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The SAT Essay: Basic Principles

Page 1

The SAT Essay: Basic PrinciplesStrunk and White Would Have Bombed on the SAT Essay
The Elements of Style, by William Strunk Jr. and the incomparable essayist E. B. White, is universally acknowledged as one of the best books ever written on crafting nonfiction. And while most of the advice in this slim, 85-page volume is relevant to the SAT essay, it does contain three maxims likely to lead students astray on the test:

• Write in a way that comes naturally.
• Omit needless words.
• Avoid fancy words.

Wrong, wrong, and wrong again! (At least when you re taking the SAT Writing Test.) There's nothing natural about writing an SAT essay, you don't have the time to omit needless words, and the fancier your words the higher your score.

Remember: SAT Writing Is Different
As I mentioned in Introduction to the SAT Writing Test, the kind of writing the graders expect to see is not "personal" or "creative," but rather clear, organized, persuasive, and scholarly. SAT writing is different from the kind of writing you do naturally and informally, like writing letters to friends or journal entries.

Your SAT graders have very definite expectations—and prejudices—about the kind of essay they expect from you. The simple, concise, natural writing advocated by Strunk and White will leave them underwhelmed. (Besides, as even Strunk and White would readily admit: simple, concise writing is anything but natural. Such writing requires painstaking efforts, numerous rewrites, and lots of time to achieve—all luxuries you don't have while writing your SAT essay at breakneck speed.)

Let's get something straight: the SAT essay is not designed to test "how well you write." It is designed to test how well—and rapidly—you orient yourself to a new topic, organize your thoughts, and write the first draft of a persuasive essay.

How well the SAT essay accomplishes that task, and the relevance of that task for the kinds of writing you are expected to do in college and beyond, are matters you and I will leave to others to debate.

The Only People Faster Than You Writing Your SAT Essay Are the Graders Scoring It
You are most likely used to getting back papers from your English teachers full of carefully written margin notes applauding its graces and subtleties, and gently admonishing its lapses. It's clear that they've spent a lot of time perusing your prose.

Now it's time to wake up to the land of SAT essays! Each grader will probably take less time to grade your entire essay than you did writing the first two sentences.

According to the test publishers, your essay will be graded "holistically," which is a euphemism for very, very quickly. In all likelihood, each grader will spend at most 60 seconds speed-reading your essay. Unlike your classroom teachers, your two SAT graders don't have the time to appreciate the brilliant nuances of your thinking or to savor your wonderful prose style. Each SAT grader has dozens, if not hundreds, of essays to mark. As a result, your essay's score will be based entirely on the first impressions formed by two harried graders.

If your essay seems to be organized and well written, if your examples seem to be scholarly, then you'll receive a high mark. Does that sound unfair? Maybe. But since your score depends on the graders snap judgments of your writing, perhaps you should learn how to turn the graders haste to your advantage.

You've Got Twelve Seconds to Impress—or Disappoint—the Graders
Okay, I made that number up, but twelve seconds really is about the amount of time it will take an SAT grader to read your first paragraph and form his or her initial impression of your essay.

Did I say "initial impression?" That's not quite accurate. By the time a grader finishes reading your first paragraph, that grader will form what is likely to be his or her only impression of the grade your entire essay deserves. And once SAT readers have made up their mind about your essay, they will probably change their opinion little if at all.

Stop! Please Read This Information before Continuing
The next page contains a sample essay topic that you can do as an online RocketScore practice exercise. If you read the topic now, without composing an essay immediately afterward, you'll deprive yourself of valuable practice.

I strongly recommend that you read the sample instructions only when you have 25 minutes to write a sample essay. Use a legal pad to compose your response. When you're done, transfer your answer into the RocketScore online form to get a score.

If you don't feel like writing a practice essay right now, just skip over the directions box; you can always return to read the instructions later.

Page 2 The Instructions You'll Probably See
The new SAT Writing Test hasn't settled into a predictable pattern just yet (and the test writers will probably tinker with the precise format over the next few years). Even so, the essay instructions you'll see on the actual test will probably be very close to the following (with a different topic, of course):

Directions: Consider carefully the following statement and the assignment below it. Then plan and write an essay that explains your ideas as persuasively as possible. Keep in mind that the support you provide—both reasons and examples—will help make your view convincing to the reader.

In his poem, "To a Mouse," the Scottish poet Robert Burns (1759-1796) wrote these immortal lines: "The best laid schemes o' mice an' men / Gang aft a-gley." To paraphrase Burns's archaic dialect in modern English: No matter how carefully we plan our projects, something can still go wrong with them.

Assignment: Are even our best plans always at the mercy of unexpected, chance events? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this idea. Support your position with reasoning and examples from your reading, studies, experience, or observations.

First things first: you must respond to the assigned topic! I'm serious. Two is the lowest total score someone can get on the essay if it bears some relevance, however slight, to the topic. But excerpts from the Gettysburg Address, Hamlet's soliloquy, Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech, or any other selection of surpassingly beautiful, but irrelevant-to-the-topic writing would earn the absolute minimum possible score on the essay: a zero, zilch, nada. (On the other hand, any one of these works would make an outstanding supporting example, regardless of the topic. But more about this point shortly).

As you can see, however, you are given a great deal of latitude regarding how you respond to the topic. Take a moment now and review the sample essay prompts I mentioned in Introduction to the SAT Writing Test to reassure yourself of just how broad the topics you may face will be.

The SAT Essay Grading Process Is Far Less Subjective Than You Might Imagine
Before they ever score a student's paper, the SAT essay graders are rigorously trained to be consistent. That is, they are trained to agree with each other more or less reliably. It's worth knowing a bit about the training process so you'll understand why the RocketReview formula for high essay marks is so effective.

Initially, all the graders are given the same practice essay to score. Let's pretend that you and I are sitting in on the training process and that we grade the same essay. The average mark, say, was a 4, but you gave the practice essay a 5 (because you were impressed by the subtle metaphors) and I gave it a 2 (because I thought there were too many spelling errors).

All the graders discuss why they scored the essay the way they did. But you and I learn something. You learn that the other graders don't always notice subtle metaphors, and I learn that other graders don't penalize spelling errors as much as I do.

Then we grade a second paper and go through the discussion process again. And again. And again.

Here's the key point: unlike what you might think, the goal of all the graders is not to try to give an essay the score they believe it deserves. Instead, their goal is to give each essay the score they think all the other graders would give it.

And sooner or later, subconsciously if not consciously, all the graders learn to look for the same features and ignore the others. Here are the essay features that most influence the graders:

• Essay length (evidence that you have something to say): the longer the better.
• Number of "SAT words" (evidence that you're smart and articulate—and yet another benefit of the vocabulary building you were doing for the sentence completion questions): the more the better.
• Number of paragraphs (evidence of organization): the more the better.
• Number of literary, historical, or other scholarly examples (evidence that you've learned something in high school): at least one academic example is good, but two are better, and three are great.
• Number of "personal words": I, I'd, I'm, I've, I'll, me, myself, mine (evidence of informality and of failing to provide "hard" evidence): the fewer the better.

Again, this grading process is largely subconscious. It's not as if the graders actually count the number of paragraphs you use or tally the number of SAT words they spot.

Page 3 Five Easy Rules to Ace the Essay

Now that you know what the essay graders are looking for, it's time to apply that knowledge to formulate some guidelines you can actually follow on the test. The rest of this section is a piece of cake if you keep in mind the previous features. I've boiled down everything you need to know about writing the SAT essay into a handful of simple rules.

You're Following an Essay Formula for a Reason
Some of the writing rules I'm about to recommend will have many English teachers gnashing their teeth in exasperation more than any split infinitive or dangling modifier ever did. These teachers hate the whole notion of writing formulas. They believe, with justification, that it's ridiculous if not futile to reduce the complex, intangible skill of writing to a tidy set of simplistic-seeming rules. Indeed, they point to the great writers who became great precisely because they flouted the writing rules and conventions of their time.

I agree with these teachers, but let's get something straight here: you are not being judged on whether you can create a literary work of art in 25 minutes. The SAT graders who will be marking your paper have specific expectations about the characteristics of outstanding persuasive essays. If your essay satisfies those expectations, it will receive a very high mark. If your essay disappoints those expectations, it will receive a low mark—regardless of the literary or creative merit your paper deserves.

So the upcoming rules are not ideal writing rules, but writing on the SAT is not an ideal situation. Don't take chances on the actual SAT by getting creative—you have only 25 pressure-cooker minutes to read the question, generate some ideas and examples, organize your thoughts, and compose your essay. You've only got one shot at the essay, so follow these RocketRules to the letter.

RocketRule #1: Use the First Few Minutes to Plan Your Essay
Even though you have 25 minutes to write your essay, it's crucial that you spend a few minutes planning what you're going to say.

I know it's tempting to dive right in and just start writing the moment the proctor announces, "Open your test booklets and begin." But careful planning is critical to your achieving a high mark.

Use the "scrap paper" space provided in your test booklet to jot down your thoughts and the supporting examples you want to use. If you think of some great words or impressive phrases you'd like to include, jot those down, too. Use abbreviations, of course.

Will you waste what little writing time you have by planning? No, spending a few minutes to organize your thoughts and outline your answer will actually allow you to write much faster. Once you get started, you won't have to stop mid-essay to ponder what to say next because you'll already know. Students who start writing immediately (without planning) quickly find that their writing has run out of steam. By then it's too late for them to get a fresh start on their essay.

Especially Use the Planning Time to Make Sure Your First Paragraph Is a Zinger
Your first paragraph will receive the most attention, so make sure you plan one that has snap, crackle, and pop. I'll give you ideas for how to pump up your first paragraph shortly.

As you now know, by the time the SAT graders finish reading your first paragraph they will have largely decided your essay's final grade. They'll merely skim through the rest of your essay. Although the graders will slow down a bit in the final paragraph, they do this merely to confirm their initial impression of your essay.

When students start writing immediately after reading the instructions (without planning their essays), they invariably stumble in their opening paragraph. Even if they catch their stride later in the essay, the SAT graders have already formed their opinions.

Page 4 RocketRule #2: Write Fast and Keep Your Pencil Moving!
If you're a habitual perfectionist in your writing, someone who labors over finding just the right word, who agonizes over whether or not to include a comma after a phrase, who mulls over the perfect metaphor to capture the subtle nuances of your thoughts, you'd better get over that habit—and I mean pronto!

The SAT essay is a 25-minute all-out sprint, not a marathon. Once you've finished planning your essay, take a deep breath, launch into your paper, and keep that #2 pencil moving. You should be writing at a rate of one or two sentences per minute in order to produce 400 words (which is the minimum length graders expect of the highest scoring essays).

Relax: You're Graded on How Well You Write a First Draft—Not a Polished Final Paper
You bet: writing fast is scary. Twenty-five minutes is not enough time for you to gather all your thoughts. Or to find the best supporting examples. Or to say exactly what you mean.

Writing fast also means that your handwriting won't be as elegant as it might be otherwise. It means that you'll probably make a spelling mistake or two, not to mention the occasional grammatical error. Writing fast may even mean that you'll change your mind mid-sentence. (If you need to change something, cross it out—neatly erasing takes too much time—and continue writing.

Don't worry about these problems. The graders know that you're writing under enormous pressure, and they make allowances for it. Obviously, your handwriting or printing should be as legible as possible, and you should avoid flagrant spelling or grammatical gaffes, but most of all you need to focus on getting your thoughts down on paper as quickly as possible.

The Most Common Grammatical Goof in SAT Essays
The SAT essay graders might not notice any such errors, and it's not a big deal if they do, but singular-plural errors show up frequently in students essays, especially in the conclusion.

The Top 35 Misspelled Words in SAT Essays
As I mentioned, spelling is not that important to your overall essay score. Still, the fewer spelling errors in your essay, the better.

The following words appear frequently in SAT essays, and are often misspelled:

• accept
• achieve
• apparent
• appearance
• argument (argues, argued, arguing)
• beginning
• belief
• business
• describe (description)
• definite (definitely)
• destroy
• different
• especially
• environment
• foreign
• government

• independent
• interest
• judgment
• knowledge
• necessary
• occasion (occasionally)
• occur (occurred, occurring, occurrence)
• particular
• portray
• receive
• religion
• separate (separation)
• several
• similar
• tragedy (tragic)
• truly

You don't have to memorize this list, but do skim it to see whether any of these words tend to trip you up. To quiz yourself on these words, have someone read a word. Then write it down and move on to the next word.

Many spelling errors result from your ear for words. Words that sound alike (such as it's versus its, or they're versus their versus there) cause problems, as do words we pronounce sloppily (accept, government, particular, different, describe, probably, several), or words that spell the "uh" sound differently (definite, separate, independent). Silent vowels or consonants (receive, judge, foreign) or single or double consonants (occasion, occur) are also common causes of spelling problems.

Page 5 RocketRule #3: Write a Lot
Your English teacher has undoubtedly stressed that good writing is about "quality, not quantity." And your teacher is right. But this isn't an English paper, and your teacher isn't the one grading it.

On the SAT essay, more is definitely better. The official SAT essay graders believe that good writers have a lot to say, and conversely that poor writers have little to say. (Remember our essay scoring formula?) It's true: on the SAT, 400 well-written words will invariably outscore 200 or even 300 outstandingly well-written words.

The More You Write, the Better—So Long as What You Write Is Relevant
Okay, let's be honest. We've all been in the following situation: we're taking an essay test when we come up against a question that we can't answer adequately. So what do we do?

We bluff, of course. We blather on and on, hoping that our teacher won't notice our blindingly obvious ignorance, and that he or she will accept our offering of well-written emptiness as a substitute for a complete lack of facts.

For example, let's say that we get an exam question in our United States history class that asks us to discuss the technological causes of the Civil War. Whoops. We know the social causes, sure, and we're fairly knowledgeable about the economic ones, but we don't have a clue about the technological causes.

So we ramble on about the social and economic causes of the American Civil War, and we even throw in a bit about how technology affected the course of the conflict. Admittedly this is not precisely the question we were asked, but it's pretty close. We cross our fingers, hoping that our teacher won't notice our "near miss" (or that if she does notice that we haven't answered the question, attributes it to a pardonable misreading on our part).

Anyway, you won't ever face that predicament on the SAT Writing Test. The only topics you could possibly be assigned will be general ones, like the samples I provided in Introduction to the SAT Writing Test.

Provide Specific Details
The best way to write a lot in 25 minutes, apart from knowing what you're going to say before you begin, is to elaborate. Give examples. Provide details. Be specific.

You don't have the time to provide too many details in your SAT essay, but even a few can make your points more compelling. Here are some examples of how providing details can transform short, vague statements into lengthier, more interesting sentences.

Vague Sentence #1: For someone commonly viewed as paralyzed by his own doubts, Hamlet actually did a lot.

Discussion: Who views Hamlet in this way? What did Hamlet doubt? What exactly did Hamlet do? Specific details will occur to you naturally if you simply answer the questions your own sentences raise.

Specifics Provided: For a character commonly viewed by literary critics as paralyzed by his own doubts about his perceptions, Hamlet feigned madness, dispatched two childhood friends to their likely deaths, staged a play, and killed two men.

Vague Sentence #2: Many people were affected by the farming legislation.

Discussion: How many people? Who? How were they affected? Which farming legislation?

Specifics Provided: The Eisenhower farming legislation required vast tracts of land to be set aside as fallow. As a result, tens of thousands of migrant farm workers were thrown out of work and forced to leave the countryside to seek their livelihoods in urban centers.

Notice that there's no rule that requires you to supply all the details you've chosen in a single sentence.

Don't go overboard with details or your essay will lose focus. A sentence or two of details for each example you use is more than enough.

State the Obvious, and Then Restate It
You're forced to write a lot in a short time, so don't worry about whether something you're saying is "trivial" or "too obvious." Your essay should display some originality, but that doesn't mean that every point you make needs to be important or original.

Once you start writing, don't be afraid to state anything that appears to be relevant to the topic. Will some things you write be less relevant, if not completely off topic? Possibly, but the SAT graders are trained to look at your overall essay (one of the advantages you get from the hasty reading they'll do of your essay). If your overall essay is otherwise strong, minor flaws are unlikely to have much, if any, effect on your grade.

Remember: you're writing a first draft, not a polished final work; you just don't have the time to weigh every word, phrase, and sentence. After you've planned your essay, write, write, and write!

Three Simple Starter Phrases for Writing Emergencies
You don't have much time to write your essay, so what happens if you get stuck? Writer's block is bad enough when you're trying to compose a paper at home; when you've got 25 minutes to sprint-write an SAT essay, it can be a big problem. Here are three phrases that will help you get unstuck:

• For example,
• In other words,
• On the other hand,

Let's say you're in the exam room, writing your SAT essay. You planned your essay before you started writing so the words have been flowing nicely. Then, all of a sudden, your mind suddenly goes blank. Oh no! You can't think of what to write next, and you can practically hear the exam room clock ticking down.

Here's what you do if you get stuck. Without thinking, write down one of these phrases to start off a new sentence and before you know it, you'll find that your pencil begins moving along all by itself. These phrases force you to supply more details.

Fill Up the Answer Sheet Space Provided for Your Essay
The SAT graders won't tally the exact number of words in your essay, of course. So how do they tell how long your essay is?

They look to see whether or not the 52-line answer form is full! If you've filled up the form, the graders will be impressed; if you haven't, they won't.

Right now, take a few moments and see what your essay form will look like. You can get a good idea by looking at two blank pages of lined notebook paper. All that white space is scary, isn't it? (Don't worry, I'll show you other ways to expand your essay quickly in a little while.)

If your normal scrawl is tiny, write larger—but not too large, because you can't go beyond the 52 lines. It's okay to skip a single line between each of your paragraphs but do not skip every other line in the form or you may run out of space. (Skipping every other line will also emphasize to the graders that your essay isn't very long.)

Page 6 RocketRule #4: Use Smart-Sounding Words
I know that English teachers often tell students not to use big words just because they're big, but trust me, on the SAT essay, big words have a better chance of impressing graders than do their smaller synonyms.

I wish I didn't have to write this—and I know that many teachers will object—but, smart people do use certain words to connect with other smart people. Yes, it's almost a code language.

Don't great writers tend to use simple language? Yes, but so do simpletons, and SAT readers blitzing their way through a mountain of essays can't afford the time to distinguish between the two.

While it's true that the best word is the one that says precisely what you mean, it's also true that big words impress SAT graders. Don't go overboard or it will seem like you're trying to impress. Just sprinkle your essay with at least a few big words so that your opinion sounds authoritative.

100 Words That Really Impress SAT Graders—Make Sure Your Essay Includes at Least a Few
It's likely that you'll be able to use certain big words more frequently than others because the same topics and themes show up time and again on SAT essays. The following list emphasizes those SAT words that you can probably work into just about any assigned essay topic (they're also great words to know in any event).

This list is compiled from the words professional writers use most often when writing persuasive essays. It isn't intended to be complete. Examine any op-ed ("opposite-the-editorial") piece in your local newspaper and you'll find at least one word, or a variation of it, from this list. I wouldn't be surprised if you found half a dozen or more. Again, this list gives special weight to the rhetorical concepts that occur most frequently in SAT essays.

• acute
• adage
• addressing
• aesthetic
• allusion
• altruism
• anachronism
• anecdote
• antithesis
• aphorism
• aspect
• aspiration
• assess
• attribute
• autonomy
• coherent
• compromised
• concede
• contend
• context
• conventional
• conviction
• culminate
• depict
• dichotomy

• discord
• disparate
• distinct
• distinguish
• doctrine
• dogmatic
• echoed
• egalitarian
• empirical
• enduring
• entail
• epitome
• epoch
• ephemeral
• ethical
• evoke
• exemplify
• explicit
• facet
• feasible
• ideology
• immutable
• implication
• indifferent
• indigenous

• inequitable
• inevitable
• inherent
• intrinsic
• irony
• lament
• legitimacy
• manifest
• momentous
• notably
• notion
• nuance
• objectivity
• orthodox
• paradigm
• paradox
• pervasive
• plausible
• pragmatic
• predominant
• premise
• presumably
• prodigious
• profound
• prominent

• proponent
• proposition
• provocative
• quintessential
• realm
• relentless
• reminiscent
• resolve
• revelation
• revere
• rhetorical
• scrutiny
• secular
• subjective
• subtle
• sublime
• thesis
• tantamount
• transcend
• ubiquitous
• undermine
• unparalleled
• unprecedented
• viable
• widespread

Don't get overwhelmed and think you have to use every word on this list. Just try to include a few of these words or similar ones in your essay. These words are especially effective in the first and last paragraphs of SAT essays, which the graders read most carefully.

By the way, all these words are "good SAT words" that you should know for the critical reading section; half of these words even make it to our core Power Ranked List of the 323 most valuable words to know for the SAT Reading Test.

Practice the List
Try to use these words in your everyday school papers. Here's another idea. How about astounding your friends by casually dropping these words into your lunchtime conversation around the cafeteria table?

Instead of this Common Essay Word Consider Using a Variant of One of These SAT-Words

---

A lot Prodigious Argue Contend Based, basic Premise, fundamental cause, because, result Evoke, endgender, prompt, provoke, elicit, precipitate, animate, inaugurate, attribute Common, typical, everyday Prevalent, pervasive, conventional, orthodox, status quo, ubiquitous, widespread Consequence, result Implication, outcome, aftermath, tantamount, ramification Difference Disparity, dichotomy, discrepancy, diversity, distinction, distinguish Hard, difficult, difficulty Dilemma, paradox, vexing, quagmire, arduous, intricate, inextricable, problematic Easy, practical, quick Pragmatic, expedient, viable, tenable Example, evidence, instance, illustration Paradigm, archetype, empirical, epitome, exemplify Experience, story Anecdote, chronicle False Untenable, fallacious Free, freedom Autonomy, sovereignty Help, assist Facilitate, bolster, foster, expedite Hurt, hinder Compromise, undermine Illustrate highlight, exemplify, epitomize, substantiate, embody, underscore Important Paramount, momentous Main character Protagonist Mother, father, brother, sister maternal, paternal, sibling Natural, essential, need, necessary, require Inherent, innate, intrinsic, quintessential, implicit, underlying New, unique, unusual Unparalleled, unprecedented, singular, novel Opposite Antithesis Part Feature, aspect, attribute, facet Period, time, era, centuries, history Epoch, millennium (millennia) Possible Plausible, credible, tenable, viable Show, obvious Manifest, ostensibly, explicit, depict Similar, equivalent Parallel, analogous, affinity, reminiscent, echoed, coherent Situation Context, domain, realm Statement, idea, view, opinion, belief, phrase, theme, expression Notion, proposition, adage, maxim, doctrine, tenet, credo, thesis, contention, dogma, presupposition True, absolute, definite Irrefutable, immutable, objective, categorically, inescapable, incontrovertible Unfortunately Lamentably Very, quite, really Particularly, notable, exceptionally, singularly

Refer to the list frequently, especially as you write your school papers. You'll quickly become more comfortable using these words in your everyday conversation and writing. Plus you'll impress your teachers!

Squeeze at Least Two SAT Words into Your Very First Paragraph
My research shows that including just two SAT words in the first paragraph or your essay can raise your overall essay score by as much as a full point on the 2-to-12 scale. That translates to a quick 20 points in your overall 200-800 score on the Writing Test!

The typical SAT essay instructions includes a statement to be commented on—usually you will be asked to agree or disagree—and asks you for examples to support your view. The instructions alone open the door for you to include the words "statement" and "example" in your essay answer. And luckily for you, those words have synonyms on our list of impressive-sounding words. See below:

For instance, instead of ending the first paragraph with this sentence:

The idea that our most careful plans sometimes go awry is illustrated by examples in history as well as in literature.

Clever you could write this:

The notion that our most careful plans sometimes go awry is exemplified by a number of prominent instances in history as well as in literature.

Hey, that's three SAT words. A little finesse like that would have boosted your final 200-800 Writing Test score by 20 points or more!

Page 7 RocketRule #5: Avoid Personal Statements or Qualifiers
Phrases like I feel, I think, I believe, and It seems to me have no place in your essay. Such phrases are unnecessary (it's a given that you're expressing your opinion) and suck the vitality right out of your writing.

For example, instead of writing,

I think that our plans are always at the mercy of events outside our control.

Write this instead,

Our plans are always at the mercy of events outside our control. To demonstrate the dramatic difference, here are some famous quotations followed by versions that include personal qualifiers:
Famous Quotes Same Quotes Diluted by Personal Qualifiers Experience is the name we give to our mistakes. I feel that experience is the name we give to our mistakes. Imagination is more important than knowledge. In my opinion, imagination is more important than knowledge. Every truly new idea looks crazy at first. I believe that every truly new idea looks crazy at first. There is more to life than simply increasing its speed. I sincerely think that there is more to life than simply increasing its speed. The journey is the reward. It seems to me, from my point of view, that the journey is the reward.

See? Omit the humble personal qualifiers and write with confidence; your words will be much more convincing.

This rule is an extension of our general principle to avoid personal words—I, I'd, I'll, I'm, I've, me, mine, myself—as much as possible in your SAT essay.

Note: It is unlikely but still possible that your SAT topic will specifically require you to write about a personal experience. Even in this instance, however, you should focus on the other persons involved in the anecdote and put yourself in the background.

While we're on the topic of phrases to avoid, another common weakness is attempting to make assertions sound more convincing by including any of the following adverbs for emphasis: a lot, definitely, especially, extremely, greatly, terribly, really, very. These adverbs are rarely necessary, and using them too often is a hallmark of unsophisticated writing. One or two of these adverbs in your essay is okay, but avoid using more than two.

As an exercise, experiment with adding any of these adverbs to the famous quotes above, or indeed any famous quote, and you'll see how these adverbs sap the vigor of writing. Or take a sample of your school writing: if you're using more than one of these adverbs every page, find ways to reduce your dependence on them.

Take a Break Before Moving On
We've already covered most of what you need to know to ace the SAT essay. It's probably a good idea to take some time off maybe switch to one of the math or reading chapters if you're still feeling energized before you move. Spending some time away from the material will give these rules a chance to sink in.