<p>thats where i struggle alot</p>
<p>Not a book, but here is something posed a couple of years ago on CC that helped my D:</p>
<p>How to Score a 12 on the Essay – A Miniguide </p>
<p>I scored a 12 on both the March and June SAT essays, so I thought I would write up some spicy tips for you all to do the same.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Read the Quote and the Question. Most kids open the first page of the question booklet and skip the quote, heading right to the question. The quote is there for a reason, though. It gives you some instant mental imagery, sets the tone for the question, and ignites your critical thinker. It is highly probable that you wont know the author of the quote, but if you do, it would definitely be prudent to at least mention that person and his or her ideas briefly in the essay (on the same topic, of course). Read the quote twice if you have to. Otherwise, move onto the question. Read the question ten times if you have to, noting how it is phrased. Realize that the questions must be politically correct and are supposedly philosophical, which means they are questions of truth and knowledge. You must fully understand the question to proceed. If you misread it and write off-topic, the results could be disastrous.</p></li>
<li><p>Time is not on your side. The test prep books will tell you how to manage your time, but the fact is that theres barely enough time for any type of planning. You do not have time to create an outline! Immediately after comprehending the question, begin your first sentence! You need every second possible. If, after reading the question, your mind begins to race with ideas (which is the best possible scenario), jot a few letters down in the test booklet to refresh your memory, but thats it! The ideal situation is to spend just a minute or two on the quote and question, dive into writing, and have a minute to spare at the end to search for grammatical errors or to upgrade your word choice in a few areas. However, you dont want to have to stop in the middle of a sentence when time is called, so bring a watch with a built-in stopwatch if possible. Try not to look at it for the majority of the essays duration, though.</p></li>
<li><p>Examples, Examples, Examples
and more Examples. This is the fuel of your essay. You need to keep thinking of examples as you write. Personal anecdotes will not work (e.g. At my school, I volunteer every week…). You need solid examples that carry at least partial academic weight (for instance, a well-known person, historical event, movie, philosophical concept, etc). The more examples you have, the more you have to write about, and the better your argument becomes. Many people have stated that since these essays are read by english teachers, it is a good idea to include books as examples. I think there is validity in this belief; however, you want the reader to think of you as a culturally enriched student, so draw from all types of examples, current events, entertainment, whatever!</p></li>
<li><p>Stay Focused. Its easy to lose sight of what the question is asking. In each paragraph, re-read the question to tie it all together. You dont want to write two whole pages only to realize that you digressed majorly and went off on a tangent. You can easily lengthen your essay by continuing to mention how your examples fit with the topic. </p></li>
<li><p>Content is King, but it wont guarantee a 12. Ever since that MIT professor found a correlation between length and scores, everyone assumes that longer essays get higher scores. Its true, but only because the more capable students usually have more to say and more to think about. Writing just to fill up space wont ensure a high mark (in fact, the more a reader sees of your writing style or lack thereof, the more it may in fact hurt you). Many of my friends filled up both pages until the last line and still received 10s. This reaffirms the fact that its what you write and not how much you write. (I will note, though, that I did fill up every line provided on both of my essays).</p></li>
<li><p>Prepackage, but also let it Flow. Think of some well crafted sentences and vocabulary that you know you want to use in the essay. Broad but insightful statements work very well as they can be applied to almost any essay the SAT writers throw at you. The readers <em>will</em> award more points just because there is an indication of planning. During the week or night before the test, lay out some vocab words which you are familiar with but which are still academic (dont use anything too far above your level). You can also think of some broad examples (for instance, editorialist Thomas Friedman has been writing recently about how the world is flat since jobs are being outsourced to India and China this could work for that job essay prompt, the majority rule question, practical skills, creativity
you name it!) Still, you should allow yourself a good amount of flexibility, so dont try to memorize an entire 2 page essay you could end up reading the question and panicking since your ideas dont fit the topic.</p></li>
<li><p>Forget conventional American writing. The 5-paragraph essay format practically breeds mediocrity. Its true that you need some type of introduction, and you will need insightful concluding marks, but anything in between should be up to you. On my essays, I had solid introductions but only a couple sentences for the conclusions. There are no rules, so as in the previous tip, let it Flow. If your ideas require one continuous paragraph for the whole essay, so be it. That probably isnt a great idea, but you shouldnt stress yourself out with having three main examples fit perfectly into three main body paragraphs. You are allowed to break a new paragraph just for one or two sentences if you so desire. Whatever you do, make sure its on your terms. In European countries and around the world, they use a spiral format, which uses the whole essay to discuss many viewpoints, and then they arrive at a thesis in the conclusion. For the SAT essay, it doesnt even matter if your thesis isnt the most prominent line so dont spend time crafting a perfect thesis.</p></li>
<li><p>Have a point of view. Go for a nonconformist view, even though that doesnt mean taking an opposte side to the question. Go for the point of view that somehow embraces the beauty of life, succeeding, and progress (it sounds corny, but it works). Dont depress the reader
impress him or her with a new and innovative direction on the prompt.</p></li>
<li><p>Write Legibly. If your reader has to squint to read your essay, it will slow the person down, paying more attention to grammatical errors and other inconsistencies in your essay. Write clearly so that the reader can zoom through and be wowed by the end of it. </p></li>
<li><p>Retaking the SAT? Recycle your essay thoughts. There are no rules against recycling your own ideas. It will be a different grader and a different test, so if you liked the essay you wrote from a past administration, feel free to use some of the same vocabulary, examples, or concepts. Obvious? Yes. Effective? Definitely.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>thanks that was helpful</p>
<p>can anyone suggest anything else</p>
<p>Fantastic advice! :)</p>
<p>Here are some old posts that have all the writing wisdom I can give:</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/467746-advise-essay.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/467746-advise-essay.html</a></p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/467836-tips-writing-superb-thesis.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-preparation/467836-tips-writing-superb-thesis.html</a></p>
<p>General advice:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>Read some sample 12 essays and try to figure out why they got 12’s. Read the 10’s, 8’s, 6’s, 4’s, and 2’s. Try to find out how the readers grade the essays. That gives you a better of what they’re looking for. Look at the grading rubric and try to grade and correct your own essay before you post it.</p></li>
<li><p>Write naturally. This goes with any writing.</p></li>
<li><p>Write what you actually believe.</p></li>
<li><p>Answer the question.</p></li>
<li><p>Have a clear thesis.</p></li>
<li><p>Have clear topic sentences that directly back up the thesis.</p></li>
<li><p>Give examples and clearly connect the examples to your topic sentence (so what if MLK was non-violent? So what if Gatsby changed as a person?).</p></li>
<li><p>Use transitions.</p></li>
<li><p>Don’t get carried away with your thoughts (e.g. “The world is getting better” is fine as thesis for a 25-minute essay, but not “The world is better than it always has” or “Nobody in the world cares about world hunger” or “African nations are being run by a bunch of corrupt ‘leaders’ who care nothing about world hunger, but only care about getting revenge on others.”)</p></li>
<li><p>No absolute statements (EVERY technological advance has negative effects.) THINK BEFORE YOU WRITE! Think about what you’re saying. Don’t say anything you can’t support.</p></li>
<li><p>Plan an OUTLINE before you write, so that you can be sure that what you’re writing follows a suitable outline and connects overall to the thesis. Everything in your essay should somehow support your thesis. </p></li>
<li><p>Conclusions should end with a lingerer. Don’t introduce something new. E.g. the whole essay supports the statement that TV isolates more than unifies. And then say something like, “Many other technological advances, including the Internet support this view.” That is not a lingering statement. That’s a completely new thesis. </p></li>
<li><p>Remember to read good essays!</p></li>
<li><p>Say what you really think; you should have a general base of knowledge from which to base your answers (of course, you have to know some stuff in order to support your views), but you really should be able to come up with support on the spot. The essay tries to test how well you can think and write clearly in a short amount of time; not how well you memorized your essay before you write it.</p></li>
<li><p>Don’t use universal examples if they don’t work! (e.g. Jane Eyre to support optimism is fine, but never to support an argument that technology serves to unite more than separate).</p></li>
<li><p>Don’t pay attention to the fact that everyone will start out before you (they don’t know how to write an outline before you start writing). But now you know, and as a result your essay will be much more structured and just better. Focus on your work, what is on your piece of paper.</p></li>
<li><p>Sprinkle a few SAT words that make sense, but the key word is SPRINKLE. Not overload. It gets SO annoying when people use too many words that they don’t use naturally (you honestly can tell when the writer doesn’t write naturally and/or uses words incorrectly).</p></li>
</ul>
<p>Those are the major points. If you do all the above, I’m sure you’ll be fine.</p>
<ul>
<li>practice, practice, practice!</li>
</ul>
<p>I will leave you with the wise but often forgotten words of Thomas Edison:</p>
<p>“Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration.”</p>