It is not a secret that the college application process includes writing an admission essay. There is a general approach to writing a college entrance essay for standardized tests, which includes five basic steps – How to Write a Five-Paragraph Essay in One Hour.
- Determination of the type of essay.You need to know beforehand how to write a college admission essay whether it is an argumentative, narrative, descriptive, or any other type of essay.
- Determination of the volume of essay. In each paragraph of a college entrance essay, there must be at least three sentences. Moreover, it is advisable to write a standard essay that consists of five paragraphs.
- Formulation of the basic thought, thesis, and arguments. If the text of the task is formulated in the form of a question, in most cases, the thesis should be formulated as a response to the question posed.
- Presentation of the main part of the essay. Briefly: paragraphs one and five should be small. In the first, it is enough to indicate how you are going to solve the problem. Paragraph five is logically derived from paragraph four. What is specifically said is a conclusion from all that has been said above. If in part five you start a new discussion, a new idea appears, then you need to write a new essay. It’s a waste of your time. Do not add anything new to paragraph five.
In an essay up to 3,000 words, one paragraph is allocated for the introduction and conclusion each. The rest of the essay consists of the main part. For example, in an essay out of five paragraphs, the main part should consist of three sections, i.e. each argument should be disclosed in one paragraph. After a brief outline of the main part, you should write one introductory sentence for each paragraph.
The arguments that substantiate the essence of the introductory sentence and examples (a quotation or a case from life) are set forth. The introductory sentence, argument, and example together make up one paragraph of the main part.
One of the body paragraphs is a proof. This is what you were waiting for. It’s like a street altercation, which you and your friends got into. There’s no point in trying to mumble something, childishly or funny. You need to listen carefully to what you are trying to say, and then state your arguments. Convince how accurately you understand everything and how wise your position is. And this is the fourth paragraph. The first, second, and third focus on the reason that the opponent is not right. And “bang,” here is your argument. It smote the opponent; it destroyed him. You affirm your own point of view. You should clearly and simply understand that there are other points of view, but they are wrong.
Since the arguments were already presented in the introduction, there is no need to use the semantic transitions in the main part – it remains only to state them in the order in which they are presented in the introduction.
We also need to decide how to build an argument, and we do it with quotes. Today it is often said that one can not use plagiarism. This would be absurd for ancient Greeks or Romans. After all, they constantly took other people’s thoughts in order to add impressiveness to their texts. In our case, you just need to specify where you got this information from. This is normal and legal. You need to use the quotation correctly. Imagine that you have six great quotes, and there is an hour for writing an essay. Perhaps you do not have enough time to use all six quotes, so you need to carefully choose. The reason is because the quote always requires three sentences: the first is the statement, then the second is a quote, and then its explanation.
Quoting is a jewel in the ring. You look at the ring and say: “Oh, Lord! What a wonderful ring, how bright, how it shines.” Then you take a precious stone from the ring, if you are a jeweler, and look at it, turn it, and look at its edges. And your essay has the same thing – you are interested in only a few facets, not all in general. You must apply the quote – insert the gem back into the correct frame.
If the quote is used correctly, then you will benefit from this. You can not use every quote that you have in your head. You can use not only quotes, but you can make references to different events and characters, and not necessarily something to quote. This is also useful. But the quote requires these three points: the statement, the quotation itself, and the explanation. It makes no sense to quote more than your own text. The quote should be brief and add weight to what you said.
- Conclusion
How to write a college admission essay conclusion? The conclusion, as a rule, is the most difficult part of the essay. The conclusion should include a paraphrased thesis, taking into account what has been said in the main part, ie. the explanation of how the arguments reinforce the thesis, as well as the final sentence, which draws a line under the main idea of the essay.
The more concrete the thesis is formulated, the easier it is to write a conclusion. The difficulty in writing a conclusion means that, most likely, the thesis is too vague. In this case, you can try to rewrite the introduction and then start to conclude again.
The main recommendation for writing essays for standardized tests is to quickly sketch out the initial version of the essay. If you do not have enough time, at least you will have a finished, albeit imperfect, product. In any case, the finished essay is always evaluated higher than the unfinished one. If you have a little time left, you can easily improve the essay with small changes.
On our blog, you can find more tips for writing a college essay or any other type of paper.