ACT Essay Writing – Examples & Scoring
This page contains ACT essay writing examples and explains the scoring of this section of the exam.
The Essay is an Optional Component
The ACT writing section is not a required component of the exam. You will need to inquire whether your college or university requires the essay.
ACT Essay Structure – How to Score a 12
ACT essay scores range from 2 to 12.
To score a 6 from each of the two examiners on the ACT essay, you will need to write a truly exceptional piece.
Most examiners agree that the very best ACT essays have the following structure and organization:
Paragraph 1
The first paragraph gives the background to the subject and provides your point of view.
You should remember to give a thesis statement, which clearly asserts the position you are taking, in the first paragraph.
If you are able to sustain a strong but unpopular point of view, your score may be higher.
Paragraph 2
Make a prediction of a dystopian future that may exist if the issue in the essay prompt continues to remain unchecked.
Instead of a prediction, you can provide an original idea or an interesting example from the media to support your view.
Paragraph 3
Give reasons for your argument and support them with examples.
You can provide a rhetorical question in this section to incite the thought of the reader.
Paragraph 4
This is where you mention the viewpoint that opposes your own.
You will briefly explain why others have this perspective.
Then you need to go on to discount the alternative viewpoint in the form of a rebuttal.
Paragraph 5
This is where you need to sum up your essay.
Re-assert the effects that could occur if your prediction of the future actually happens.
Remember, you usually have to have a unique idea at the center of your essay to score a 12.
ACT Essay Writing Examples
In the next section, you will find one of the ACT essay writing examples that scored a 12.
Try to analyze the components mentioned above for each of its five paragraphs.
ACT Writing Example Question (Prompt)
Smart phones have become an increasingly important aspect of modern life, replacing maps, encyclopedias, stereos, cameras, watches, and even flashlights. Whereas we needed planning and preparation to carry out certain everyday tasks in the past, we can now conduct our daily business spontaneously with just a few clicks on our devices. But is all of this progress a good thing? With the prevalence and variety of smartphone apps now in our lives, it is time to evaluate the long-term consequences they may be having on us.
Perspective 1
We are ruining our analytical skills through our reliance upon smartphone apps. As a result, we are constantly facing unknown dangers.
Perspective 2
Smartphones are a useful tool for low-risk activities such as shopping or ordering food deliveries. Having apps available for these types of tasks creates more time in the day that we can use productively.
Perspective 3
In many ways, smart phones bring us closer than we were in the past. We are able to socialize with friends and share news instantly with many people at once.
ACT Writing Examples – Model Essay Response
Without a doubt, the so-called “smart” phone has already had a pervasive impact upon human society. However, unquestioning use of this technology has resulted in a plethora of unforeseen negative phenomena that were not even represented in the English vocabulary a decade ago, from “death by GPS” to “Tinder killer.” Without us pausing to consider how to self-regulate our smart phone usage, the results will certainly have a deleterious effect on our social interaction with each other and may even be catastrophic to the mental health and intellect of the general population.
One only needs to consider how human beings may devolve intellectually if the present situation progresses without us monitoring ourselves more adequately. The use of GPS apps, for instance, has resulted in deaths for those who have blindly follow the electronic voice that guides them into bodies of water, over snowy mountain ridges, or onto impassable roads. Scientists fear that we are losing more than just our sense of direction as the reliance on such apps may actually be changing our brains. Over time, a reverse form of Darwinism could take place, signaling the overall decline in natural human intelligence.
The uncritical use of smartphones is already altering us socially and psychologically. The rise of Instagram and the selfie culture has led to self-image issues that have caused some people to take their own lives, and increasing numbers of individuals will continue to commit suicide if the trend continues. Dating apps have led to far fewer, but nonetheless widely-reported fatalities when a dater is unfortunate enough to be matched with a sociopath. Over-reliance on smart phone apps also results in obsessive behaviors, addiction, and sleep deprivation. Less and less time is spent interacting with friends in person as we can now “share” and carry out “conversations” on our smart phones without even leaving our homes. Ultimately, the psychological and social well-being of more and more people will be in jeopardy as the impulsive centers in our brains become larger and the cerebral areas controlling cognitive thought go into decline.
Despite these negative developments, some people consistently argue that smart phones are only a positive thing. They can recount successful journeys they have made with the assistance of their GPS apps and can provide anecdotes of happy couples who met through a dating or social media app. While one must concede that this technology and the artificial intelligence that drives it make our lives easier in countless ways, such arguments ignore the fact that we must first critically examine the safety measures in place prior to making and acting upon decisions basely solely upon information provided by smartphone apps.
Our carelessness in considering the effect that certain apps have on our intellectual, social, and emotional well-being has already damaged us on a societal level. If left unchecked, this tendency will result in further socially adverse outcomes for us, ranging from the degradation of our general intelligence to the entire loss of any real sense of community with one another. We need to start to monitor our individual reliance on smartphone apps judiciously to prevent such a dystopian future.
ACT Essay Structure – How to Score a Solid 10
Sometimes under the pressure of exam conditions, you may not be able to come up with that creatively genius idea that will score you a 12.
In that case, what should you do? Our advice is then to try to write your essay using the following format.
Paragraph 1
Introduce your topic and give some background in the first sentence.
Acknowledge that there are different viewpoints on the topic and that a compromise is needed.
State a compromise solution in the thesis statement.
Paragraph 2
Mention the first reason for your argument and give examples to support and elaborate upon it.
Paragraph 3
Provide the second reason for your argument and support it with more examples and explanations.
Paragraph 4
Explain the alternative point of view and point out its weaknesses.
Paragraph 5
Reiterate the pro’s and con’s and sum up why you chose your compromise solution.
For course, you will also need advanced vocabulary and excellent grammar and sentence structure to score from 10 to 12.
See the official score 5 and score 6 essays
ACT Essay Scoring Chart
As mentioned before the ACT writing examples above, each of the two examiners will gives your essay a score from 1 to 6.
Please refer to the scoring chart below for the scoring classifications.
Details on ACT essay scoring by domain area are given in the last section of this page.
| Scores | Classification |
| 6 | Effective writing skills |
| 5 | Competent writing skills |
| 4 | Adequate writing skills |
| 3 | Some writing skills |
| 2 | Weak writing skills |
| 1 | No writing skills |
What is the ACT Essay Writing Test?
As part of the ACT test, you may need to take a writing test that involves composing a brief essay.
The essay should be approximately 300 to 500 words in length.
You will be allowed 40 minutes for the ACT writing test. In that time, you will need to plan, write, and check your essay.
In this part of the writing exam, you will see three differing perspectives on a particular issue, such as international travel or global warming.
You will need to state your opinion and justify it with reasons, explanations, and examples.
Your writing will be assessed only for your composition, sentence construction, and grammatical skills.
Your work will not be judged on the basis of the views that you have expressed.
The ACT is an Argumentative Essay
For the ACT essay, you will see an essay question, sometimes called an essay prompt.
The essay prompt will be followed by three different perspectives on the topic.
These types of essays are called argumentative essays because they incite the public the disagree.
So, by its nature, the ACT essay topic is going to be a contentious one.
ACT Essay Writing – Subtest Scores
If you take the ACT essay writing exam, you will receive a total of five sub-test scores.
The result you get from the ACT essay will not affect your overall ACT composite score.
However, you cannot get an English Language Arts score unless you write an ACT essay.
ACT Writing – Scoring
The ACT essay scoring is done by two examiners, who each will give your work a mark from 1 to 6 points.
The scores from each examiner will be combined, so there is a range of 2 to 12 possible points overall for the ACT essay writing exam.
You will also get a domain score from 2 to 12 for each of the four ACT writing domains.
The four domain areas are: ideas and analysis; development and support; organization; and language use and grammatical conventions.
The ACT writing domains are explained in more detail in the last section of this page.
How to Raise Your ACT Essay Writing Score
The tips in this section tell you how to raise your ACT essay writing score.
To achieve your best possible ACT essay writing score, remember to do the following:
- Agree with any of the three perspectives provided, give a compromise, or state an entirely new position.
- State your point of view obviously and clearly at the start of the ACT essay.
- Provide reasons and examples to support your opinion.
- Organize your essay in a logical way.
- Use correct grammar and punctuation, advanced sentence structures, and high-level academic vocabulary.
ACT Writing Domains
Your writing will be assessed according to how well you perform in each of the four following domains:
Ideas & Analysis
ACT essay scoring is based on how well you can come up with ideas and engage with multiple points of view.
Be sure to express your position clearly in the introduction of your essay and to maintain your viewpoint in your writing.
Development & Support
You need to elaborate on the main idea of your essay.
Support your viewpoint with salient reasons and examples.
Discuss the consequences or implications of various outcomes.
Remember to include examples and explanations that illustrate and support your point of view.
Organization
Show the relationship among the ideas that you discuss in your essay.
Clearly guide the reader through your discussion.
Your essay should be organized into paragraphs.
It should include an introduction, three main body paragraphs, and a conclusion.
Language Use and Grammatical Conventions
Be sure to write in the appropriate academic style and tone.
You should compose syntactically developed sentences that demonstrate a variety of sentence patterns.
Your essay should also be grammatically correct and punctuated correctly.
More ACT Preparation
If you are taking the ACT Math Test, you may wish to see our Math Formulas and our Free ACT Math Sample Test.
You can also try our grammar exercises by clicking on the image below.
