SAT Essay help?

you should write it like you would write any well-written essay. porfessors (note that high school teachers and college professors are the ones who evaluate the SAT essays) say that essays should have an introduction and conclusion (i have had essay tests where i was told to have an introduction and conclusion for my essay).

professors often recommended that you make a outline to help organize your thinking. in the case of a timed essay or essay test, it only needs to be a quick rough outline so that you know where you are going, what point/thesis you are trying to make, and how you are going to support your thesis. the number of points you have on the outline will dictate how many paragraphs you have.

some people can have a well-written essay and get their point across in few words/paragraphs whereas others do better with a lengthier essay. remember this is the only example of your writing that the evaluators will have so if you can add quality information to your essay it would likely be advantageous to write on the long side. but if the only way you can add length is to sacrifice quality then do not do it. give yourself time to read over the essay, proofread, and edit it. many professors say that poor spelling and grammar distract them from the content of an essay so you will want to make your essay as flawless as possible. however, the evaluators/professors will understand that it is not an essay for class that you had sufficient time and resources to prepare for (ie – dictionary, thesaurus, books and other sources to support your points).

the SAT website has sample essays, explains how the essays are scored, gives strategy advice, has practice essay prompts, and talks about effective writing. what better place to get advice then the people who are administering and giving the test. they offer sample test questions. there are also packages you can pay for. while the gre, has writing only packages i cannot find one for the sat. the sat preparation course is about seventy dollars for four months, but it allows you to write essays and have them scored. there are sample essays in the preparation guide which costs about twenty dollars.

hope this helps. best wishes.

Definitely have an intro and conclusion. It shows that you know how to structure an essay.

As for paragraphs, I think 2 is ideal. 3 is alright if you write ridiculously fast and can think of that many solid examples; 1 has the risk of looking paltry, but 1 well-written example is better than 3 superficial ones.

Throw in rhetorical techniques (parallelism, rhetorical question, in particular).

Yes, short but sweet intro and conclusions. Make sure you get a general gist of what you’re going to say in your intro, and HAVE A THESIS! Conclusion…use it to tie your essay into a more universal topic like racism, pride, etc. For everything in between, just give examples and explain WHY it relates to your thesis.

Good luck.