PSAT / High School Writing

Other PSAT classes solely teach what is covered on the multiple choice test. We help your student conquer the multiple choice questions as well; however, we ALSO emphasize essay writing. This class familiarizes students with the PSAT, and it also assists them in developing strong writing skills. Students will learn how to:

  • Analyze articles, take an argumentative position and support it with evidence, and develop strong critical reasoning skills
  • Perform literary analyses of short stories similar to what will be expected of them in their high school English classes
  • Write efficiently and persuasively based on personalized feedback from the instructor
  • Improve their critical reading and comprehension abilities
  • Identify question types and the most common methods for solving them
  • Internalize the principles of good writing so they can confidently recognize and correctly answer grammar and usage questions

In college, a typical social sciences or humanities course requires 15-25 pages of writing per quarter – that’s up to 100 pages of writing in 4 courses over 10 weeks.

To prepare students for upper-level analytical writing, this course will sharpen students’ essay-writing skills, beginning with the standard five-paragraph essay but moving into the argumentative, claim-driven essays expected at the AP and college level. Essays will be issue-based and students will learn to take an argumentative position, support it with evidence, make connections between multiple sources, and produce critical insight. Besides covering the fundamentals of writing, this course challenges students to break out of the five-paragraph formula to create a sophisticated collection of essays.