1. IR Essay: What to Change for Next Time
7th Grade

2. You were too “thesaurus happy”
Be careful: when you try to find synonyms for words, make sure your sentence still makes sense
Trying to sound “smarter” can often backfire on you

3. Repeating ideas
Just because you say something over and over again, does not make the idea any better
It also does not make your essay LONGER

4. Missing a Direct Quote
In your IR Essay Format packet, it told you that in PARAGRAPH 4, you needed to include a direct quote to support your connection

5. You did not restate your thesis
Original thesis: “In the novel, Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, the main conflict is Katniss’ struggle to decide if and when she should kill Peeta, this connects to a personal experience in my life, because recently I had to make a difficult choice to reprimand my daughter for staying out past curfew.”
Restated thesis: “Katniss finally realized that she could never kill Peeta. My daughter and I continue to trust each other and communicate even better than before.”

6. Book titles are always underlined
It should look like this: In the novel, The Hunger Games, by…
NOT like this: In the novel, “The Hunger Games”, by…
In the novel, The Hunger Games, by…

7. Indenting Paragraphs You MUST indent every new paragraph
If you have 5 paragraphs, you must have 5 indentions

8. Indented vs. Not-indented

9. Be more specific
This means you did not add enough DETAILS or EXAMPLES to this paragraph

10. Circled Words This could mean any of the following: Misspelled word
Confusing word/ did not make sense
Empty word
Contraction (can’t= cannot, don’t= do not)
You wrote a number (7= seven, 10= ten)

11. Thesis length
Your thesis will ALWAYS be one sentence

12. Thoughtful closing sentence
Your essay should not just end, it has to have a thoughtful closing statement
Non-thoughtful closing: “And I think we can agree that this was awesome.”
Thoughtful closing: “True heroes do not always wear capes.”