Can someone please critique my essay? Thank you!
Assignment: Should people take more responsibility for solving problems that affects their communities or the nation in general? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view in this issue. Support your problems with reasoning and examples taken from your reading, studies, experience, or observations.
Essay:
People should learn to take more responsibility for solving problems that affect their communities or in some cases the whole nation in general. This issue can be viewed on the grand scale and small scale as well. One prime example that was seen in history was during the Revolutionary War that occurred between the thirteen colonies and Great Britain. The patriots had to work together each individual came together to support a common cause, irrespective of government actions. Another example is of local issue, where people can be more responsible is keeping city streets clean, and recycling their garbages correctly, and efficiently with the government not having to hold a hand.
One example that illustrates people did indeed take responsibility for solving problems was during the American Revolution in 1775. The individual people from all over the 13 colonies, from the Northern Colonies, Middle Colonies, and Southern Colonies all rose together to support once cause. It is completely feasible for individuals to work together to solve a problems that affects their nation. These people were able to come up with their own suitable tactics on how to handle the situation of British oppression. The Americans were faced with a problem, and they make themselves self-reliant, and do not need to look at higher authority for instructions of an sort, then people should and can take the responsibility for solving issues that do indeed affect their nation as a whole.
Another example that supports the idea that people should take more responsibility for solving problems that affect their community is recycling and keeping the streets clean. It is not difficult to place trash in trash receptacles and if each member of the community is able to do that then the problem itself will eventually diminish. No longer would higher authorities such as the government feel the need to interfere with such petty matters that could be handled by individuals in a community. Simply, put if the individuals in a community all participated in recycling programs, then that would eliminate any issues of garbage removal, and jeep city streets clean. If each individual is able to take their own responsibility for actions then indeed problems that affect communities can be easily solved.
People should take more responsibility for solving problems that affect their communities or even the nation in general. One example of the Revolutionary War goes to show, that even history shows that if each individual takes responsibility and through a cohesive effort on everyone's end, solving problems for that nation would be less tedious. Even the example of my neighborhood, if even person became responsible for their actions and recycled properly and efficiently, solving problems for the community would be a piece of cake.
grading it on SAT criteria, rough draft, looking at logic, development, and answering the prompt: 5
I see wordiness creeping into your writing...long sentences especially. The concluding sentence is really terrible "a piece of cake" Surely you jest. Community problems are seldom a piece of cake, and considering the Revolutionary war, it was not.
Last sentences should be the icing, and set the character for all before. You did well in development. Recycling is good. I might have thought of trash pickup, planting flower beds, volunteering for community organizations. But the SAT model is not doing it perfect, you get 30 min to write a rough draft, indicating to the evaluator your thinking on your feet ability.
Work on the wordiness, I suspect honest teachers have told you that before.
I asked another teacher to evaluate it, she was concerned about the generalizations in the second paragraph. Reread those. Generalizations do not reflect well on your thinking to the evaluator.
She rated it a 4 mainly because of those.
I was wondering about my comments, so I ran it through a Readability calculator.
http://www.standards-schmandards.com/exhibits/rix/index.php
Grade level 16. Ok, college graduate. Reading ease: 24 not bad. But my thought on that is that Sat Evaluators have large stacks of these essays to read, score, go to the next on, and so on. Grade level 16 reading material in stacks is tiring. I do think it would help your score to work on shorter sentences.
Thank you so much sir. I have another essay to post shortly. I have trouble with conclusions. I do not know how to properly start the conclusion off. I didn't want to write , "in conclusion" or "to wrap it up" I just don't what to do for that. Also, what is the readability calculator for? And, I'm hoping for a score of 6, so will working on sentence structure fetch me that score? Thanks so much.
Overall, your essay has a good structure and touches upon the main points of the topic. However, there are a few areas that could be improved upon. Here are some suggestions for critique and revision:
1. Introduction: While your introduction mentions the importance of people taking responsibility for solving community and national problems, it would be helpful to provide a clear thesis statement outlining your stance on the issue. This will give your readers a concise overview of your argument.
2. Development of points: In your essay, you mention two examples to support your argument - the American Revolution and recycling/keeping streets clean. While these examples are relevant, it would be beneficial to provide more in-depth analysis and explanation for each point. How did the individuals in the American Revolution take responsibility and what were the outcomes? How does recycling and keeping streets clean contribute to community problem-solving? Expanding on these examples will strengthen your argument.
3. Evidence and reasoning: While you mention that the examples are taken from "reading, studies, experience, or observations," it would be more effective to provide specific evidence or data from credible sources to support your claims. This will add credibility to your argument and make it more persuasive.
4. Organization and coherence: It would be helpful to have clear topic sentences at the beginning of each paragraph to guide the reader and make your points more focused. Additionally, using transitional words and phrases between sentences and paragraphs will improve the overall flow and coherence of your essay.
5. Conclusion: Your conclusion effectively restates your argument, but it would be beneficial to summarize your main points from the body paragraphs and provide a final thought or call to action. This will leave a lasting impression on the reader.
Overall, your essay has potential, but it could benefit from further development and evidence to strengthen your argument. Remember to be specific, provide examples, and support your claims with relevant evidence. Good luck with your revisions!