Eleven Plus English - Essay Writing

Introduction

Most senior independent schools require candidate pupils to write an essay as part of their selective entrance exams. Typically the school permits 20 – 30 minutes for the essay, offering up a selection of up to four essay titles. One of these titles is often requires the child to continue the story within the comprehension they may have just completed in a previous section, or complete an essay for which the first few lines/paragraph is given or sometimes to write about a personality.
This is actually an amazingly short time to plan and write an essay from scratch, especially one that contains a proper introduction, body and conclusion. If you don’t believe it try one yourself, bearing in mind this essay is written typically by a ten year old at the end of a day in which the prospective pupil has sat Verbal Reasoning, Mathematics, and English comprehension examinations in an intimidating alien hall full of hundreds of other prospective pupils all competing for a limited number of places.
Preparation Overview
A good starting point is to source examples of good short stories written by their peer group, or last year’s successful eleven plus veterans, especially those essays that they wrote in their own preparation. The benefits of this are instant. For instance your child can tangibly identify the three sections of a good essay (‘Introduction, Body, Conclusion’ or ‘Beginning, Middle, End’ respectively) written in a language and a vocabulary they can relate easily to, as well as get the main point of being able to write something interesting yet succinct enough to conclude within the allotted time.
Ask your child to critique these example essays, spot grammatical errors, suggest better vocabulary, spot rambling sentences (like many in this piece of work) and suggest alternative endings. Once you have critiqued a few essays jointly with your child, he or she will be thinking along the right lines, and their mind will be more fertile and focused.


Practice Overview

Begin by exploring permutations of typical titles with your child, initially verbally, trying out a host of endings, introducing additional characters both male and female, changing locations, different times of the day etc. Make sure most of the creative thinking is sourced from the child, by seeking inquisitive opinions. Accolades, encouragement and enthusiasm are the order of the day, since confidence should outweigh doubt in the child’s mind. Making this into a game will make revision more fun, involve other siblings if possible.
The next stage is to start planning essays. There is no ‘industry standard’ for this. Some children will write notes under headers of ‘Introduction, Middle and Conclusion’, others will use memory maps or bubble diagrams. Experiment with your child to see what works best for them. In an examination if your child fails to complete the essay, the examiner may make reference to the plan to see how your child had planned to conclude it, otherwise it is largely ignored.

Writing Overview

The actual practice of essay writing is a slow iterative process. Remember, in the short allotted time, your child has to, at the very least:

All this is not something that is instantly achievable by the best of ten year old candidates. So practice is essential.


Typical Essay Titles