English Essays, writing "off the cuff"????

turgon

I have composed a short story in conjunction with my teacher. I have just put the final touches on it about a minute ago. I think it is s**t (in boards.ie language quite bad). My teacher thinks it is "fine". To be honest, i don't want just fine, a want a good essay.

The whole point of doing a short story is that it would be easy to find a relevant title in the exam. If I were to do it it would probably be the "write a shot story based on one our more of the images..."

I was wondering would it be stupid to go into the exam and write another form of essay in the exam "off the cuf", without previous preparation. This is what I did in the pre's, and it worked well because the title was good.

The essay I would write would hopefully have elements of politics and history, either a persuasive but probably an argumentative prose. I would make a point and back it up using historical and current affairs information.

What would ye all think of this? Is it too risky??????????

kaki

This is what I'm doing. Partly because I think that English should test one's ability to compose something off the cuff, rather than regurgitating some piece that has been perfected over a coupla' weeks in school.

Partly also because I am lazy and not counting English for points.

Cokehead Mother

kaki wrote: »

This is what I'm doing. Partly because I think that English should test one's ability to compose something off the cuff, rather than regurgitating some piece that has been perfected over a coupla' weeks in school.

Damn straight.

Riotguy

I'm not risking it, I'm learning the bones of three A-standard essay I've written over the past two years...hopefully the pics will allow for one of them.

dip

I'm just gonna write it off the cuff on the day too.

I suck at short stories, but if I had a good A-standard one I probably would learn it off and as long as there's a tenuous link to the title/picture it'd be fine.

I prefer the informative/persuasive speeches and personal essays so hopefully there'll be one that suits me on the day.

turgon

Riotguy wrote: »

I'm not risking it, I'm learning the bones of three A-standard essay I've written over the past two years...hopefully the pics will allow for one of them.

Well my predicament is that I don't think my essay is anywhere near A standard.

And I dont exactly want to ring my teacher today 5 days before the exam and say, look there my essay is crap, what can I do?

PurpleFistMixer

I'll be doing it off the top of my head. Short story most likely, unless the pictures are horrific somehow. I've never had a problem coming up with a story from a title on the spot, and you don't need a terribly elaborate plot anyway... then just fill in the rest with descriptive language. Grand.

The historic/political aspect is interesting, as in, using other subjects you do.. we had to write an interview with a famous person for English the other week, and I thought "Okay, i'll interview Einstein, and ask him about the photoelectric effect, and write a page of physics...". But I'm not sure how much they'd like that in an English exam. History and politics you could probably get away with though... just pray your examiner agrees with you. My Irish essay for the mock was a giant anti-consumerist rant ("Materialism".. what else could you do?), and it was a bad idea in retrospect. You don't know the examiner and as unbiased as they're supposed to be, you don't want to piss them off either...

Corruptedmorals

I had a rough idea in my head for the short story question, if the essay/speech questions sucked last year, which they did, so I launched into my short story. I'm fairly bad with them, and I didn't really like my short story, I only talked about the ballot box for a second...story ended up being young girl..50's west of ireland..pregnant..suicide, lol it was cringeworthy but it worked cause it got 90 something out of 100.

And the marking scheme said it didn't matter if you only talked about the image for a second, which was nice. So there's a good bit of leeway with the question, just have an idea in your head but I wouldn't recommend learning one off..

devinejay

It really depends (on what, I wish I knew?!?!)

Fro the pre-mocks I hit a blank and wrote an argumentative that was pure dribble. Then the mocks came around and with practically no further preparation I had some sort of epiphany in there, and came up with a great short story "off the cuff"

This is what scares me, it's unpredictable, or I'm unpredictable, whatever. Because of this I plan to prepare a few short stories before hand, just the bare bones (No learning off by rote tywm!!) so if I'm stuck for inspiration I can adapt the storyline around the titles I'm given.

Should really look at something other than short stories too, but I'm not sure I have the time.

meeka

I'm not preparing an essay anyway... I've learned off some nice/interesting/philosophical quotes from various famous-ish people (I find that it's often easy to begin an essay with "As X once said, 'blah blah'"), but that's about it.

My imagination leaves a lot to be desired with regards to thinking up plots for short stories, but I'm hoping to be inspired on the day.

Fuascailt

I'm kind of in the same situation as this. We havent done much paper one, and when we have, I've mostly done short stories. I was also thinking history/politics might get me through it. Would i be mad to do a personal essay now, having done like one before? I've read through a few samples, does a first person short story count?

Riotguy

Riotguy wrote: »

I'm not risking it, I'm learning the bones of three A-standard essay I've written over the past two years...hopefully the pics will allow for one of them.

Same as that, I am so not risking it. Too many marks to lose.

turgon

PurpleFistMixer wrote: »

But I'm not sure how much they'd like that in an English exam. History and politics you could probably get away with though

My mock's essay was titled "becoming more acceptant" or something along that lines. I basically wrote about the move from imperialism towards unity from pre WW1 to the end of the Cold War, mentioning things like the French-Indo Empire, and the United Nations. I also focused in on compassion amongst individual people, making a comment that the relationships between two nations can be similer than between two people.

But if I do that in the exams I might read over it and see loads of mistakes. I was probably lucky the pre's. So what I might do is learn off both of the essays and see what happens.

I think, more than any other subject, you can make History relevant. Obviously not writing a history essay, but you can support many points with examples from the past.

BJC

It all depends on whether you're good at coming up with one off the top of your head. Some are and some aren't. If you need preperation to write a good essay then prepare, if you are capable of producing good work oo the cuff then I say go for it, it's more fun anyway. I find my essays off the cuff are way better because Im interested in where the story is going.

PurpleFistMixer

Fuascailt wrote: »

does a first person short story count?

Personal essay isn't a narrative, so avoid stories. In our mocks one girl did the personal essay on "What Success Means to Me", but she wrote a story about some girl becoming famous, got slaughtered for marks. Another girl did the personal essay of "The Impact of Television on my Life", wrote it from a persona that was clearly not hers (middle-aged woman addicted to TV), also suffered the marks. But we hadn't really covered personal essays in class so nobody knew what they were meant to write.
To me it seems like it'd be too easy to drift into rambling rant land, so short stories all the way for me. Everyone's got a style they find most comfortable, though, so go with what you're good at.

devinejay

PurpleFistMixer wrote: »

To me it seems like it'd be too easy to drift into rambling rant land, so short stories all the way for me.

Hit the nail on the head there, if you don't know what you're doing with a personal essay it turns in to philosophical rambling/garbled social commentary (Read; crap)

Since I prefer the short story, whenever I do a personal essay, the above happens. Not good.

Nikkio237

What happens if your perfect essay title comes up in the wrong section? As in, you've prepared for a narrative but you get a title on a perconal essay? That's going to throw you off completely. To be honest, I've never once prepared an essay. For one thing, I wouldn't remember it and I'd spend a good fifteen minutes that I don't have trying to think what the hell I was going to say! Someone had a good idea about learning a few quotes. If you think something factual could come up, research a few stats on a topic. Like BJC said, I suppose it all comes down to what you're good at. If you're that worried, your teacher's not helping and you feel you could do better on the day, go for it. That's what I'm doing!!

turgon

Good idea. What sorta topics do you think could arise.

That the reason I would base mine on history - I already know all the information

Kurtosis

I couldn't advocate doing a personal essay enough! My teacher always told us that your own experiences are the things you know most about and so can write more about. No matter what title comes up, you could manage to write a fair bit around whatever theme it was.

I did the LC back in 2006, did that personal essay “Let’s stop all this pretence! Let’s tell each other the unvarnished truth for a change!”. I can't actually remember exactly what I wrote about, but I did it in the style of an autobiographical piece and ended up getting an A1 overall, so it mustn't have been too bad!

Nikkio237

Oh, Lord only knows, don't ask me!! It depends on the theme of the paper, like our Pre was "A Sense of Occasion" and some of the topics that came up dealt with big occasions in your life. I'd say try modern social issues, though if you can fit historical references in, more power to you!! I'm guessing you did "Nationalism and State Formation" as your second Wider World topic? A lot of the time, you can study social issues for French/German/Spanish and your Irish, so if you get facts for one of those, just try and keep them handy for the Eng paper.

1huge1

Well i'll be writing it off the top of my head, as our teacher said if your higher level leaving cert english students you should be capable of going in there and being able to come up with one there on the spot.

In the pre there was a short story with the heading ''the air was electric''
I went on from there to talk about the rolling stones at slane last year where my main character got stabbed... got 94 in it.
Its good to take it from personal experience (well the concert bit not the stabbing, I don't know where I got that from) and write about stuff that your interested in. For me I hope to relate the short story to music, otherwise I'll go for the speech.

fivetwenty

Just go in there with a free spirit and an opinionated mind.

In my mocks I went in there with nothing, I got 84 for the long essay, you can't go wrong on a debate, whatever the topic is. And I have never read a book outside of school requirements in my life.

lovechem

I got 80/100 in the pre's for an article on our celebrity obsession. I hadn't put much thought into composing an essay for Wednesday but after reading this I'm a bit wary of the risk. Should I prepare something?! I usually go for speeches or articles. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh I'm so conflicted.

ShaneU

I wrote an "off the cuff" essay, an autobiographical story from my childhood, I got a B in Honours English

KeyLimePie

off the cuff always and forever:):):):)
the main thing is to have your own opinions and AMAZING vocabulary

declan_lgs

I did an off the cuff one in my mocks and it went deadly, but that was the only time I ever tried almost.

So, there is a chance I'm gonna fail.

I needa sort my life out.

SmashingPilot

KeyLimePie wrote: »

off the cuff always and forever:):):):)
the main thing is to have your own opinions and AMAZING vocabulary

I'd have to agree with you there. Normally, I don't prepare anything for my essays but in all honesty, I'm not hoping to do amazingly well in the subject.

Our English teacher gave us an essay titled "Castles In The Air" which can be adapted in many ways for certain essay titles. Thats the only thing I've learned and plan on learning.

turgon

Was just looking at my pre essay - the meaning of greatness - I got 78 for it so I might learn that too.

In an effort to ease my dislike of my essay I decided to ring my teacher and ask his advice. Here is how the call started:

Me "Hello Mr Nally, James here.
Teacher "Hi James"
Me "I am just wondering would have a minute to talk about my essay"
Teacher "Well actually James, I'm just walking down a street in Spain"

Hmmm ... as well as being embarrassing it no doubt cost each of us a load of money!!!! :D:D

daggy

I always write off the cuff.. very risky but in the past it has served me well!
I know Junior Cert is puny compared to leaving but i remember i wrote mine about a dream i had. In my mocks i did a dream based one and got full marks. i have vivid, bizarre dreams though.

dodgy, but it seems to work. Pot luck though.

Here's hoping i have a twisted dream on Tuesday night.

Peleus

personal essays are the way to go. Just speak form the heart and let it all out. I'm hopefully doing one on childhood and my 'loss of innocence'. it's really gay but it's good and nostalgic. It's most likely not going to come up but i'm gonna try to fit it in.

Also what you should do is have a few quotes ready, like ones from films/books and write em down and learn them. then you can use them in your personal essays. like "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it." examiners love qoutes in a personal essay. it shows you went the extra mile. I shouldnt be giving away my 'secrets' but oh well.

hippety-pippety

how can you predict what essay you're going to write when you don't know what the topics & essay titles are going to be?
i haven't done a thing, ever, for the essay... not the wisest but i've always thought just go with what you're given, just write and write, i don't really see how one can prepare for this.

although everyone here seems to think history/politics or something like that will be the topic, is this just a guess or what? i'm totally out of touch with all that..