The Essay

You will have 20 minutes to plan and write an essay on a topic like the one below.  Read the topic carefully before you begin writing.  This essay is assigned to give you an opportunity to show how well you can write.  You should, therefore, take care to express your thoughts on the topic clearly and effectively.  How well you write is much more important than how much you write, but to cover the topic adequately you may want to write more than one paragraph.  Be specific.
 You may want to write an essay on this sample topic for practice.

Young people often want the power and privileges of older people, whereas older people often feel that childhood and youth are the happiest times of life.

   Explain some of the advantages or disadvantages of being the age that you are now.  Be specific.

Good Response:

As a young woman of eighteen, I feel very fortunate to be young enough to enjoy the benefits of my youth and old enough to be wise in my decisions.  Being young allows me to be more carefree than my parents because I have fewer responsibilities weighing my life down.  I am old enough to choose my own friends and recreations, and I have a driver’s liscense to permit me additional freedom.  My parents trust my decisions as mature and responsible, which is very supportive.  I am recognized by them as an adult, whereas my younger sister is slightly more restricted.  I have also experienced the priviledge of voting in a local ellection, which fulfills a sense of duty for me.  My friends feel comfortable having someone to depend on, a responsibility I could not have held up to as well at fourteen.  This expansion of my life experiences due to my age status is preparing me for my future by making me a more rounded person.
 Being eighteen has its drawbacks  I am not allowed to buy alcohol in the state of New Jersey.  This is not a major defeat, but to function in the social circles of adult life, one must socially drink.  Because I am still a student, my age is overruled by my educational status.  My parents, however supportive, still view me as a child in some respects  because I still live in their house.  I have not had the full responsibilities of an adult as yet, and the changes seem slow in coming.
 In contrast to this, the life of a child of eight or nine sometimes seems much easier.  It is sometimes difficult not to be enviable of their carefree lives.  I feel that being eighteen is a rich experience, in view of all of its advantages and disadvantages.

 This 20-minute writing sample is a good first draft.  Despite the errors in diction and spelling, the writer obviously has control of the language:  the ideas are generally clearly stated; they are organized; they are pertinent.  The sentence structure has some variety.  The errors in spelling are not frequent.  The writer’s major weakness is in the inexact use of words.  Even so, the total piece of writing is strong enough to justify a good rating.

Mediocre Response:

The advantages of being eighteen are numerous.  First of all, it is a time when you are no longer considered a child.  The majority of eighteen year olders are heading off to college.  This is a new beginning because no longer will people do things for you.  Now you must do it for yourself.
 New ideas are developed by oneself the emergence of self-discipline and being independent are very important.
 One of the best advantages is being on your own and doing what you want to do.  This includes good studying habits, staying in shape and enjoying the night life.
 I find that the disadvantages are very few.  The best one is leaving all your high-school friends behind.  The same people you got along with for four years.
 Another disadvantage is unavailability of a full-time summer job.  this would help cut the high cost of college tremendously.
 Finally the lack of respect for not living up to your fullest expectations such as top honors in high school and all-country in basketball.
 In closing I would like to say that being eighteen is the greatest time of life.

 This sample is somewhat weaker.  Some sentences are complete, indicating control of sentence structure, while others are fragments.  There is some organization to the ideas, but that organization is not consistent.  Some of the statements are clear; some are murky.  The sentences are not very sophisticated in structure, but neither are they invariably simple.  The writing is definitely in the middle range.

Weak Response:

If your in a family with older sisters and brothers you will learn.  The older kids get more priveleges, to go out later, and not many questions asked of where they were.  Young people have to be in earlier and account for everywhere they have been.  Older people think childhood is better because they don’t have the worries or expences as an adult which in turn makes their life happier.  At the age I am at now respoucibility is greater than ever.  Every step I take builds up my tomorrow.  And every move I make counts either against it or for it.  But now my time to make mistakes and learn how to improve them tomorrow.

 This writing sample is definitely weak.  The sample lacks organization; not even a topic sentence appears.  The writer’s difficulties with sentence structure, for example, make some of the ideas hard for the reader to comprehend on first reading.  Even though the writer does have ideas and those ideas are all relevant to the topic, the writing is weak and the sample deserves a low score.