 Wed Jul 12, 2006 9:04 am GRE essay sample: Two minds are better than one... |
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Essay topic:
Two minds are better than one. Group working in tandem always provide faster and better results than individuals working alone. [This is a poorly phrased question, and I see that you have elected to repeat the unfortunate phrase in your essay. 'In tandem' means 'two things, one behind/after the other', so is rather odd here. What is meant is simply 'working together'.]
Essay:
Working in a group might provide better solutions in some situations, but stating that a group working in tandem will
always provide better results is an overstatement. [You repeat the root 'state' (stating, overstatement), and this is a form of redundancy. This first sentence is quite weak; it says little. Get more quickly and deeply into your thesis. From your following text, you make good cases for both ways of working; your introduction and thesis statement should reflect that conclusion.]
The world has seen many great men and inventions. Thomas Alva Edison, who invented electricity, Sir Isaac Newton, who discovered gravity, Albert Einstein, who invented the theory of relativity, and many others worked alone. Great minds do not need to work in a group to achieve great results. [This paragraph would be a better contribution to the introduction than your previous paragraph. Be careful of spelling and capitalization-- you are not good at either.]
As a matter of fact, great deeds in history, science, mathematics, philosophy, religion [no reason to capitalize] and almost every
field of study known to man kind [one word], has seen this kind [which kind? What is the referent for 'this' massive development?] of massive development because of great individual effort. Of course,one cannot disparage the efforts taken by group of people, say [too casual] a team working in NASA, who have made significant contributions too.
Taking History for instance, Mahatma Gandhi is an example for a single mind acheiving [spelling] great result. He worked alone to bring a divided Indian nation together and crusaded single handedly [hyphenate] against Bristish [spelling again-- you have obviously not proofread your essay before posting] Imperialism [no cap] and made freedom possible for India. In Many historical revolutions, we find a single person/mind [don't use slashes like this in formal writing; use correct sentence structure] behind it; like Abraham Lincoln who fought to abolish slavery or Nelson Mandela who fought for his country's Independence [after a semicolon an independent clause is required]. These great leaders galvanized people and acheived great results single-handedly.
Working in a group can be beneficial in cases that requires it [this is a truism and says nothing really; delete or amend]. In the case of building a house, a single person would take ages [too casual] to buid it, whereas a group of men can complete it in a few months [houses don't take that long, I think]. For a group working together, providing faster and better results calls for harmony among the people in the group. The people in the group [you have repeated the phrase twice in succession: very boring] must be at ease with each other and there should not be any communication gap between them. In some situations. too many minds can be detrimental to the solution. As one might have heard, "too many cooks spoil the broth" [using proverbs and sayings can be effective on occasion, but do not place them in highlighted positions; they are unoriginal].
Where neccessary, a group working in tandem can be beneficial. But the group will always need a single mind to steer the group in the right direction tp acheive results. This explains why we see hierarchical organization of people in almost all companies to make the most of working in groups and single person [a singular countable noun requires an article or determiner] to guide the group.
Thus, group [a singular countable noun requires an article or determiner] of men in tandem coupled with the resourcefulness of a single mind will acheive better and faster results. [This is too brief a conclusion, but is good in concept; its idea is what should have appeared in your introduction.]
Your ideas are good, your images/examples are striking, and your presentation is clear within each paragraph. The essay suffers from imperfect overall organization, in part a result of a poor introduction. Before writing you need to outline for yourself the points to be made for optimum impact:
- sometimes we need to work alone
- some solo work has been impressive
- sometimes we need to work together
- some group work has been impressive
- the best work is a combination of individual creativity and group effort.
- this way we can reach the stars (!)
This, in skeletal form, should appear in your introduction.
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Mister Micawber
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| Wed Jul 12, 2006 11:54 am Great job, Charles |
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Hi Charles,
Just a quick note to let you know you have been doing an outstanding job amending our users' essays and I think Amy, Conchita, Jamie and of course Alan will agree with me when I say that we are on the right track to becoming an efficient team.
Thanks a lot for your great support!
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Torsten
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