EssaysHow to write these essays
These topics are about your own life, so you are the expert. Before writing, note three or four true details: the colour of your school building, the name of your hobby, the job you dream of. Build each paragraph around one detail.
For topics such as Discipline or Value of Time, begin with the meaning, give examples from nature, school and the lives of successful people, and end with what a student should do. A proverb or a couplet, used once and correctly, adds weight.
A plan for essays about your own life
- Opening: name the thing: your school, your hobby, your aim.
- Describe it: where, since when, what it looks like or what you do.
- Why it matters to you: what it has given you or taught you.
- A day or a moment: one true scene, such as the morning assembly, a prize, the first day of the holidays.
- Closing: a hope or a promise.
A plan for essays on a value
- Say what the word means in plain language.
- Show it at work in nature, at school and at home.
- Show what happens without it.
- Say what a student can do, starting today.
Words that help
Punctual, regular, obedient, self-control, routine, ambition, goal, determination, well-equipped, spacious, co-curricular activities, pastime, leisure, creative, knowledge, bright future.
Mistakes examiners notice
- Describing an ideal school in place of your real one. Real details read better.
- An aim with no reason behind it. Say why you want to be a doctor, a teacher or a farmer.
- Preaching. An essay on discipline that only gives orders is dull; give examples.
- Paragraphs that are one long sentence joined by "and".