The Unified State Exam in Russian is a mandatory exam that every student who completes 11 grades must pass in order to receive a certificate. The essay on the exam in the Russian language plays a big role and is one of the most important tasks. It can bring a graduate up to 24 primary points or about 40 test points. That is why preparing for an essay is so important for students - a good essay can be the key to successful admission.
Criteria for the content of the essay
In 2019, the criteria for evaluating an essay in the Russian language changed slightly. Until this year, the main part of the essay, for which students could get the most points, was the expression of their own opinion with reasoning and reliance on literary texts. However, this approach had its drawbacks, the main of which was the appearance on the Internet of many ready-made arguments. Therefore, many students did not show their real level of preparation at the exam, but reproduced memorized phrases.
Probably because of this, changes have been made. Yes, and the same skills - the ability to work with classical texts and to argue their position based on them - students work out in preparation for an essay on literature. On the exam, now the student can get the most primary points (up to 5) for commenting on the source text.
Another point corresponds to the wording of the text problem. It is important to note: if the problem is formulated incorrectly or is completely absent in the text of the work, zero points are set for criteria K1-K4. In total, the student loses 8 points.
The graduate receives one more point for formulating the author’s position and his own attitude to it with the substantiation of his opinion.
Composition structure
In preparation for writing an essay, it is very important to know exactly the structure of this type of work and adhere to it. Firstly, it helps not to get confused in the stressful situation of the exam, just follow a well-known plan. Secondly, do not miss the thread of the story, guided by all the criteria. According to them, a model essay should have the following plan:
- Introduction, formulation of the main problems of the text.
- Detailed commentary on the text of the problem.
- Author's position.
- Own position and its argumentation.
- Conclusion
And now we will analyze the spelling of each item in more detail.
How to formulate a problem
The first thing a student should do when preparing for the essay is to learn to read the text and identify the problem that the author raises. To do this, you should carefully read the text. Perhaps even a few times. Then mentally answer the questions:
- What is this text about?
- Who are its main characters?
- What events are happening?
- What time is described in the text?
This is necessary to make sure that you have carefully studied the text and not make any actual mistakes when writing the essay.
Next, you need to think about what idea the author tried to convey, what is the main idea of the text. Write this in a couple of sentences, formulating the author's position. After asking a question for this part - this is the problematic question.
In any fiction or journalistic text, as a rule, there are several problems. The student should choose the most, in his opinion, “obvious”, the one that is most easily traced in the text. These skills can also be obtained at the time of preparation for the composition of the exam.
Once you have selected a problem, it’s worth writing a short introduction - one or two sentences that carefully introduce the reader to the subject of the essay. Quotes, aphorisms, or definitions may appear in this role. Next, you should identify the problem or problematic issue, complete the part with the final phrase.
So, summarized, the first paragraph of the essay should look like this: 1-2 introductory sentences + problem (“The problem is raised in the text [...]” / problematic question) + “It is [this author’s full name] that he suggests reflecting on this important issue”
Comment Writing Features
After formulating the problem, you need to start writing a comment. As already mentioned, commentary is the most “valuable” part of the work. Therefore, this stage is also important in preparing for the composition of the exam - text analysis.
The commentary is a detailed explanation of the problem involving material from this text. In your commentary, you must explain how the author reveals this topic and by what means he expresses his opinion.
The comment is rated as follows:
- One example is an illustration from a text with explanation = 2 points.
- The second example is an illustration from the text with the explanation = 2 points.
- The semantic connection between the above examples = 1 point.
Each example should consist of three parts: an example from the text, a quote and an explanation for the example. This means that a sample comment plan is as follows:
- 1 paragraph: example (a small description of a specific situation from the text and using facts) + quote-illustration + explanation of the example;
- 2 paragraph: the second example is an illustration, designed according to the same plan;
- 3 paragraph: semantic connection between the two examples.
The semantic connection may be located elsewhere, for example, between examples. The main thing is not to forget about her! Otherwise, you can lose one point.
It is very important that the commentary is written strictly on the problem that you indicated at the beginning of the essay. For example, if in the introduction your problematic question sounded like “Why is loneliness terrible?”, The problem of cruelty cannot be revealed in the commentary. In this case, the comment will be set to "misalignment."
Formulation of the author's position
After the comment on the plan, the author’s position follows. This is a small paragraph that, as it were, summarizes everything that was said earlier. During the formulation of the problem, the author’s position was already recorded as an auxiliary element, now it can simply be rewritten with small corrections if they are required.
Own position
Another important stage of preparation for the composition of the exam. It consists in gaining the ability to formally express one’s consent with the author using the design:
- “It’s impossible not to disagree with the author”;
- “I completely share the author’s position.”
However, it should be remembered that this is more of an introduction, and it will not be counted as a full answer. In order to earn 1 point for this criterion, you must also argue your position. There are two main ways to do this:
- Attraction of literary material. You reinforce your judgment using an argument from the literature. It is necessary to describe the specific situation and give it a short explanation as to how it confirms your idea. In this you can prepare for the final essay of the exam in the Russian language. Surely you have in stock ready-made literary arguments.
- Judgment + judgment. In the same way, you can reinforce your thought with a second proposition, for example, by spreading the thought or by giving an example from life. You can use a quote from a famous person.
Regardless of which way of argument you choose, you can get only 1 point to the maximum. Therefore, it is probably not worthwhile to make great efforts to search for literary arguments if it takes you a lot of time.
Writing a conclusion
The conclusion is not directly evaluated, but it is an important part of any composition, since it is the conclusion that gives it compositional integrity.
The conclusion should consist of a couple of sentences and be the logical conclusion of your work. The conclusion should be appropriate and written strictly on the problem that you stated at the beginning, and consistent with the author's position.
To do this, you can reformulate the position of the author, expressing it in other words. Also in the conclusion may be incentive proposals, appeals. Given their relevance, they can be a good conclusion to an essay.
Speech composition and literacy
In preparation for the composition of the exam should pay attention not only to its semantic content, but also form.
So, a student can get 4 points for speech typography. This block includes the following criteria:
- The semantic integrity and sequence of presentation. The absence of logical errors, as well as the motivated division of the text into paragraphs - 2 points. If there is 1 logical error or 1 error in the paragraph division of the text, 1 point is set. If more errors are made, 0 points are set.
- The expressiveness of speech, the diversity of the grammatical structure of speech. If the work is original and diverse in lexical and grammatical means, it receives 2 points by this criterion. Important: the maximum score can only be set provided that there is only one speech error in the work! If lexical or grammatical techniques are uniform, 1 point can be set. In other cases, 0 points are set.
For literacy criteria, check out the table.
The last criterion is an explanation. Ethical errors - a manifestation of disrespect or aggression towards the author of the text or to someone else, an insulting attitude. This criterion measures how correct the student is in his statements.
How to avoid spelling and punctuation errors
Obviously, in contrast to the preparation for the composition of the exam in history or social science, for example, in Russian you need to pay special attention to your literacy. As you can see, the criteria for evaluating an essay are quite strict, however, mistakes can always be avoided. Remember, an essay is not a dictation. You have the right to change the wording, break complex sentences into simple ones. If you are not sure about the spelling of a particular word, try to find a synonym for it, replacing it.
Of course, we must not forget about the school lessons of the Russian language, because the examination is aimed at testing this basic knowledge. You should also expand the vocabulary, apply the knowledge of the rules in practice and develop visual memory by reading literature or solving tasks.
An example of the essay on the Russian language
Of course, the key to the successful completion of any task is practice. Only regular independent writing of essays and analysis of your mistakes can provide high scores. However, preparation may also include reading and analyzing other people's work.
Further, for example, an essay written based on an excerpt from the novel by L. L. Pasternak “Doctor Zhivago” is presented. It was written by future examiners in the lessons of preparing for the composition of the exam.
War is always a tragedy. But there are wars that are especially painful to watch - civil. What is the essence of the civil war, its particular drama? It is precisely this important question that B. L. Pasternak is asking.
The author reveals his understanding of the civil war, describing Russia in the years after the revolution. The main character - Yuri Andreyevich Zhivago, a military doctor, accidentally finds himself in the midst of battle, becoming his unwitting observer. Despite the fact that he is on the side of the “Reds,” at that moment he sympathizes with the “White Guard children”. The fact is that he sees in them not only "reckless" youth, but also people "close to him in spirit" - one circle with him. For him, they are not enemies, but brothers, equal to him both in education, and cultural level, and in origin.
After the battle is over, the doctor examines the two dead: the telegraph operator who fought on the side of the Reds, and the White Guard. He finds with them the text of the same psalm, which "was considered miraculous, protected from bullets." These people had just fought against each other, but now their souls were reconciled and were closely connected by one faith and one single desire - the desire to live.
With these examples, the author shows that despite all the political and ideological differences, all these people are part of one people, united by one history and culture.
B. L. Pasternak believes that a civil war is a fratricidal war, forcing people of the same faith, one nation to annihilate each other, which cannot be justified.
It is impossible to disagree with the author. Indeed, civil war is unnatural. People do not protect their country from the enemy, but, on the contrary, they destroy it themselves. In a civil war there are no winners or losers, only ruined fates, divided families and the tragedy that affected everyone.
In conclusion, I would like to say that any war is a huge sorrow, but civil war in particular. Therefore, people should make every effort to avoid this catastrophe, and try to find other, creative, ways to resolve conflicts.
In this article, all the requirements for verifying examination essays were set out in sufficient detail, comments were given on them, and several plans for constructing their work were provided. This material can help to better understand what mistakes you are making and how you can improve your work to successfully pass the exam.