Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Using templates in the TOEFL essay

With regard to templates, I’m not sure what the McGraw-Hill book says, but the ETS TOEFL iBT Guide say do *not* memorize a text to write for an introduction or conclusion. Though I haven’t seen the McGraw-Hill book, I am willing to bet a lot of money that they say the same thing. No reputable book would ever tell a student to cheat. Indeed, it is very easy to see when a student is simply using memorized sentences in the essay. Avoid doing this. Of course, the essay has to have a format or structure—maybe this is what your book calls a “template”—and this is what it should look like:

PARAGRAPH 1: introduction
PARAGRAPH 2: first main point to support your thesis
PARAGRAPH 3: second main point to support your thesis
PARAGRAPH 4: conclusion

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