O-Level Tips #1: Answer the question|| A Small Writing Guide

So I decided to set up a small series of tips and tutorials to help students who are weaker in essay writing based on my experience as a volunteer tutor. Hopefully this will be helpful. I hope ;w;

Okay, so the first thing I always check in a weaker student’s work is if they are answering the question. This may sound obvious and thus unnecessary to students, but I always start there. Why? Because this is the most important element of any essay and this seemingly uncomplicated question actually involves in a lot of the skills you need to write a good essay. As this is meant to be short, I will only touch on question analysis and thesis statement writing.

Question Analysis

Possibly the most important thing for weaker students. Without proper question analysis, students are unable to understand the requirements of the question at hand and thus write poor essays because they cannot grasp the implication of the questions they are trying to answer. Normally, the exercises I do are asking the student themselves to identify parts in the question (in some questions, you have to cover 2 parts while in others, you will only need to cover 1 part) and ask them what the part is asking and consequently, what kind of essay is needed.

eg. How can people live healthier lives?

This question has only one part to it: it is asking for methods on the ways people can lead healthier lifestyles, which make it easy to answer. As such, this question calls for a discursive essay.

eg. Will the use of technology, such as the e-book and online reference sites, mean that the traditionally printed books will no longer be needed?

This question is something you might more commonly see. While there is only one question (will technology make print books obsolete?), there are 2 parts you should cover: The E-book and Online reference sites as they are specifically mentioned in the question. As such, if you decide to go along with the question, there are actually more than 2 possibilities.

1) The E book and the Online Reference sites will make physical books obsolete.

2) The E-book and the online reference site will NOT make physical books obsolete.

3) The E-Book will make physical books obsolete, but the Online Reference Sites will not.

4) The Online Reference Sites will make physical books obsolete, but the E-Book will not.

While the weaker students may not want to deal with the question after seeing the above combinations, they will still have to identify the questions to know what to avoid. Additionally, this question calls for an argumentative essay as well, given that it is a question which requires a stand and which requires substantiation to the stand rather than giving facts.

Okay, so now you’ve selected the question and then go on to write the thesis statement. Excellent! So the thesis statement is like, the part that will make or break your essay. For the student, the thesis statement serves 2 purposes: 1) telling themselves how they proceed and 2) telling the examiner how they proceed. For this purpose, I like the thesis statement to be one clear sentence (at least for weaker students) that answers your question. Normally, I start with a Yes/No approach and then work my way out to introducing a more complex statement.

So for the example of this question: Will the use of technology, such as the e-book and online reference sites, mean that the traditionally printed books will no longer be needed?

I will start with asking: Do you think that it will or not? Answer Yes or No.

A thesis statement at this level will look something like: Yes, the use of technology means that traditionally printed books will no longer be needed.

If I think the student is capable of more complexity in the essay, I will then ask: Do you think that E-Books and Reference Websites are equal? I will then present the 4 permutations on top and ask the student which the student is most comfortable with writing before letting the student do the writing. Chances are this this will not produce the most sophisticated writing but it will help avoid the pitfall of not knowing how to start or what to write.

So yep, that’s my small tip for weaker students: Always ask yourself if you’re answering the question.

A teacher detained ll Vocaloid Song Review

I’ve been writing too much for school and not enough for leisure. I’m hoping this idea will get me more excited about writing. It might get a little academic and stuff but more writing is more writing, and honestly I’ve been neglecting this blog.

So I’ve been obsessed with this song, simply because its so interesting. I mean, normally we have the dichotomy of love and hate in Vocaloid (think Acute and Culture Blooming Girl, to name a few), in which I will argue that death is merely an extension of the love that the characters have for each other. The dichotomy here of the person being seemingly helped and the person being helped shows that this is a 2-way exchange (as is everything in life)

Looking at the lyrics, we can see that the student is portrayed as emotional, even impulsive and as hating his teacher. He is shown in the video to hit his hand on the wall (at 1:07) and even manhandles the teacher (at 2:20). His character sings “Hey teacher, I hate your guts!”, which is something quite strong. However, at the end of the first couple of choruses, he asks the teacher to help him with his homework (“This homework I haven’t done…Mind lending a hand?” On the surface, he is the one who needs the teacher there, which is what we see in reality.

His teacher on the other hand, doesn’t even truly seem to retaliate; he seems a goofy but static character. We never truly get insight into his character- he is defined as a very nice teacher by his students. We see him as insistent through the eyes of the student, but he fails to define himself as a character through his actions.

It is only at 2:55, when we see him chasing after the student that we see a role reversal; the student becomes the object and the teacher being the subject. From that point onwards, we see the teacher’s thoughts  shine through- and at the end, the role reversal becomes complete when the student offers to assist the teacher, much like the teacher offers to help him at the start of the video.

 

Phew, that was only in draft for like 2 weeks -_-;