BECE/WASSCE 2020: Secrets to ANSWERING essay questions

BECE/WASSCE 2020 secrets to answering essay questions known by a few students and so they make good use of this rare knowledge in the exams and pass easily whiles others suffer due to the lack of this knowledge.

This post to help WASSCE and BECE 2020 students will explain this in detail.

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When attempting an essay question the first thing you should do is read through the question carefully a number of times and underline the keywords such as summarise, compare and contrast, discuss etc. etc.

You would be amazed at how many people spend the whole of a ‘compare and contrast’ essay just comparing and consequently throwing away half the possible marks by simply not doing what they were asked to do in the WASSCE.

Having spent a few moments thinking about what the question is asking, start noting down everything that comes into your head on the subject no matter how irrelevant it may seem.

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Try and keep your notes brief, to the point and as neat as possible whiles doing this in your mock or main WASSCE 2020 or BECE 2020 exams.

You should spend anything up to a quarter of the time available to you for the question (and maybe even longer), for the writing of these notes as they are the foundations for your essay. A house without foundations will fall down!

Once your rough notes are written you can start deciding which bits you do and don’t want to include in your answer.

Go through your notes and number the parts you want to use in the order in which you want to use them. You are now formulating the structure of your essay. Don’t cross out unwanted notes because they may still be of use later on.

Now you are in a position to start writing your essay bringing up the points you made in your notes and putting them together in a smooth, flowing style.

This method of essay writing at the WASSCE  helps you to come up with a well structured and well thought out answer.

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Simply launching into writing an essay without any thought means that you could well get halfway through and suddenly think of other points which should have been raised earlier on, or a different angle from which to tackle the subject.

By using notes you are able to empty your mind of the subject and then try and put your thoughts into some sort of logical order that hopefully makes sense.

Never forget one of the earliest rules you were taught regarding essay and story writing – beginning, middle and end.

Start an essay by saying what you intend to do, then do it, then reach your conclusions and perhaps summarise what you have said.

Never be radical in your answers. Despite what you may think even at degree level free thought appears to be fairly limited.

Write what the examiner wants in the WASSCE 2020 wants to hear or read and you will do well. Be radical in your answer and unless your argument is that of a genius then you risk losing more than you stand to gain. The rule in all exams is to play it safe, no matter what you really think.

Use examples and quotations as often as possible. Use of an example to back up your argument is a good essay technique and can only gain you marks. Don’t worry if the example or quotation is not quite 100% accurate – providing it’s close no one should mind too much.

Don’t be fooled into thinking that the more you write, the more marks you will get. Waffle will gain you no marks and will bore the examiner maybe even to such an extent that he misses a good point when you make one simply because it’s surrounded in waffle.

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As you write your essay in the WASSCE 2020 you should be consciously thinking to yourself as you go along “1 mark” for every good point you think you make. This is the way the examiner will probably be thinking when it is marked so if you can think in the same way it will probably help you to write quite a good essay.

If you find yourself running out of time in the BECE or WASSCE 2020 examination then make a neat list of the points that you were going to raise at the end of your uncompleted essay. Write a note to the examiner in the margin such as “sorry, ran out of time”. Also, always hand in your rough notes. You may well pick up marks f or the points you were going to raise even though you didn’t have time to incorporate then into your essay.

If you know the person who is marking the exam, (i.e. it is an internal exam), then you are in an even better position to do well. Write what you think the marker will be looking for and if they taught you the subject then think back to the lectures and discussions you had with them. Write what they think and you can’t go far wrong!

Always hand in your rough notes with your essay. Write at the top of them – “Essay Plan”. This shows the examiner that you thought through what you were going to write and that you. Carefully planned your essay. You may well pick up a couple of extra marks for this.

Handing in your rough notes also has the advantage that if you run out of time whilst writing the essay the examiner can still see what points you were going to make and also the way in which they would have fitted into the essay. Once again this could well pick you up marks which you wouldn’t have got if you had just stopped writing and handed in an unfinished essay.

If you make what you consider to be a good point near the beginning of your essay then try making the same point again later on.

Use different wording and bring it up in a different way and you may just fool a weary examiner of the WASSCE 2020 into giving you marks for it again! After all he’s probably seen hundreds of answers to this question so was it you who made the point or was it someone else? You can gain the odd free mark like this but don’t go overboard and use this trick more than a couple of times or your ploy will be spotted!

What are the secrets of essay questions answering?

1.  Read the question carefully and note key words
2. Make rough notes
3. Put rough notes into order and compose essay
4. A good essay has a beginning, a middle and an end
5. Never be radical in your answers
6. Use examples and quotations
7. Don’t waffle
8. If you run out of time then list the points you were going to make
9. Hand in your essay plan.

Source: Anonymous

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