ESSAY CHECKLIST
FORM AND STRUCTURE
INTRODUCTION
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Do you have a hook that will entice the reader?
Is your hook on topic?
Have you introduced the genre, title, author/director?
Have you checked that you have underlined long titles (novels, plays,
films) or put “quotation marks” around short titles (poems, short
stories)?
Have you provided a brief summary about what the piece of literature
is about?
Have you given a statement about the topic?
Have you used a theme statement to help you build your thesis, which
tells us what you are trying to prove?
Does your thesis have a blueprint, attached or separate, telling us
what is going to be in all of your body paragraphs?
BODY PARAGRAPHS
Topic Sentences (Check all)
 Does your topic sentence (first sentence) capture the controlling idea
of the paragraph?
 Does your topic sentence connect to your thesis statement?
 Does your reader know what you are trying to prove in that paragraph
just by reading your topic sentence?
 Does your paragraph contain only information proving that topic
sentence?
Thought and Understanding & Supporting Evidence (Check all)
Have you given all of the necessary details that prove your idea?
Do you have details that are insightful and perceptive?
Have you used specific examples or INTEGRATED quotations?
Have you backed up each example or quotation with a discussion,
explaining what it is important?
 Have you made sure that all of the details relate to that paragraph,
and that you’re not just retelling the story?
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Concluding Sentences (Check all)
 Have you summed up what your paragraph is about?
 Is it in different words than your topic sentence?
 Have you attempted some transitions to flow into your next paragraph
(except in your last body paragraph)?
CONCLUSION
 Have you restated your thesis statement in new words?
 Have you broken apart your blueprint into a separate sentence or
more?
 Have you ended with some sort of exciting ending?
MATTERS OF CHOICE
SENTENCE STRUCTURE
 Do you have a variety of sentence starters?
o “ing” starter: Racing down the track, the race car sped out into
the lead.
o “ed” starter: Frightened, the rabbit hopped away from the
crowd of children.
o prepositional (anywhere the cat goes) starter: Underneath the
large tree, the panther stalked his prey.
o clausal (although, since, if, because) starter: Although I got a
sunburn, I still enjoyed the trip.
o subject (noun, pronoun) starter: I feel that chocolate chip
cookies are the best type of cookie.
o “ly” (adverb) starter: Slowly, the ice-cream melted down the
side of the cone.
 Do you have a variety of sentence lengths?
 Do you a variety of sentence types?
o simple sentence (ex. He stopped. I went to the store. The boy
was tall)
o compound sentence using and or but (ex. He stopped, and he
walked over to the girl next to him. I went to the store, and I
bought some milk. The boy was tall, and he was able to reach
the top shelf with ease.)
o complex sentence (ex. After he almost fell down, he stopped.
Because my mother asked, I went to the store. The boy was
tall when he was only twelve.)
o compound-complex sentence (ex. After he always fell down, he
stopped, and he walked over to the girl next to him. Because
my mother asked, I went to the store, and I bought some milk.
The boy was tall when he was only twelve, and he was able to
reach the top shelf with ease).
DICTION/STYLISTIC CHOICES
 Did you only use words you KNOW?
 Have you created a persuasive tone?
 Have you added creative or interesting words where possible to add to
your voice? (Note: This is an essay, not a story, but you can still have
some voice!)
 Have you added interesting punctuation such as a dash –, a colon : or a
semi-colon ;?
 Have you introduced some interesting stylistic choices (we learned
this with poetry/short stories) such as anaphora, parallelism or
metaphor (hint – this works very well in your introduction or
conclusion)?
MATTERS OF CORRECTNESS
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checked for, and added, capital letters at the beginning of sentences
checked for, and deleted, capital letters where they shouldn’t be
checked for, and added, proper end punctuation (.?!)
checked for sentence fragments and made them complete sentence
(ex. After a while. -> After a while, we were there. Because it was
night. -> Because it was night, we couldn’t see a thing.)
checked for run-on sentences and made them separate sentences,
remembering to only use ONE and, but, or, so, etc. per sentence (I
went to the store and got some milk and after a while I came right
home. -> I went to the store and got some milk. After a while, I came
right home.)
checked for comma-splices and made them separate sentences, added
a conjunction or added a semi-colon (I wanted a new iPod, I bought one
-> I wanted a new iPod, so I bought one)
used the same tense (present tense for literary essays)
checked for spelling errors
checked for proper integration of quotations