

<p>I usually get 8 on the essay. But I got 9 once. I think I'm capable of getting a ten. But I can't seem to meet their standards. </p>

<p>I think the determining factor is the mediocrity - to say the least - of my examples, and their relevance to the topic. While they do refer to the topic being asked, sometimes I tend to stray a little.</p>

<p>I usually write a 1 and 1/3 of a page in most essays. is length a factor as well? or can it be well writen and short, yet still recive a high score?</p>

<p>My sentences tend to be the same. i.e not very varied.</p>

<p>Any advice?</p>

<p>You need to write as much as you can in the 25 minutes that they give you; don't stop if you have even the least bit of time to write. Make sure you stay on topic.</p>

<p>What kind of examples do you use?</p>

<p>personal experiences mostly.
When I try to use examples from History, I screw up and/or cut it short (that's if I ever find any).
I can never find anything in literature or any other field for some reason.</p>

<p>For a 10, I suggest:</p>

<p>having a very phlosophical first liner
use a lot of words</p>

<p>how philosphical? To what extent?</p>

<p>Ummm... </p>

<p>I can't explain, but go to the CB website and there is an essay with 3 examples and read the first line -> that's how much philosophical</p>

<p>If you have a decent intro/conclusion with 2 good examples, you will get a 12. A lot of people claim that length determines the score, but what they fail to understand is that if you DO write a good essay it will naturally come close to 2 pages. </p>

<p>I had a decent intro/conclusion, 1 good example, 1 retarded example, and 2 pgs in length and I got a 10. </p>

<p>You don't need a philosophical opener, just good examples. I recommend that you don't use two personal examples because while they both might be relevant, choosing two different examples (like one personal, one literature/history) shows that your thesis has examples to prove it from a broad range of sources.</p>

<p>Oh and the CB examples are dumb. They are probably the best essays that CB got, and they will give you a skewed interpretation of what it requires to get good scores.</p>

<p>I got a 12 by:
having a great first line
3 examples - last one was personal
over 600 words
a decent conclusion</p>

<p>At least more then 1.5 pages.
Intro -> Body -> Conclusion
Body paragraphs must support thesis, and the thesis must answer the question.
Don't get too concerned with using 'big words', just make sure you make the whole thing sounds fairly good and answers the question with good examples without making big mistakes (switching from 1st to 3rd person or something).</p>

<p>but nothing other than personal examples (almost always fabricated) comes to mind during the test. My mind goes completely blank while writing - But alot of good exapmles might pop into my head when I get to section 5 or 6 lol.</p>

<p>think of a few universal examples the day before</p>

<p>lol. you mean memorize a few examples and edit them to fit the prompt?</p>

<p>yup .</p>

<p>care to give a few examples? 'cause I don't see how that would work - wthout me completely screwing it up and making it seem comepletely irrelevant, i mean.</p>

<p>Gandhi
To Kill a Mockingbird
The Crucible</p>

<p>Civil rights movement (USA), current events (wars, terrorism), Politics, WWI or WWII, any book you have read, especially To kill a mockingbird, etcetera. Things you know alot about and have alot of different themes.</p>

<p>never read to kill a mocking bird.
I though that politics/terrorism was frowned upon in the SAT. guess I was wrong.</p>

<p>When I read the study that found a correlation between essay length and score (it said that the researchers were ultimately able to guess an essay's score from across the room simply by seeing how long it was), I wondered what role handwriting played. Could you literally make your essay longer by writing bigger? I wouldn't begin to suggest trying it but it's an interesting question.</p>

<p>Well, not really current day politics, you could talk about historical political figures easily though. And terrorism and war, or other current events, I probably wouldn't use since those are more like personal examples. I was just thinking up possibilities of things you could use, since you could probably relate that in somehow if you were having trouble thinking up other examples.</p>

<p>puzzled - I don't think writing bigger is a good idea, obviously, because the bigger oyu write, the more childish the handwriting looks. I know if I were grading an essay with that really big, bubbely handwriting, I'd give it a lower score automatically. But that's me.</p>