Planning is a vital process in writing your essay. It is not an option! The 3000 word essay is the most challenging and testing part of this A Level. Without thoughtful planning you are almost certainly condemning your essay to a low grade - even failure. Below is one way to plan your essay.
Firstly - Don't panic! When you panic your body releases hormones that are really good in life and death situations. These hormones are designed to help you survive in the wild. They will help you run faster, jump higher and will help you hear the enemy approaching. You will react much faster when you are under attack. These hormones can help save your life and the lives of people around you. However when it comes to writing essays they are useless. In fact they are very very unhelpful.
Don't panic! Whatever way you plan it's important to start now while you still have time to think. In a week or so when the deadlines are close the only thing you'll be fit for is running!
Firstly [again!]- take the notes you made on the two essay titles you've chosen when you were choosing your essay and keep those notes handy. They may contain the most important points in your essay. Whatever you do in the following stages of the plan refer back to those first notes you made.
Firstly - Don't panic! When you panic your body releases hormones that are really good in life and death situations. These hormones are designed to help you survive in the wild. They will help you run faster, jump higher and will help you hear the enemy approaching. You will react much faster when you are under attack. These hormones can help save your life and the lives of people around you. However when it comes to writing essays they are useless. In fact they are very very unhelpful.
Don't panic! Whatever way you plan it's important to start now while you still have time to think. In a week or so when the deadlines are close the only thing you'll be fit for is running!
This can be the most exciting and creative part of the essay. Enjoy it!!
Firstly [again!]- take the notes you made on the two essay titles you've chosen when you were choosing your essay and keep those notes handy. They may contain the most important points in your essay. Whatever you do in the following stages of the plan refer back to those first notes you made.
Title - Identify the key word or key phrase - this is the theme - in the title and jot down definitions of the theme. Look it up in a good dictionary and or thesaurus. What do you think it means? Exclude nothing at this stage.
Then with this definition in your mind - jot down ideas associated with this theme that you consider relevant to the essay title. As you do this try and divide or split the theme into smaller themes. These are sub themes and will form the main paragraphs of your essay.
Ideas will come in waves I expect. Give yourself time to reflect and think about the theme, your ideas and all three texts.
I don't expect you to be reading and pouring through the texts at this stage. If you were preparing for each lesson, attending most lessons, taking reasonable notes, making annotations in the texts and listening in the lessons, you already know a lot. So allow yourself to really engage with the texts and the themes. Trust yourself and your thoughts about the essay.
Structure - At the end of this part of the planning stage you should have a list of sub themes - I don't really know how many but I suggest you write them down on a sheet of paper in a list. Leave a few lines free before you write the next sub theme.
Write the list with what you think is the single most important point you want to make. It is probably the point you feel most confident in making. Then continue with the next most important point and so on until you've finished.
Now draw up three columns and write the name of a text in each column. You should now have a page of boxes. Ideas for paragraphs in one column and three columns for each text.
Now you should fill each box with the notes you have already made. Somtimes the texts will be similar and sometimes they will be different. You should aim to write something for each box.
Content - Now it is time to pick up the texts and identify extracts and more specifically quotations that you can use to support the comparative point you are making. Keep a note of the page reference. Try and find good quotations. A good quotation is short - perhaps a word or a phrase. A good quotation has a strong literary element to it.
Realistically this is going to take a few hours and may take place over two or three days. But we've identified key extracts in the novel and in the play to some extent. You may have to spend some time re-reading or skim reading parts of the texts. See post on skim reading.
Ideas will come in waves I expect. Give yourself time to reflect and think about the theme, your ideas and all three texts.
I don't expect you to be reading and pouring through the texts at this stage. If you were preparing for each lesson, attending most lessons, taking reasonable notes, making annotations in the texts and listening in the lessons, you already know a lot. So allow yourself to really engage with the texts and the themes. Trust yourself and your thoughts about the essay.
Structure - At the end of this part of the planning stage you should have a list of sub themes - I don't really know how many but I suggest you write them down on a sheet of paper in a list. Leave a few lines free before you write the next sub theme.
Write the list with what you think is the single most important point you want to make. It is probably the point you feel most confident in making. Then continue with the next most important point and so on until you've finished.
Now draw up three columns and write the name of a text in each column. You should now have a page of boxes. Ideas for paragraphs in one column and three columns for each text.
Now you should fill each box with the notes you have already made. Somtimes the texts will be similar and sometimes they will be different. You should aim to write something for each box.
Content - Now it is time to pick up the texts and identify extracts and more specifically quotations that you can use to support the comparative point you are making. Keep a note of the page reference. Try and find good quotations. A good quotation is short - perhaps a word or a phrase. A good quotation has a strong literary element to it.
Realistically this is going to take a few hours and may take place over two or three days. But we've identified key extracts in the novel and in the play to some extent. You may have to spend some time re-reading or skim reading parts of the texts. See post on skim reading.
Wow! - This is your plan! You don't have to think any new thoughts. You don't have to add anything. The essay is now before you on this sheet of paper. And its time to write! It's time to write an introduction.
