Students who have mastered and understand the top 7 secrets of essay questions and how to answer them always do well in their exam, and the reverse is true. In this post, we shall master the needed tips to help you answer your section B or subjective test questions with confidence.
Remember as you read this that “The exam hall is not a place for trying new skills but a place to replicate what you know how to do best.”
What are the top 7 secrets of essay questions and how to answer them?
#1. Read the question carefully and note key words
The first of the top 7 secrets of essay questions and how to answer them is reading questions to understand them.
When attempting an essay question, the first thing you should do is read through the question carefully a number of times and underline the key words such as summarise, compare and contrast, discuss, etc. You would be amazed at how many people spend the whole of a ‘compare and contrast’ essay just comparing and consequently throw away half the possible marks by simply not doing what they were asked to do.
#2. Make rough notes
Having spent a few moments thinking about what the question is asking, start noting down everything that comes into your head on the subject no matter how irrelevant it may seem. Try and keep your notes brief, to the point, and as neat as possible. You should spend anything up to a quarter of the time available to you for the question (and maybe even longer), for the writing of these notes, as they are the foundations for your essay. A house without foundations will fall down!
Never start answering questions as soon as the examiner or invigilator says start work. Do not ever start answering questions right after reading a question without brainstorming and jotting down the key points you have to explain. Some questions can look pretty easy but you can only tell the full difficult level after brainstorming the question for potential answers. Do not forget that jotting down points for each essay is key and the second most important act and skill in the top 7 secrets of essay questions and how to answer them.
#3. Put rough notes into order and compose essay
Once your rough notes are written, you can start deciding which bits you do and don’t want to include in your answer. Go through your notes and number the parts you want to use in the order in which you want to use them. You are now formulating the structure of your essay. Don’t cross out unwanted notes because they may still be of use later on.
Now you are in a position to start writing your essay, bringing up the points you made in your notes and putting them together in a smooth, flowing style.
This method of essay writing helps you to come up with a well-structured and well-thought-out answer. Simply launching into writing an essay without any thought means that you could well get halfway through and suddenly think of other points that should have been raised earlier on or a different angle from which to tackle the subject. By using notes, you are able to empty your mind of the subject and then try and put your thoughts into some sort of logical order that hopefully makes sense.
#4. A good essay has a beginning, a middle, and an end. Ensure you follow this format.
Never forget one of the earliest rules you were taught regarding essay and story writing—beginning, middle, and end. Start an essay by saying what you intend to do, then do it, then reach your conclusions and perhaps summarise what you have said. Your points raised must be explained and provide the examiner with useful information. When writing an assay or answers to section B questions, see your self as someone reteaching your teacher what ever he or she taught you regarding that questions. If you write the kind of answers expexcted, your teacher will award you more marks and the reverse is true.
#5 Never be radical in your answers
Never be radical in your answers. Despite what you may think, even at degree level, free thought appears to be fairly limited.
Write what the examiner wants to hear, and you will do well. Be radical in your answer, and unless your argument is that of a genius, then you risk losing more than you stand to gain. The rule in all exams is to play it safe, no matter what you really think.
READ: How to pick or choose your questions to answer correctly
#6 . Use examples and quotations
Use examples and quotations as often as possible. Use of an example to back up your argument is a good essay technique and can only gain you marks. Don’t worry if the example or quotation is not quite 100% accurate – providing it’s close no one should mind too much.
Don’t be fooled into thinking that the more you write, the more marks you will get
Don’t be fooled into thinking that the more you write, the more marks you will get. Waffle will gain you no marks and will bore the examiner maybe even to such an extent that he misses a good point when you make one simply because it’s surrounded in waffle.
READ: How to Answer the New BECE Questions By WAEC and NaCCA
As you write your essay you should be consciously thinking to yourself as you go along “1 mark” for every good point you think you make. This is the way the examiner will probably be thinking when it is marked so if you can think in the same way it will probably help you to write quite a good essay.
#7. If you run out of time then list the points you were going to make
If you find yourself running out of time then make a neat list of the points that you were going to raise at the end of your uncompleted essay. Write a note to the examiner in the margin such as “sorry, ran out of time”. Also, always hand in your rough notes. You may well pick up marks f or the points you were going to raise even though you didn’t have time to incorporate then into your essay. This is to be used only in a situation where you have very limited time. Trust me, if you use this in all questions answered. You will fail before you submit the script for marking.
READ: Answering BECE and WASSCE Summary Questions: Secrets Out
If you know the person who is marking the exam, (i.e. it is an internal exam), then you are in an even better position to do well. Write what you think the marker will be looking for and if they taught you the subject then think back to the lectures and discussions you had with them. Write what they think and you can’t go far wrong!
Always hand in your rough notes with your essay. Write at the top of them – “Essay Plan”. This shows the examiner that you thought through what you were going to write and that you. Carefully planned your essay. You may well pick up a couple of extra marks for this. Handing in your rough notes also has the advantage that if you run out of time whilst writing the essay the examiner can still see what points you were going to make and also the way in which they would have fitted into the essay. Once again this could well pick you up marks which you wouldn’t have got if you had just stopped writing and handed in an unfinished essay.
If you make what you consider to be a good point near the beginning of your essay then try making the same point again later on. Use different wording and bring it up in a different way and you may just fool a weary examiner into giving you marks for it again! After all he’s probably seen hundreds of answers to this question so was it you who made the point or was it someone else? You can gain the odd free mark like this but don’t go overboard and use this trick more than a couple of times or your ploy will be spotted!
READ: Answering BECE and WASSCE Summary Questions: Secrets Out
Summary
- Read the question carefully and note key words
- Make rough notes
- Put rough notes into order and compose essay
- A good essay has a beginning, a middle and an end
- Do not be radical in your answers
- Use examples and quotations
- Don’t waffle
- If you run out of time then list the points you were going to make
- Hand in your essay plan.
READ: How to pick or choose your questions to answer correctly
By applying these top 7 secrets of essay questions and how to answer them, you stand a better chance of making good grades. Do not forget that practice makes perfect. Practice these tips with your class excercies, home works, assigments, before you try them out in the exam hall. The exam hall is not a place for trying new skills but a place to replicate what you know how to do best.
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