There may be other variations in phrasing of question, but approach you adopt needs to be always same: present examiner with what is effectively a concise answer to question. It usually takes no more than a few lines, maybe a dozen at most. He/she will jump up and down in excitement at having found someone who not only knows answer but who can also actually make it explicit.

2. The expansion of essay is simply a development to show that whatever you said at 1. is correct or relevant. This takes up most of essay. Use a new paragraph for every new point. Don't be afraid to be pedantic. End each of these paragraphs by relating what you have said directly back to question. e.g. "Hence it can be seen that..." and so forth.

If, during course of writing your answer, you suddenly remember a really major point which really should have come earlier, just "knit" it in as if this is where you always intended it to go. Thus: "Of course, a further point which needs to be given especially emphasis at this juncture is..." Try and make it seem most natural place to put it. The examiner may think it better put elsewhere, but he will not usually penalise you for that700

3. The conclusion will be little more than a restatement of introduction - but you do need a conclusion. During writing of essay you may have thought of some other points not mentioned in introduction. If so, be sure to mention them in conclusion.

Read Before You Write Always spend at least six/seven minutes out of a three hours exam reading question paper. Read it three times. The first to get a general impression. The second to mark any question which you can reasonably attempt. The third to check that your second reading decisions were accurate - sometimes, in face of nervous tension, they are not. This is time well spent. As an invigilator, one often groans within at seeing student grabbing their pens and beginning to write before clock has stopped chiming hour to commence!

Dividing Time Unless some questions have unequal shares in total marks possible, always divide your time equally between questions. There are severe diminishing returns to each extra minute spent on present question - more could be added to overall total by going onto next.

Conclusions year through bad or none existent exam technique. With good technique it is, in fact, possible to do rather well with skimpy knowledge (although one does not advocate practice!), whereas it is commonplace for students to underachieve by neglecting their technique.

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