Writing Essays: Perhaps the most important area of focus has been on essay writing. As most of our AP score will depend on our essay writing-abilities, it's crucial that we practice. Working within a time limit poses a challenge, and a good way to work around that is with a clear step-by-step process.
Layout: pick apart the prompt. Decide what it's asking and create a thesis that answers the question(s).
Body: create topic sentences underneath the thesis that support it. Include evidence from the work to support these claims. Good evidence includes selections diction, imagery, details... etc.
Be consise: review the essay to make sure it doesn't deviate from the thesis. It will almost always point to the meaning of the work. The conclusion is a great way to close out what the essay is about in a few sentences, just as the introduction allows the reader an easy transition into the essay.
It will ALWAYS point to the meaning of the work.
ReplyDeleteOkay, so, a summative comment on these Synthesis entries: you make some good points, but I can't really call these entries comprehensive. Critical Theory, the history of lit, Foster, plain style, allusions, definitions of terms, defintions of the DIDLS and SSTIFS mnemonics, a discussion of annotation, notes from the text, and so on are all worth considering as important parts of this course.