Team Activities to Help High School Students Craft Standout College Admission Essays

Hi Marcus! It’s great to see you focusing on the college admissions essay. While the final product is deeply personal, the process of understanding how to write one is much more effective (and less intimidating) when done collaboratively.

By working in teams, students can learn to identify "clichés," recognize a strong "voice," and understand the importance of the "show, don't tell" rule.

Here are three ready-to-use activities to help your students master the college essay as a team.

1. The Mock Admissions Committee

In this activity, students stop being writers and start being readers. By evaluating others' work, they quickly learn what makes an essay memorable versus what makes it forgettable.

The Task: Divide the class into "Admissions Boards" of 3-4 students. Give each board two contrasting mini-essays (provided below) and ask them to decide which student they would admit based solely on the essay.

Materials for Teams:

• Candidate A (The "Resume" Essay):

"I have always been a hard worker. In high school, I was the Captain of the Varsity Soccer team, President of the Debate Club, and volunteered at the local animal shelter every Saturday. These experiences taught me leadership and time management. I am also a member of the National Honor Society. I believe my dedication to my community and my high GPA make me an excellent candidate for your university."

• Candidate B (The "Specific Moment" Essay):

"The smell of burnt toast and industrial-strength lavender cleaner always reminds me of Tuesday nights at the Westside Shelter. My job wasn't glamorous—I was the 'Socks and Underwear Coordinator.' While my friends were at practice, I was organizing donated garments by size. One Tuesday, a man named Arthur asked for a pair of blue socks. When I found them, he reacted as if I’d handed him a gold medal. In that moment, I realized that leadership isn't always about standing on a podium; sometimes, it’s about noticing the small things that preserve someone's dignity."

Team Discussion Questions:

1. Which candidate feels like a real person you’d want to grab coffee with?
2. What is one specific image you remember from Candidate B?
3. Why does Candidate A’s essay feel like a list rather than a story?

2. The "Show, Don’t Tell" Transformation Lab

Students often "tell" their emotions (e.g., "I was nervous"). This activity challenges teams to "show" those emotions through sensory details.

The Task: Give each team a "Boring/Telling Sentence." Their goal is to rewrite it into a vivid 3-sentence paragraph that conveys the same meaning without using the original keywords.

Team Challenge Board:

Actionable Step: Have teams rotate their papers. The next team must read the "Showing" paragraph and try to guess what the original "Telling" sentence was.

3. The "So What?" Peer Pitch

The biggest mistake students make is telling a great story but forgetting to explain why it matters. This activity helps them find the "pivot."

The Task:

1. Each student writes down a "Micro-Story" (a 3-sentence memory) on a piece of paper.
2. They pass that paper to their teammate.
3. The teammate must write the "So What?"—what does this story reveal about the writer’s character or future potential?

Example:

• Student A’s Micro-Story: "I spent three months trying to fix an old 1970s film camera I found at a garage sale. I watched forty YouTube tutorials and took it apart three times. Finally, I heard the shutter click."
• Teammate’s "So What?": "This shows you are someone who doesn't give up when things get technical. It reveals a 'problem-solver' mindset and an appreciation for how things work under the surface."

A Quick Tip for Presenting These Activities

If you want to present these instructions or share the "Candidate Essays" on the big screen for the class to see, I recommend using Alayna’s AI Slides Generator for Google Slides. It’s a great way to quickly turn these activity prompts into a professional presentation. You can install it here and access it directly in Google Slides via Extensions → Alayna AI for Google Slides™.

How do these activities sound for your group, Marcus? If you need more specific sample essays or a grading rubric for their drafts, just let me know!