Let’s cut to the chase: being in a situation where you have to write an essay in an hour is just something you’re gonna have to deal with when you’re in college. No worries, though, every student’s been there, it’s just a law of the universe… or something. Regardless, there’s no need to despair. Here’s what you do to write essays quickly:
Plan it out
When you have to write a good essay but are pressed for time, nothing is as important as spending the little time you have efficiently. Creating an outline for your essay is key – if you don’t, you’ll run out of thoughts after a paragraph or two and spend valuable time on thinking how to proceed.
If you’re one of those people who prefer writing essays without an outline, reconsider, if only this once. Having the skeleton of your essay done before commencing writing will expedite your process greatly, and since you’re in a situation where you can’t waste time, this is crucial.
Take some time to create a schedule
This might not be needed if you’re really pressed for time, but if you have over two hours, try and spend them like this: 30% planning, 50% writing, 20% editing. Feel free to adjust the planning and editing – if you spend more time on planning your essay, you won’t need much time to make changes.
Don’t neglect to include editing in your schedule altogether. It’s very obvious to your professors when you’ve just finished writing your paper and sent it out without having re-read it. That’s just something that will end up reducing your grade dramatically, and what’s the point of writing anything in the first place if you’re going to get low marks on it?
Think of examples
Everyone’s been in a situation when they’re writing, need something to back it up and end up spending a ton of time looking for an example that fits the argument. The time-conscientious way of writing an essay is structuring your arguments around examples you’ve already got. Now, using your outline, think about where you’d need a quote to illustrate something or an expert opinion to support you. Find them and use them later to create the backbone of your argument.
A good essay uses a healthy mix of literary quotes, expert opinions, examples from history or ones in the news right now. Try not to overdo it on the last one, though – no one wants your shoehorned hot take on the latest controversy.
Write an essay introduction
An introductory paragraph is the hook for your essay. It’s supposed to be strongly worded and contain your thesis. The thesis should be the first sentence (or several sentences) and will be the central idea around which all of your essay revolves. It’s supposed to be the statement every sentence in our essay serves to support. Write this in sentences that are clear, direct and to the point.
Lots of people prefer writing the intro last, but if your essay was well-outlined, you don’t need to.
Provide your arguments
This is going to be the biggest part of your essay. You already have the examples and quotes you want to use, so now’s the time to come up with what you’re going to say around them. If you picked examples that illustrate a point well, they should naturally lend themselves to expansion into four or five sentences.
Write those down, and use the quote or example to conclude the paragraph. The number of examples you use for each point you’re making will depend on the length of your essay, but there’s no need to use more than two.
Try not to overuse those inserts, by the way. They should be illustrative and back up your own thoughts and ideas, not used to bump up word count. It will usually be obvious to your professors when you didn’t know what to say, so you stuck in something from a book and called it a day.
Craft the conclusion
A passable conclusion will be a short version of what you’ve said in the previous paragraphs. You should know that this reads like “OK, that’s it, bye” but your professors probably don’t expect much more, since this is the tried and tested way of people who want to do an OK job. Instead, try saying why this topic is important in a global sense. Why is it important to you?
A great way to conclude an essay is to write a memorable, strong statement that will stay with the reader for a long time. Writing a strong conclusion that your professor will remember after grading a pile of essays will earn you major brownie points. And real points, too.