hi I'm Rebecca and today I'm going to
share with you a whole new way to think
about your essay writing now a lot of
students get very confused when it comes
to essays they don't understand why they
got a low score or they don't sometimes
understand why they got a high score
well I'm going to break it down for you
so you understand exactly how an
examiner thinks when he's giving he or
she is giving you marks all right
because I've been an examiner thousands
of times so this is what it breaks down
to what is a good essay writing well a
good essay depends on two main areas
what you write and how you write what
you write depends on your topic whether
you write about your topic because if
you write about a beautiful essay on the
wrong topic you're still going to get a
zero depends on what you write depends
on your topic depends on your logic of
your ideas how you present it the
organization of your ideas and things
like that that's what you write but
today we're not going to talk about what
you write we're going to talk about the
second element which is how you write
okay it'll be there are other essay
other lessons of mine which talk about
what to write today we'll focus on how
to write and what I want you to
understand is in connection with how you
write every single little thing you do
matters from the smallest thing to the
biggest thing and that's how I want you
to learn to think about your writing
that everything from the micro level the
smallest level to the macro level the
largest level matters what do I mean by
that
let's look so what I mean is every mark
you place on your essay matters every
word you choose matters every sentence
you write matters every paragraph you
construct matters and the entire essay
that you build is important okay what
did I just go over at every mark you
place
every word you choose every sentence you
write every paragraph you construct and
the entire essay all of that construct
goes together and combines to give you a
good score or not so let's see how you
can improve in every single aspect okay
let's start with the smallest aspect but
smallest doesn't mean necessarily least
important okay so when we talk about
every mark you make it means the
punctuation now people think that they
know punctuation but do you really know
punctuation yes you probably know how to
use a question mark you may know how to
use an exclamation mark although we
don't use them too much in essay writing
do you know how to use a semicolon do
you know how to use quotation marks if
not that's something you need to go and
study so that you can include the whole
range of punctuation marks in your essay
so you can show the examiner that I know
how to write well in English which is
what you're trying to do so if you're
not a hundred percent sure for example
how to use a semicolon then go and find
out okay next the words you choose
obviously are very important that means
you need to use rich vocabulary that
means using more than just saying good
and bad in fact I have another lesson on
that go check that out on how to use
anything but good and bad right and go
to our website I have a whole resource
about 142 words you can use instead of
good or bad some give you a higher score
alright
it also means vocabulary in essay
writing also means using transition
words like for to express your opinion
to compare and contrast things like that
right to conclude and if you want a list
of those you can go to another website
which I'll give you a little bit later
you can check these things out these
things are available take advantage of
them okay next what's important when it
comes to the word spelling yeah you have
to learn spelling I know that English
spelling is very difficult I have a
resource about that too on our englidh
website about 50 common spelling
errors make sure go through the list
make sure you're not making those errors
there are some things we can control for
example check the spelling of the
transition words right make sure that
you're not making a mistake in something
you're guaranteed to use you can't know
all the words you're going to use but
you can know some of the words you're
going to use for sure make sure you know
how to spell them make sure you know the
rules of capitalization which words do
you capitalize right make sure you go
over those rules really important next
when it comes to the sentence obviously
what do we mean by the sentence why are
you getting good or bad marks based on
the sentence
depends on your grammar grammar includes
of course all of the things you've been
trying so hard to learn includes your
tenses the word order the prepositions
the articles and modal's everything okay
we do have things to help you there also
we have resources all about the tenses
for example about word order things like
that check out those resources use them
make sure you're not making those
mistakes and if you are correct yourself
you can do it okay next sentence
structure if you're going to write an
interesting essay you have to use varied
sentence structure so what does that
mean that means you won't always write
every sentence in the same way sometimes
you're going to use simple sentences
sometimes you're going to use compound
sentences and sometimes complex
sentences what is that if you don't know
what a simple sentence is in English and
a compound sentence and a complex
sentence then I think you better go and
check that out but to tell you very
briefly a simple sentence is like my
name is Mary compound sentences my name
is Mary and his name is John and a
complex sentences while my name is Mary
his name is John okay so you have to use
a variation of sentences okay
variety of sentences to make your essay
interesting they also checking for that
you're also going to at the sentence
level make sure that your capitalization
is right at the beginning of the
sentence and anywhere it's necessary and
also correct punctuation
all of that comes into play at the
sentence level next we come to the
paragraph itself do you know how to
construct a proper paragraph or are you
just sort of writing well there are
rules and guidelines right how to do
that you have to make sure if it's an
introductory paragraph do you have a
thesis statement if you write a
beautiful essay and you forget to have a
thesis statement that's you're going to
lose mark that's really bad each
paragraph also needs to have a topic
sentence do you know what a topic
sentence is you should know you need to
check that if you're going to appear for
an exam like the IELTS or the TOEFL or
the TOI right topic sentence is
basically a general descriptive sentence
before usually at the very beginning of
each paragraph to give you a general
idea of what you're going to talk about
in that paragraph and usually for let's
say the TOEFL essays you're asked to
give an example so you are to make sure
if they ask you to give examples give an
example give a result give a summary
sentence right that will construct your
paragraph and that will construct a good
paragraph but you'll give the examiner
all the things that he or she is looking
for to give you better marks next at the
level of the essay right now we're
looking at the macro level right overall
have you divided your essay have you
structured USA in the way it should be
do you have an introduction do you have
a body do you have a conclusion right so
usually we have one introductory
paragraph two or three body paragraphs
if it's a TOEFL essay which has to be a
little bit longer 300 to 350 words then
you'll probably have three body
paragraphs and then a conclusion if it's
an IELTS essay you have one introduction
one conclusion maybe two body paragraphs
because you don't have to make it as
long but you must have those paragraphs
if you don't have them you'll lose marks
right you must know what an what an
introductory paragraph is how it should
be written what are the essential
elements of it one essential element is
a thesis
statement again in the introduction
you've got to have one and the body
paragraphs you must have your topic
sentences there in the conclusion you
must have a concluding sentence that
clearly shows that it's a concluding
sentence so you need to learn to use a
transition expression like in conclusion
in summary all in all something like
that right and last you must make sure
that the total length of your essay is
what they asked you to do so if they
told you to write 300 to 350 words make
sure that you have 300 or 350 words how
do you know that by practicing by
practicing until you have a sense of
what 300 to 250 words are like okay in
some exams you can there is a word count
in some exams there aren't there there's
no word count right there's nothing like
that on the IELTS you just have to write
on a piece of paper so unless you've
practiced and you have an idea what 250
words are like you won't know so make
sure because you could lose marks for
any of them leaving out any of these
things and you could also increase your
marks by doing all these things so what
I'm trying to do here is to get you to
think from this smallest point to the
biggest point how you can improve and I
can guarantee you that if you address it
at all of these levels the mark the word
the sentence the paragraph and the essay
you are guaranteed a much higher score
now if you are appearing for the TOEFL
exam we also have a website that I wrote
which is WWF accom another one if you're
appearing for the IELTS is good luck
IELTS comm and if you'd like to do a
quiz on this or go to some of the
references and resources that we have
available go to our website wcvb.com and
I mentioned about the transition words
that we have a really good list of
transition words which you can use on
our good luck IELTS website okay
all of us with your essay writing it's
not random you can make yourself yet a
better score
the best buy for now