How should I structure an essay?

There are two ways I would suggest for structuring a good A Level History essay. The first, and my personal preferred method, is to write it thematically, starting with the most relevant or important theme and stating the intended order in the introduction so the examiner knows the direction your essay will take. Make sure your topic sentence is clear and that you use enough specific evidence such as dates and events to back it up. At the end of each of your thematic paragraphs you should link your point and evidence back to the question in order to get marks for analysis. This should also be done throughout the paragraph so that every point is furthering your argument. This will prevent you from rambling and therefore losing the focus of your essay.

Another way that you could formulate an essay is by analysing periods of time in turn in relation to the question. For this method you will need to make sure that you justify each of your sections’ start and end points. This method may be more useful for a question with a stated time period of around 100 years as it can help you make sense of such a large and therefore difficult question. In both of these structures you should make sure that the debatable term from the question is defined in the introduction as not everyone will take the same interpretation of the question asked. You should also make sure not to include any new information in the conclusion of your essay as you will not be able to analyse it fully, especially if you are short on time in an exam. Just use these last words to summarise your best points so you remind the examiner of them.