a.k.a. telling your story

The Writing Center @ Graded Ms. Pfeiffer

Look at Common Application topics to get a sense of the task—the end result is an essay of 500-650 words.

Get what you need on the Writing Center site:

Writing Center @ Graded

¡  What do you want the colleges to know about you that won’t be evident from the rest of your application?

¡  What topic makes you immediately think of a personal experience or memory?

¡  What events and experiences, people and places have affected you? What are the “chapter titles” of your life?

¡  What stories do you tell when you are just sitting around with friends and family? What did you write about in past personal narratives or essays for classes? If you are in TOK, what was the focus of your “This I Believe” assignment?

¡  Some comfort: No one writes college essays well the first time; your drafts SHOULD be rough.

¡  In your early drafts, write as if you were talking to a friend or family member. This will get across your authentic voice.

¡  Draft stories without thinking about audience or “essay voice.”

¡  Draft stories without thinking about length. Shorter ones can be fleshed out; longer ones can be edited.

¡  After you get the story down, walk away from it. Write another (rough) story. Maybe on a different take on that topic, or on another topic.

¡  Then write another (rough) piece. Keep writing and writing. Maybe you will find that one session yields merely a long paragraph; maybe another session will result in a rambling story. It’s all good at this stage: If you write without worrying about it being The One, you may find it gets easier.

¡  Which do you like? Why?

¡  Which sound more like you?

¡  Which show something about you that you want others to know?

¡  Which have the most potential to be worked on further?

¡  Which have the most potential to stick in the mind of a reader?

¡  Hello. My name is John and I was born in Toronto in 1996.

¡  I would appreciate if you would read the reasons why I would like to attend your school.

¡  This essay will explain why Stanford is the perfect place for me.

¡  When I was thinking about who has influenced me, I considered several people.

¡  I came upon the shores of Graded School a shipwreck, lost.

¡  Red heels, cascade of curls, a deep voice trying to seduce the audience—yet I am shaking inside.

¡  It all started with a first grader holding a bag of marbles.

¡  The December air was humid as we lay in our beds, thousands of kilometers from our homes in São Paulo.

¡  A year and a half ago my swimming instructor told me about a competition that required crossing two Amazonian rivers, the Orinoco and the Caroní.

¡  “Mr. X, have you marked our tests?”

¡  Choose one to work with first. If you decide later it’s not The One, you can always choose another.

¡  Reread it, making sure you answered the question.

¡  What’s your main point in this piece? Does it come across to the reader? Revise so that you are showing that point, illustrating the idea/scene/experience with vivid, memorable detail.

¡  Get other readers, such as friends, family, a teacher, Ms. Miller, Mr. Daniel, and me in the Writing Center. After they read it, ask them what they “get” about you from the piece. Is that what you wanted to convey?

¡  Ask for suggestions—and really listen to them, without being defensive. Ask them where your essay is strong or weak. Take notes. Get their opinion (and grammar/spelling corrections), but don’t have them rewrite your essay or it will become their story and not yours; it will ring false, and experienced readers (like college admissions officers!) will sense this.

¡  Good luck beginning the writing process!