Drafting a Response to an Essay Exam

The introduction to an essay is supposed to provide a thesis for the essay and a context or background (lead-in) for the thesis. Since the essay question does the same thing, students can rewrite the essay question, in their own words, into their introduction. For example, using this essay question,

The stereotypical American family, in the tradition of Father Knows Best and Leave it to Beaver, was characterized by a working father, a homemaker mother, and several well-behaved children. How is your family similar to or different from this once typical American family?

Back in the 1950's and '60's, the typical American family could be seen every day on television. Shows like Father Knows Best, Leave it to Beaver, or Dennis the Menace showed happy households where the father worked a nine to five job, coming home every day in his business suit. The mother met him at the door, smiling with supper waiting, the house neat and sparkling, the wife looking like she was ready to go out to dinner. June Cleaver actually met Ward at the door wearing her pearls and nylons. These homes usually had one to three children, who if they were sometimes mischievous, were basically well-behaved. My family was nothing like that. My parents were divorced; my mother worked evenings in a factory, and my five brothers and sisters and I were latchkey children who roamed the neighborhood after school each evening.

Notice that the introduction to the essay restates the same ideas in the same order as the essay question.

The highlighted thesis statement above (the last sentence of the introduction) is a closed three-part thesis statement. A closed thesis statement limits the essay by providing an outline of the ideas to be explored. An open thesis statement still makes clear the purpose of the essay but does not provide an outline of ideas. The sentence in the example above "My family was nothing like that" could have served as an open thesis for the introduction. The closed thesis simply makes explicit the details to be explored in the essay.

In an in-class essay, the five paragraph essay with a three-part thesis statement in the introduction provides a convenient structure for students to use for planning their essay and managing their time. Knowing that the essay will contain three body paragraphs, students can pace themselves as they write. The key in any timed essay is for writers to have a clear sense of what they want to say which they have organized around subtopics which can serve as the focus of paragraphs in support of their thesis.

The main thing to keep in mind when concluding an in-class essay is to keep the conclusion short and to the point. If students are running out of time, many instructors may suggest students write a one sentence paragraph conclusion. It is important that this one sentence conclusion be in a separate paragraph so that it does not feel like the concluding sentence to the last body paragraph. This one sentence conclusion should also be a restatement of the thesis. In any case, the conclusion of an in-class essay should not be more than three sentences.