It’s a far too common story: students that frequently score A’s on their essays in school come up short on the SAT or ACT. Unfortunately, normally proficient writers can end up scoring lower than expected on test day. 
Why the difference? Why are so many students disappointed in their essay score on the SAT or ACT?
It’s a simple answer: most essays miss the mark because they lack a clear thesis. A clear thesis is the most important element to scoring high on both the SAT and the ACT essay.
While a clear thesis may be important on a school essay, it is paramount to a good score on the SAT and ACT. Without it, you can score no higher than a five out of a possible six, and in many cases not better than a four.
Most baffling is how unmistakably easy it is to communicate a clear thesis. Both the SAT and the ACT offer a question in which the writer must pick a side. Test scorers could care less which side you take as long as you take a side.
Score higher by stating only one side of the argument. Make it patently obvious which side you take. The easy route is to answer the prompt in the positive or the negative, whichever will be the argument you develop in your essay. You don’t need a catchy opening as some people might suggest. Just spell out your main point and hit the reader over the head by repeating it throughout the essay. After reading your essay, there should be no mistake as to your perspective on the issue.
Sounds simple, and it really is. Unfortunately, even the best writers get lost in their own prose. Avoid a low score on your essay by making a clear point and sticking with it.
Learn more test tips by reading “2400 SCORES: 24 Life Lessons to Demystify the SAT® and Boost Your Score” by Brooke Higgins available at Amazon.
Contact CROSSWALK to learn about SAT and ACT Boot Camps, private test prep and academic tutoring for all subjects on the Monterey Peninsula.
Two Secrets to a Better Essay
Back to School time means essay writing time. My guess is that most students, regardless of level, will be assigned some essay topic about your summer in the next coming weeks. For primary grades it might be a short paragraph about your summer. For secondary grades it might be about summer reading.
Regardless, start your school year with the two secrets to a better essay:
1) Make Your Point Clear: next time you are faced with an essay, think about who will read your essay. Put yourselves in their shoes and ask, “what number one point do I want the reader to understand?” Also known as your thesis, your main point should be very clear from the first sentence to the last. The worst type of essay is the one where the reader asks herself, “what did I just read?” Ouch! Ensure that your reader will walk away from your essay understanding your point very clearly. If you are writing about your summer vacation, make it clear how you spent your vacation. Was it fun? Boring? Short? Long? Whatever it was, make your point as clear as day. If you are writing on deeper subjects, like your summer reading, make sure your main point is the most obvious argument or statement in the essay. It never hurts to repeat your main point several times in a given piece.
2) Use Concrete Examples: I wrote about how a good essay is a “C” in a previous post. In this example, C was for concrete. The more concrete your essay, the more powerful the message. Trying to communicate that your summer was boring? Well, it’s one thing to say it was boring. It’s another thing to describe how your mind endlessly idled in a holding pattern while channel surfing through Judge Judy reruns on afternoon television programming. Or if you need to argue a point from a summer reading book, make sure you pull actual evidence from your story to paint a concrete picture of your point. For example, if you want to argue that Animal Farm is an allegory for the Russian Revolution, then use excerpts from the book to specifically connect actions and descriptions of Napoleon the pig to similar actions and descriptions of Stalin.
If you make your point clear and use concrete examples, your essay writing will drastically improve. Sure there are other things you can work on–like grammar, structure and vocabulary–but if you start with a clear point supported with concrete examples, your Back to School essays might cause your teacher to think you spent all summer studying!
Why "C" is a Great Essay
Which of the following arguments is most convincing?
A: Deception is bad.
B: Deception is bad because it is dishonest.
C: Deception is bad because when the dishonesty is revealed, real people are deeply impacted like those that lost their life savings when Bernard Madoff’s ponzi scheme collapsed.
Of course “C” is clearly more convincing. Why? Because “C” uses a very concrete example. “A” is too vague. “B” is better but it is still a bit abstract.
If you want to make your essays more convincing, shoot for “C” as in concrete. The number one way to make your essays more convincing is to use concrete examples. This is true on standardized test essays like the S.A.T. as well as essays for school assignments.
So for your next essay, lose the abstract and get concrete!
The Path Towards Learning Success 