Preparing for essay exams

It’s time to start getting ready for the summer exams. This is going to need focus on time management and a different style of essay writing:-

Plan your revision time. There are lots of useful study charts online. Many of these are made for secondary education students, but there is no reason why you can’t take a GCSE study tool and use it for your BA course. If it’s helpful to you – use it. No one else is going to know you used a Key Stage 3 timetable! Take a look at some of the revision charts available online

Essay Writing – Analysing your 1st draft

After completing the first draft of your essay, how do you know whether it is any good? Some editing will improve punctuation, spelling and grammar, but you also need to give serious thought to the content.

Look through your article paragraph by paragraph and ask yourself these questions:-

Essay writing time: Time to take control

As you move away from school and into a university environment, the way you study and your essay writing changes. You are now seen as an adult, and it’s up to you to make sure that you succeed in your studies. To effectively study, make sure you can deal with these points:-

Solitude – During the course of your university career, you will have to spend a lot of time on your own studying. Some people love studying alone, but for others you may feel a complete lack of motivation. Work out how you feel about solitary writing time and how you can best deal with it.

Essay exams: How to make revision notes

It’s the time of year when students turn their attention to revision. But how can you produce effective revision sheets?

Making revision notes seems to be something that causes many students concern. There’s no big mystery as to what should go into your notes. Also, there is no right way to make revision notes. Your revision note methods will depend on the subject matter and what you prefer.

Making yourself understood: Essay sentences

Badly written sentences can lead to all sorts of misunderstandings – from poor grades for essay writing through to upsetting someone with the wrong tone in an email. Here are some pointers to help you tackle sentence construction.

Writing incomplete sentences is becoming common. The informal nature of written communication on the internet means that there are many times when you can construct an incomplete sentence and yet – in context – it makes sense. However, in an essay, informal writing can damage your grade.

Essay Writing Tips – Using ‘signals’ in essays

As you write essays, you need to be very clear about where you are going next with your argument. Using signalling words tells the reader what you intend to do, where you have been with your argument so far and where you intend to take it next.

To get a better understanding of any of the signalling words for essay writing, you can look at the essay examples from the Oxbridge Essays website.

Writing essays: Why bother with essay plans?

What is an essay plan and why bother writing one? Isn’t it a waste of time when you could be getting on with actual essay writing? Here are some reasons why taking the time to write a plan is a better bet in the long run:-

Focus on the question. What are you being asked for? What does it mean? Take the question apart on paper and identify the key words. A common mistake amongst students is to just write everything they know on the topic. But how often have you seen an essay question that asks you to “Write down everything you know about… enzymes (or Elizabeth I or existentialism or Italo Calvino”? Never, right? It’s time to start paying attention to what the examiner really wants. Essays and exams are not just a test of memory.

Preparing to Write Essays in Exams

Writing an essay in an exam is a different experience to producing one over the course of a term. You might have a three hour exam with four essay questions to answer and preparing for it needs some skill in effective preparation and good revision sheets. Here are some tips to help you prepare and then stay calm once you’re into the exam hall:-