Ah sorry for not being able to critique or anything guys! I thought we were posting essays on Tuesday lol, but I will get on typing/grading either tonight, or tomorrow morning!! SO sorry but I’ve been really busy!! @milopenguin @clpony7 @Synonyms
No worries @malfoythegreat.
Ok guys, I was finally able to write my essay and also able to critique all of your guys’ today! I chose @milopenguin 's prompt of “Is a perfect society possible or even desirable?”
A perfect society is not possible, or even desirable because it restricts the freedom of individuals which ultimately harms them as well as their society. Several examples from literary works, historical events, and current occurrences demonstrate that a perfect society is not possible.
In the novel We, by Yevgeny Zamyatin, the author demonstrates how the dystopian society of the One State directly inhibit D-503’s personal freedom as an individual. D-503 believes in the perfect mathematical society of the One State, idolizing human mechanization. He does not see the purpose of being one’s own person, nor does he see the beauty of emotion. All is controlled by the One State, from the laboratory creation of children, to the standardized sexual relations. In an attempt to create a perfect society, the One State took down all freedom, and mechanized each person into a cog of the entire machine that is the One State. However, Zamyatin demonstrates how detrimental a perfect society can be in the evolution of D-503’s character. D-503 begins to learn about the ways of freedom, by following a revolutionary woman, I-330, who does not abide by the restricting laws of the One State. She takes D-5s to try alcohol, to dance, and to leave his work. The One State develops into an anathema for D-503 as he experiences the revolutionary beauty of having emotions and truly loving another person. Hence, D-503’s actions support the fact that an attempt to create a perfect society merely inhibits the freedoms of an individual and takes away basic human rights.
The actions of Mao in 1940s communist China also demonstrate how a perfect society is destructive towards the well being of individuals. Mao Zedong had seen how China was under severe problems with the lack of a centralized government as well as little revolutionary leaders. Previous leaders had tried to revolutionize the proletariats of China, believing that with them lay the key to China’s ultimate success. However, Mao saw power in the peasants, who made up the majority of China and thus created the Chinese Communist Party 1931 (CCP) in order to bring standardized communism in hopes of developing a better China by advancing the peasants with communism. His idea of a perfect society lay in the belief of destroying the bourgeoisie and giving rise to the peasant masses. However, this soon proved to be a violent approach. Mao began to murder the upper/middle class by the thousands, with beheadings, pillaging, and burning of villages. He held Rectification Campaigns (1942) in an attempt to cleanse the CCP of any anti-communists. These campaigns forced members to be self critical and subject themselves to the criticism of others. This led to suicide and psychosis. Mao’s attempt to create a perfect communist society proved to be extremely destructive as it led to the destruction of many Chinese people as well as the take down of anyone perceived not loyal to Mao.
Lastly, as demonstrated by the current occurrences of Kimy Jung Un’s North Korea, an attempt to create a perfect society in this day and age still restricts the freedom of the people and ultimately hurts them. Kim Jung Un has isolated North Korea from the rest of the world, brainwashing his people into believing he is the ideal ruler and that the lives of North Koreans is the only way of life. All must abide to his ways, from mode of dress, to style of hair, to the extreme adulation of himself. Kim Jung Un represents an extreme attempt to establish a perfect society that will be the mirror reflection of all his wishes. However, this proves to be very detrimental to all his people. They are isolated from the ways of the rest of the world, stripped of personal freedom and democracy. They are punished and often persecuted or executed for ever going against Kim Jung Un in attempts to be their own individual. Therefore, this dictator’s pursuit of a perfect society is actually a restriction on the freedom of his people and thus having their own individualism.
After a careful analysis of We, Mao’s CCP, and Kim Jung Un’s North Korea, a perfect society is indeed undesirable and not possible. An attempt to create such a society severely impedes the individual’s freedoms and need to be themselves, without the brainwashing and input of dictatorial leaderships. A perfect society only hurts the people who live in it.
- I swear I wrote all this in 25 minutes!!!!!! I feel so bad because it looks like I went above the time constraints but I promise I didn't, these were all just topics we are covering in class so I was able to brain dump a lot about them!! *
@clpony7 This essay is has an awesome foundation but also a lot of potential!
So, I also gave this a 3-4/6. Your arguments seemed to be real and legitimate to me. You stay generally focused, but the big problem seems to be critical thinking. You need to expand on why the Utopian Socialists were a representation of an idealistic approach and why a practical approach would have been better. You should also provide probably two more examples of why idealistic approaches fail and why practical one’s succeed. Some examples could include Gatsby and his idealistic approach to trying to get Daisy back, which ultimately failed because he was not practical, but instead believed too much in the past and his own personal ideals.
Your intro could also be more direct so it is clearer to see your view. I usually do 2 sentences with keyword+ agree or disagree+ why/how/what. Then you say “several examples include blah blah blah…” I got this formula from AcademicHacker: http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/645763-how-to-write-a-12-essay-in-just-10-days.html
Anyways, your essay definitely has a lot of potential because of the solid base you created for it. There is definitely good vocab and language, as well as an interesting and thoughtful example. I’m positive you can get a 6 on your SAT essay! 
@milopenguin Wow, your essay is superb! I give it a 5-6/6! You have very thoughtful and interesting examples that demonstrate higher thinking because of your explanations and expansion of why they failed as a perfect society. You definitely know your names/dates and include a lot of SAT words/vocab.
There were a few places where sentences didn’t seem to flow, but again that does not really matter when weighed against the content and critical thinking of your essay. My only critique is to include sentence transitions, such as “As demonstrated by” or “Through the actions of” at the start of each paragraph, so your ideas flow better and connect more cohesively. But other than that, I highly doubt you could get a score below a 5!
@Synonyms You have extremely good critique!! You really seem to know what you’re doing when reading and analyzing these essays!! Do you know when you are gonna post your own essay? 
I’d love to see how your essays are!!!
@milopenguin @clpony7 @Synonyms Thanks everyone for our first successful critique!! I look forward to continue working with such awesome people as you guys!
I was wondering what our next step should be for choosing essay…I like the idea of the surprise factor of picking an essay prompt so maybe each time one of us could be assigned the job of finding a prompt and then posting it so it’s more of a surprise for all of us? Also, are you guys still fine with the 2 essay a week? I was thinking we could maybe even bump it up to 3 or 4 since we all seem pretty on top of everything. But again that’s up to all of you guys!
I also found this cool website that tells you what type of events you should know to do well on the essay! http://www.camillasenglishpage.org/wp-content/uploads/test-prep/SAT-essay/The-SAT-Essay-Building-a-Repertoire-of-Examples.pdf
@malfoythegreat If your essay isn’t a six, I don’t know what is. There isn’t much to fault. You have solid paragraphs with in-depth examples - nothing more to say, really. Your handwriting must be super small to fit all those words onto two pages! I think you just need to make sure that you can replicate this for a wide range of topics.
I’m fine with 3-4 essays a week, but even if I can’t find the time to write an essay, I’ll make sure to critique any essays that you guys post up. Perhaps you should post a new assignment up tomorrow - try to make it a completely different topic.
@malfoythegreat Thanks for the critique! I should probably do like a Cliffnotes review of the novels I’ve read, because it’s been a while since I’ve read Gatsby, Catacher in the Rye and the other staples that would help me with examples.
Wow, you have a really good set of diverse, relevant, and well-developed examples! You restated your thesis at the end of each paragraph which is great, too. Some thoughts:
“A perfect society is not possible, or even desirable because it restricts the freedom of individuals which ultimately harms them as well as their society.” For some reason, this sentence seems to run on…I think either switch ‘which’ to ‘and’ or split the sentence into two.
“They are punished and often persecuted or executed for ever going against Kim Jung Un in attempts to be their own individual.” * I’d recommend removing ‘punished and often’ because then, persecuted seems repetitive.
“The actions of Mao…” *I don’t know if this was on accident, but I think that the first time you introduce a name, you should always say it in full, so Mao Zedong.
“An attempt to create such a society severely impedes the individual’s freedoms and need to be themselves, without the brainwashing and input of dictatorial leaderships.” * the whole clause starting with without doesn’t seem to make sense with this sentence; also, a minor grammatical error, but individual’s is singular while themselves is plural/ I don’t know if sat graders allow they as a gender neutral singular term.
I’d say 5/6, but only because your intro and outro thesis sentences weren’t very effectual in my eyes.
As for writing 3-4 essays a week, that sounds all the better! Also, that resource you found is really useful! Thanks for sharing! As an off-topic note, I really want to read Zamyatin’s We… I read his short story “The Cave” a while ago and his writing style really struck me.
Thanks so so much guys!! @milopenguin @clpony7 Trust me, my essays used to be way worse haha, it’s only until recently that I’ve gotten better!
Yeah, maybe we can all find some topics that can apply to a wide range of topics? @milopenguin That way, we can all have some different topics at hand for each essay question.
@clpony7 Yeah, my grammar is usually pretty choppy during the time constraint haha, but thanks a lot for giving me ways on how to fix my grammar!! That definitely helps. Omg, yes, you should totally read We, Zamyatin has a really amazing writing style. As for “The Cave” I’ll for sure look into it!
Ok cool! I’ll post a new assignment tomorrow! So just to be clear, you guys want me to pick the prompt for tomorrow right?
Thanks again guys!!! 
@malfoythegreat I’m fine with that.
Sorry guys! My internet connection died on me again! Terribly, terribly sorry for being so late!
I agree with the 3 or 4 essays per week. Even though it’s highly likely that I won’t be able to write them all since I’m in the middle of finals and all, I think I’ll be able to take my time off to review your essays. Also, if I’m suspiciously missing for a few days, that means that my internet connection dies again. In that case, I’ll try to catch up to you guys once I can get online.
Here’s my essay. I also got the perfect society prompt. The Random Number God sure loves that prompt…
From before the dawn of human civilization, a perfect society has always been the ultimate goal of the human kind. However, in reality, that goal has never been achieved once, suggesting that the perfect society may turn out to be nothing more than human kind’s shared delusion of grandeur. This notion has been well-illustrated by history and literature and has been thoroughly discussed by a recent scientific study.
While many may argue that the concept of a perfect society is harmless and can be even beneficial in the long run, history has proven times and times again that that concept is a particularly dangerous one to have and can have disastrous consequences. Started out as a wide-eyed idealist with the grand dream of a perfect democratic society, Maximilien Robespierre quickly jumped off the slippery slope as corruption in his new Republic ran rampage. By the end of the Reign of Terror, an estimate of 16 000 to 40 000 people were executed by the guillotine under his order. The full-circle revolution came to a close in 1794 with Robespierre’s own execution and the subsequent counter-revolution led by Napoleon Bonaparte – the final curtain falls on Democracy in 18th century France. With his dangerous idea of a perfect society, Robespierre, for all of his good intentions, had paved the way to hell for both himself and his people.
Another argument for the stance that the idea of a perfect society is a damaging one to have is made by George Orwell in his work Animals Farm. In the book, on the way to the perceived utopia that is a farm run by animals, for animals, the mistakes of the creatures of the farms was made clear to them in the most terrifying ways after Napoleon self-elected himself as their leaders. From “all animals are equals” to “4 legs good, 2 legs bad”, the equality the animals bet their lives on collapsed like the house of cards that it was. Ending with the infamous “all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others” and the pigs drinking themselves into human beings – the initial oppressors of the animals, the story came to a close, just as the bubble that is a perfect society burst with the meaningless sacrifices of animals to the so-called “revolution”.
To fully understand why a perfect society is impossible, we must turn back time and consider the origin of the modern human, so said a scientific study of The University of California. The study posits that with our ancestors being what they were – hunters and gatherers, we were wired to be satisfied with our achievement for only a short period of time before a new desire strikes us. As such, the concept of “perfection” itself is a moving goal post, never to be reached, always to be a distant promise of tomorrow. To illustrate its reasoning, the study puts forth an example in the form of the evolution of the definition of “heaven” from the middle age to our time. To the medieval peasants, paradise would be enough food for the family, clean water, not dying of the Plague, not freezing to death when winter comes – exactly what constitute as the modern man’s basic standard of living that is every so often taken for granted. The study concludes that the notion of a perfect society is nothing more than an outdated empty motivation for the pre-civilization mankind to keep on moving forward.
The dream of a perfect society has lost its meaning. While a perfect society is not worth chasing after any more, in this Enlightenment days and ages, a better society is the logical goal for humanity to set for itself in order to advance and build a kinder, gentler world.
Eh, I’ve finally managed to squeeze in a third example, but then the essay turned out to be too long and took 45 minutes to complete. @malfoythegreat, I’m really, really jealous of your writing speed. About your essay, I agree with milopenguin because holy cow if that essay doesn’t get a 6 I don’t know what will. Aside from a few minor snags here and there, I think this essay is superb. I’ll list those few snags anyway here:
- “A perfect society is not possible, or even desirable because it restricts the freedom of individuals which ultimately harms them as well as their society.” I don’t think this sentence is a run-on one, it’s more like comma splice and missing antecedent. “A perfect society is neither possible nor even desirable because it restricts the freedom of individuals, ultimately harming them as well as their society.” will be better.
- “An attempt to create such a society severely impedes the individual’s freedoms and need to be themselves, without the brainwashing and input of dictatorial leaderships.” What clpony7 said.
- " These campaigns forced members to be self critical and subject themselves to the criticism of others. This led to suicide and psychosis." => " These campaigns forced members to be self critical and subject themselves to the criticism of others, leading to suicide and psychosis."
- “Mao’s attempt to create a perfect communist society proved to be extremely destructive as it led to the destruction of many Chinese people as well as the take down of anyone perceived not loyal to Mao.” => “Mao’s attempt to create a perfect communist society proved to be extremely destructive as it led to the death of many Chinese people perceived as not loyal to Mao.”
This is only my personal opinion, but maybe you should prioritise your intro and conclusion for revision, esp the first sentence. First impression is everything, after all. While the other grammatical mistakes are not likely to be picked up on, tiny as they are, it’s extremely probable that the readers will pick up the mistakes in the first sentence. At least, that’s what happens to me. It’s, like, once I’ve gotten into the flow, my brain automatically fixes any small mistakes, and as such, those mistakes rarely bother me. However, at the beginning of an essay, I haven’t gotten into the flow yet, and since I have the tendency to judge if something is good or not based on the first few sentences, the preconception kind of sticks even though the rest may be a gorgeous piece of work. Eh, it’s still my personal opinion, though, so I don’t know.
Hey can i also join u guyz?..i am International student from Pakistan and taking SAT in May @malfoythegreat
@mickey29 Hey there! Ah, sorry we’re kinda full right now, but I was in your position a while back and decided to just start my own forum asking for a study group! It’s pretty easy to do! Good luck!
@Synonyms This is essay looks like a 4-6/6. Two examples can be quite sufficient if they are well elaborated upon. You’ve really put a lot of substantial details into the examples which is exactly what the markers are looking for, I believe. Don’t worry about squeezing in a third paragraph if you think you can write two solid examples. Often, the third example is just a “safety” measure to ensure people can get a 5+. While there might be a few grammar mishaps - nothing too major, of course (which is why I wouldn’t downgrade essay) - I don’t see much wrong with it.
In your conclusion, make sure you explicitly state the thesis and examples - don’t worry about making it “fancy” like you would on a normal English assignment. Your introduction and conclusion MUST be very straightforward. Markers spend about 2 minutes on each essay, so they don’t have time to interpret any implicit meanings. You’ve included “The dream of a perfect society has lost its meaning” but make sure you also explicitly answer the question - “Is a perfect society possible or even desirable?” All you have to add is “A perfect society cannot exist” or something similar. This is the main reason why I awarded you a minimum of 4 - otherwise, it would have definitely been a 5.
Your first example seems to be longer than your second. This isn’t a criticism, but perhaps you should spend less time developing your first example so that you have more time left over?
Also, another tip - avoid cliches (“From before the dawn of human civilization”), especially at the start. This is the first thing the marker reads.
I know I might have sounded a bit harsh in this review, but I was just attempting to provide some constructive criticism. To be honest, I would be quite surprised if you got anything lower than a 10 on the real deal - you’ve nailed the hardest part of the essay, which is the examples. Fixing up the conclusion is literally the easiest thing ever, so you should be all good.
Should we limit our use of the term “courage” to acts in which people risk their own well-being for the sake of others or to uphold a value?
Bravery, valor, courage- these are words often applied to actions undeserving of such laud. True courage comprises the readiness to sacrifice oneself and everything one has for a greater purpose.
Heroes that commit acts of true courage are few and far apart. One such hero was Adam Johnson, an American soldier fighting in the Middle East, who by sacrificing himself saved the lives of his whole division. Upon finding a bomb that he knew he could not defuse, he made the ultimate sacrifice- his life- to save the lives of his brothers in arms. Thus is an act of pure courage.
Another great man of our nation who displayed courage was President Abraham Lincoln. He fought to abolish slavery despite all predicaments. His fight for justice tore the nation in half and took the lives of 600,000 American soldiers. Nevertheless, the truth prevailed and was slavery was abolished. In refusing to be complacent in the face of injustice, Abraham Lincoln risked everything, and eventually paid with his life. He was assassinated in 1863 at Ford’s Theater by the Southern radical John Wilkes Booth who craved revenge for the South’s defeat. Lincoln is remembered as one of the most courageous men in our nation because he put the truth and the slaves’ rights as human beings before his own profit.
Courage is self-sacrificial in that the hero is willing to lose everything for what he believes in. No matter the cost, he puts the greater purpose above himself.
@Synonyms Yeah, I think the SAT graders would print that essay out, frame it, laminate it, and hang it on the wall of fame for SAT essays if such a thing existed. Good luck with your finals!
@Synonyms No worries about being late!! Finals are a struggle for everyone haha, and internet connection can be bad for all of us
Your essay seems pretty solid, but I agree with milopenguin in a score of 4-5/6. You definitely have got the sure fire examples that an awesome essay needs, and they are also high quality examples which provide thoughtful interpretations of about your topic. However, the main reason I gave you a minimum of 4 was because you just needed to connect back to your thesis a little more, and explain why a perfect society is undesirable vs just stating the negative aspects of it.
Some notes to look into:
- since you said you spent 45 minutes on this, I would suggest spending more time on your body paragraphs, vs creating a multiple sentence intro. Many successful essays have a 2 sentence max for their intro because the graders only have 2 min to read your essay and a quick and to the point intro will allow them to understand your point of view quicker. To shorten you intro, you could say “The goal of trying to create a perfect society has never been achieved, suggesting that the perfect society may turn out to be nothing more than human kind’s shared delusion of grandeur. This notion has been well-illustrated by history and literature and has been thoroughly discussed by a recent scientific study.”
- also make sure to estb why a perfect society is unattainable in your intro- I notice you say that it often has disastrous consequences throughout your essay, so you could include that in one of your two sentences.
- for each of your paragraphs, it is also best to open with a topic sentence that introduces what you will talk about from the get-go, instead of going into some broad generalizations. So for your first body paragraph, start with introducing Maximilien Robespierre and then go into how he demonstrates the lack of a perfect society. You could say “As demonstrated by the wide-eyed idealist, Maximilien Robespierre, a perfect society cannot be attained because it has proven to have disastrous consequences.”
- I really like that you chose Animal Farm as one of the examples for this prompt! It’s a really good novel to use for this. Just again make sure to connect why Animal Farm specifically represents why a perfect society is undesirable, and how it’s is specifically bad for the animals as a whole
- lastly for your conclusion, you seemed to branch away from the prompt, so I would suggest just ending with what you determined collectively from your thesis/essay, and state why (simply) a perfect society just cannot be achieved
Other than that, your essay is well on way to being a 6!!!
All right guys. So our next assignment is to write an essay by tomorrow night on the topic of creativity! I thought that this one would be more difficult to do, since not that many SAT prompts involve creativity:
It is better to try to be original than to merely imitate others. People should always try to say, write, think, or create something new. There is little value in merely repeating what has been done before. People who merely copy or use the ideas and inventions of others, no matter how successful they may be, have never achieved anything significant.
Assignment:
Is it always better to be original than to imitate or use the ideas of others?
So, try to get it posted by tomorrow night, but if that’s not possible, it’s fine to post Wednesday! I’m just trying to make a schedule for us haha
@clpony7 I will edit your essay you posted tomorrow! I don’t want you to think I’m ignoring you lol!
Hear from you guys tomorrow! @milopenguin @Synonyms @clpony7
Thanks to all of you for the critique. @milopenguin, don’t worry about being too harsh. Constructive criticisms are always welcome. Also, haha, now you guys see what I meant about giving myself very good advice that I seldom followed…
I’m turning my essay early this time because I’ve got to concentrate on preparing for my Chemistry lab finals the next days. Hopefully, I’ll somehow manage to find the time to write the upcoming prompts next week as well.
Prompt: It is better to try to be original than to merely imitate others. People should always try to say, write, think, or create something new. There is little value in merely repeating what has been done before. People who merely copy or use the ideas and inventions of others, no matter how successful they may be, have never achieved anything significant.
Assignment:
Is it always better to be original than to imitate or use the ideas of others?
Isaac Newton once said: “If I have seen further it is by standing on shoulders of Giants.” While many may argue that it is always better to be original than to use others’ ideas, the fact stands that the modern world that many of us have taken for granted is a skyscraper with its foundation laid brick by brick by our forefathers. This notion has been well-illustrated by the development of many major scientific advances, among which are those of Heliocentrism and the molecular orbital theory.
Rome wasn’t built in by one man, just as the Copernican Revolution wasn’t fought by one scientist. First proposed by Copernicus in 1543 and improved upon by Johannes Kepler in 1600, Heliocentrism as a legitimate model of the universe wasn’t widely accepted until Galileo Galilei due the Aristotle’s dominant model of geocentrism at the time. Because of the infamy of the Galileo trial, the heliocentric model quickly garnered the attention of scientists worldwide, eventually leading to its evolution into the model of star systems and unanimous acceptance within the scientific community. However, the final nail on geocentrism’s coffin didn’t arrive until the late 17th century when Isaac Newton with his laws of motion and universal gravity expounded upon Kepler’s laws of planetary motion. Had it not been for the accumulative evolution of Heliocentrism, the world-changing Scientific Revolution, the opening act of which was the Copernican Revolution, wouldn’t have happened.
Another argument for the stance that sometimes, using other people’s ideas is a form of creativity in and of itself is the history of the molecular orbital theory. In 1916, the Lewis structures were born, becoming the precursor to the next tentative step in the right direction of the development of quantum mechanics – Linus Pauling’s valence bond theory. Combined with Max Planck’s law, Einstein’s formula, De Broglie’s theory of matter waves and Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, the valence bond theory was advanced into the first prototype of the modern molecular orbital theory through the efforts of Friedrich Hund and Robert Muliken. By 1950, thanks to Hartee-Fock method and the Schrodinger’s equation, the molecular orbital theory had become fully rigorous and consistent, having evolved into the modern molecular orbital theory that is widely in use today. Built upon the first building blocks set down by the previous generations, the molecular orbital theory has been one of the most important tools for man to further its understanding of molecular bonding.
In conclusion, it is not always better to be original than to imitate or use the ides of others. By not wasting time re-inventing the wheel, thus taking advantage of the accumulative wisdom thousands of generations before us left behind, we, as the modern human race, have achieved many unparalleled feats, the most miraculous of which has been the birth of the modern civilization itself. In the words of D. H. Lawrence: “The ideas of one generation become the instincts of the next.”
Well, this time, I couldn’t time it because I got interrupted several times while writing. So, eh, I’ll try to time it next time.
@clpony7, this one is much, much better. A 4-5/6. A definite 5 with a bit more polish and another example as your essay is a bit on the short side. Aside from this minor mistake “Upon finding a bomb that he knew he could not defuse, he made the ultimate sacrifice- his life- to save the lives of his brothers in arms. Thus is an act of pure courage.” => “Upon finding a bomb that he knew he could not defuse, he made the ultimate sacrifice- his life- to save the lives of his brothers in arms, thus performing an act of pure courage.”, the essay as a whole is swell and good. That was some really big improvement you’ve made in such a small amount of time.
@milopenguin, this is a bit off-topic, but how is fancy a normal English assignment usually? I’m an international student, so I have never had an English assignment that doesn’t consist of pages and pages of error identification and rewriting sentences.
I’m also an international student! Yes, our English assignments are usually 2—4 pages long, and we have to write them to “entertain” and “engage” the reader. That is, we have to make sure every word we use is perfect.
In this essay, it’s all about getting the main idea (thesis) across with supporting examples. We don’t necessarily have to “entertain” and “engage” the audience here - in fact, we have to be very explicit in this essay. The marker knows we only have 25 minutes. They won’t be expecting a “fancy” essay. They just want to see if you can communicate your thesis with supporting examples clearly and logically. If you find yourself pondering on what to write next, you shouldn’t be. Write down the words as soon as they pop into your head. Don’t waste time trying to think of a better way of phrasing out idea. In this essay, you should be writing more than thinking. Whereas on a school assignment, you would spend more time thinking than writing. I hope that helps.