Index Cards are a brilliant way to help break an essay into more manageable elements and to develop structure for your final piece of writing. This is so easy that I am sure you will have success with this process!

Let’s pretend my teacher told the class they had to research an illness and turn in an assignment describing the ways in which that illness can be treated:

I am very interested in depression because I have heard heaps about that illness in the media lately. Therefore I head to the library and read about depression and the ways in which it can be treated. I find some great books and also browse for some websites on the world wide web. While I am reading, I scrawl down some of the major notes on Index Cards like this:

Now that I have the major dot points for this subject written down on index cards, I am able to order them logically so that my essay will have a good structure. You most likely understand that a well-written assignment has an introduction (defining the topic and summarizing the main points), a body (with each paragraph detailing a main point) and a conclusion (the last paragraph that reminds the reader about the main points and reaches some kind of decision on the topic). Considering this I may sort my index cards in this way:

Now that my cards are rearranged into a logical order, I can draft my assignment. The first card will form the basis of my introduction. It will outline depression as a disorder and I will probably add a sentence about the two major treatments. The rest of the cards then become another paragraph in my essay: I simply expand on the points I have written on the cards and write the content in my own words as full sentences. Then, I outline a conclusion that summarizes the main points from my assignment. I might also write a final sentence along these lines: “Depression is very treatable with medication and psychotherapy so patients do not have to suffer in silence.” This would draw my assignment to a nice conclusion.

I hope this helps you to write some top scoring assignments!

Making use of index cards is just one way to organize your thinking. I prefer a strategy called Mind Mapping for taking notes and planning assignments. You can find more information about Mind Mapping at Buzan’s Mind Mapping site.