What to do when you don't fully understand the AWA topic?

[tamedmond]

I know we don;t need to focus too hard on the AWA portion itself, but I worry that the topics will be on something that I don't fully understand. Any suggestions if this happens?

[StaceyKoprince]

Yeah, that can happen sometimes, and it's tough when it does. Two things:
(1) you're allowed to do a certain amount of interpretation, as long as you tell the reader what you're interpreting and how you're interpreting it. So, within reason of course, you get to decide for yourself how to interpret something that is confusing or ambiguous - you just have to make very clear to the reader how you're interpreting it.

(2) you can do some brainstorming with the chapter on essays in either OG11 or OG12. There are a bunch of sample topics in there, so look at a couple of random ones everyday and just brainstorm: what do I think this means and how would I talk about it? Try not to spend more than 5 minutes brainstorming, because that's all the time we can afford to take on the real test.