Kinds of essays and how to write them
1. The open prompt- the open prompt is an essay that asks you to recall books you have read and analyze the meanings. A few pointers- know a few novels really well. Holmes suggests American Dream and Hamlet. Also use plan text. Do not have run on sentences, or be too wordy. The prompt will remind you of this but do not analyze the story.
2. The closed prompt- here you have to analyze a piece of work that the AP board will provide. Make sure that you remember DIDLS and use them to answer this question. While in the open prompt you should do that as well it is even more critical here because you have the text right in front of you. A mistake that I made at the beginning of the year was ignoring some of the text. Do not do this even if it does not for your argument. When you get the prompt go through whatever they give you and come up with as many examples of DIDLS as you can so you have lots of examples.
I think that the organization of this post is very good. I think you mentioned a really good point when you said not to ignore part of the text especially when it contradicts your opinion. I have done that a few times but I learned from my mistake. I think you should also talk about plan style a bit more just because it is so important. I think you should have also mentioned about thesis answering the prompt, because your essay is s dud if you forget that.
ReplyDeleteI wish you could have expanded more on the open prompt and what we need to include in it.... there are all those things like meaning, effects, and technique that you could have expanded upon. The essays are hard to summarize because quite honestly, I find them extremely hard to write! I think you could have mentioned DIDLS as well maybe as a way to scan the closed prompts.
ReplyDeleteMaybe also point out similarities between the open and closed prompt so that we know what kinds of techniques to master.
Actually, I suggested Death of a Salesman and Hamlet, not American Dream. And it's "Plain Style," not "Plan Text." And you DO need to analyze the story. That's the whole point of writing the essay. What you don't do, whether the prompt reminds you or not (some don't) is SUMMARIZE the story. I agree with Carina's comments--both that you might have talked more about Plain Style and that you make an excellent point about not ignoring parts of the text.
ReplyDeleteAs you can see from my comments on your various posts, I'm a bit frustrated with the quality of your work on this blog. You need to be more attentive and thorough--I'd like to see you practicing the kind of work habits that you will need in college.