<p>…(continuing above post) Also, one of the books published the complete essays of several students who had all replied to the same prompt, so my S could read what a “3” “4” “5” and “6”(perfect) score sounded like.
Another book published 2 responses to different prompts, at each score level, which I liked even better. The 2 samples took different approaches adn sounded like quite different students were writing…and yet, generated the same score. That way, the real variable was the writing style and not the examples chosen.
I think the way to learn to improve writing is to read examples of good writing. I even heard the President of Bard College speak on NPR about this.
So read other graded essays in those SAT-Writing Books.
BTW, my S didn’t keep all that rubric in his head as he wrote, but by grading his own essay once, I think he did learn to keep in the back of his mind their laundry list…are my sentences varied? did I develop the thesis logically? were my examples well-chosen? etc.</p>