Tips on how to deal with the volume of material you have gathered for essay
Some students write poor essays because they don’t put enough time and effort into preparing them. Many others, however, read numerous books and produce huge quantities of notes but still fail to do themselves justice because they don’t know how to deal with the volume of material which they have generated.
a. Write down the essay question, together with an ‘answer’ (however crude) in the form of a few short sentences which summarise what you want to say on the topic, e.g.
Example:
Q ‘Population growth: the cause or the consequence of the Industrial Revolution?’
A Early census figures indicate that population growth was taking place well before the accepted start of the Industrial Revolution. The increasing pace of industrial development through the late 18th and 19th centuries served only to emphasise a trend that was already happening.
b Go through your notes and number each page, section or reference. Then, go through the numbered pieces and write down, on a separate slip of paper for each, one sentence which says what each piece is about.
c Place the separate slips of paper on the floor, or on a large table, and sort them out as far as possible into an order that makes some kind of sense to you, bearing in mind the ‘answer’ which you identified earlier.
d Identify any obvious gaps in the material and fill them in with slips of paper indicating further arguments, additional data or any other supporting information. It is unlikely that the numbers on these various bits of paper will be consecutive so it is important at this stage to make a note of the resulting sequence of numbers so that it can be replicated later if necessary.
e Collect up the bits of paper, shuffle them and repeat the process described in c above, but this time give the material a different ‘shape’, e.g.
– the chronological sequence;
– the range of points from the most important to the least important;
– the listing of points for and points against.
After each ‘sort’ it is important that the sequence of numbers on the bits of paper is recorded for subsequent retrieval if needed.
f Now, you are able to manipulate material and produce an essay of your own design in a sequence that is clear and logical.