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CSS Essay Important Topics for CSS - 2024

Written By ahtisham.akbar       Nov 26, 2023

92% of candidates appearing in the CSS examinations, fail the English Essay section. During their whole CSS journey, they keep on preparing for the Essay paper without knowing the targeted topics that can be expected in their exams. Similarly, keeping an eye on the national and international changes happening in the world. They can prepare broader themes on a few topics. Through those themes, students can easily narrow down any topic according to their needs.  CSS exams require more than just textbooks and notes – it demands a keen understanding of the crucial essay topics that might shape your success. In this blog, we're unlocking the treasure chest of essential essay themes that could very well be the key to unlocking your full potential in the exam room.

Certainly! Here are twenty major topics or themes to prepare for the CSS exam in Pakistan:

1. Democracy and Governance

2. Economic Challenges and Opportunities

3. Education Policies and Reforms

4. Healthcare Systems and Challenges

5. Climate Change and Environmental Sustainability

6. Foreign Policy and Diplomacy

7. Role of Media in Society

8. Water Scarcity and Management

9. Terrorism and National Security

10. Gender Equality and Women Empowerment

11. Poverty Alleviation Strategies

12. Digital Transformation and Technology Policies

13. CPEC (China-Pakistan Economic Corridor)

14. Human Rights Issues

15. Social Justice and Inclusivity

16. Migration and its Impacts

17. Role of Youth in Nation Building

18. Public Health Crisis Management (e.g., Pandemics)

19. Cultural Diversity and Heritage Preservation

20. Ethical Dilemmas in Public Service

These topics cover a broad spectrum of issues relevant to Pakistan and the world. It's crucial to have a comprehensive understanding of these themes, keeping in mind both national and international perspectives. Regularly updating your knowledge on these subjects and practicing essay writing will enhance your preparedness for the CSS exam.

Conclusion:

Dear CSS aspirants, our exploration into these important essay topics is not just about passing an exam; it's about equipping yourself with the knowledge and insights that can shape your understanding of the world. Each topic we've covered is a key to unlocking a new level of comprehension and critical thinking. As you embark on your exam preparation journey, remember that it's not just about memorizing facts; it's about engaging with ideas, forming your perspectives, and contributing meaningfully to the conversations that matter. So, go forth with confidence, armed with the awareness that you are not just preparing for an exam; you are preparing to be a thoughtful and informed participant in the world around you. Best of luck on your CSS journey!

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SYLLABUS: ESSAY (COMPULSORY)

Total Marks: 100 Time Allowed: 3 hours

Candidates will be required to write one or more Essay in English. A wide choice of topics will be given.

Candidates are expected to reflect comprehensive and research based knowledge on a selected topic. Candidate’s articulation, expression and technical treatment of the style of English Essay writing will be examined.

Pakistan | FPSC | CSS | NTS | Federal Board | MCQs |  Urdu

Home → CSS/PMS → Deconstructing the CSS English Essay

Written by Zuha Tiwana • June 18, 2024 • 6:35 pm • CSS/PMS , Published Content

Deconstructing the CSS English Essay

Ms Zuha Tiwana is a psychologist, freelancer, and analyst. She can be reached at [email protected]

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Every year, more than 80 percent of the aspirants fail the CSS English essay. In 2019, the percentage was 73 percent, and in 2021, 91 percent of aspirants failed to pass. In the recent results of 2023, 92 percent of students flunked it. Unfortunately, even students with a good grip on the English language also fail this subject.

Most of the aspirants consider it just like any subject and prepare accordingly. English essay is not just a subject, it is a skill. When one has learned this skill, it becomes easier to crack CSS and every other essay exam.

To begin with, an essay has a typical structure that needs to be maintained accurately. Good English with poor structure gains nothing. The main components of an essay are outline, introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion. The first component of an essay is the outline, a mini-map of the essay. It must contain every component of the essay. In other words, nothing in the essay body can be included if it has not been mentioned in the outline. Moreover, the outline of the essay must be precise, and the usage of phrases is also recommended.

Generally, there are different levels of headings in an essay. The primary headings must include only the point the examiner has asked. However, the secondary headings are the supporting points for the arguments in the essay. For instance, if the question is Economy of Pakistan: Issues and Hopes , the primary header will account for the introduction, the economy of Pakistan, its issues, hopes, and conclusion. On the other hand, the secondary headings may include current economic trends in Pakistan or a relevant case study.

Secondly, the main essay starts with an introductory paragraph that entirely summarises the whole essay. It accounts for 10 percent of the total essay. The introduction paragraph must start with a hook. A hook can refer to some catchy lines or ideas at the start of the essay that get the attention at once. There are multiple forms of hooks for the CSS English essay: quotations, fictional stories, statistics, and facts.

Only a single hook must be chosen for the essay at a time. The hook should be relevant to the topic and must be connected to the succeeding arguments and summary of the entire essay. An introduction paragraph must contain all the main points of the essay. Furthermore, the last line of the introduction paragraph is the thesis statement that defines the whole essay in one sentence. It is one’s stance on the topic. What a particular discourse will include should be reflected in the thesis statement.

Thirdly, body paragraphs are the main body of the essay comprising 80 percent of the whole essay. After the introduction paragraph, with proper use of discourse markers, the body paragraphs should start. Remember, each body paragraph itself has a specific structure including an introductory line, supporting statements, any instance/ stats/ facts, and a concluding statement.

However, each body paragraph must cover only a single point of outline. Each point in the outline must be discussed in a separate section following the basic structure. The most important elements in writing are the connectivity and expression that distinguish the high achievers and the ones who fail the CSS English essay exam.

Fourthly, transitional paragraphs between the switching of primary headers are necessary to maintain coherence in the discourse. Similarly, first-degree or second-degree discourse markers are a compulsion. Lastly, it is the conclusion paragraph that summarises the essay within ten percent of the word limit of the entire essay. It contributes to forty percent of the summary of the essay and concludes an essay in a “specific to general” flow.

The concluding paragraph must not include anything that has not been written in the introduction or main body of the essay. It must cohere with the sequence of the essay. The essay should be ended in a general way and an optimistic tone. However, it can also end with a quotation that must be completely relevant to the essay topic. Interestingly, this essay format is universal and can apply to any essay one has to write, in any exam of their life.

Similarly, the structure presented here makes the essay clear and accurate for the examiner to mark. In competitive exams, the evaluative criteria are high and require the aspirants to show the best of their knowledge, logic, and sense of expression to the examiner. An aspirant must try to facilitate the examiner while reading his or her essay paper. A fluent, coherent, and well-expressed discourse can help the aspirants gain good marks and increase the passing percentage of the subject.

Besides, mastering English is not enough, it is pertinent to master the skill of writing an essay. In the end, it is the skill that helps the aspirants in the three-hour exam to brainstorm, outline, think, and write a masterpiece. To all the aspirants of CE-2025, keep practicing the right structure for your CSS essay . It will pass, God willing!

If you want to submit your articles and/or research papers, please check the  Submissions  page.

The views and opinions expressed in this article/paper are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Paradigm Shift .

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English Essay and Precis Course for Special CSS

• December 22, 2022
• Online Classes
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Are you looking to prepare English essays and precis papers for the Special CSS exam? Then, let’s join Sir Syed Kazim Ali to learn competitive English grammar thoroughly, understand how to make assertions, and support them with specific evidence to qualify for the Special CSS attempt!

Special CSS has proved a blessing for serious aspirants and for those who, by bad luck, did not make it. The age relaxation has been increased to 34 years, especially for the Special CSS. All of you know that qualifying for the CSS examination to step into Pakistan’s bureaucracy requires aspirants have a good command of English. The better the command of the subject, the better the chances of qualifying for it. Undoubtedly, CSS English papers move around English written communication skills and clarity of expression. But, English essay paper demands aspirants to write their ideas, thoughts, and viewpoints on the selected topic rather than reproducing sentences and paragraphs they cram from the newspapers. Thus, aspirants with better writing skills, analytical approaches, and knowledge can easily give their ideas a motion required to qualify for the paper. As far as the CSS precis paper is concerned, aspirants think that learning some grammar books and memorizing some error rules can help them qualify for this paper. So, they keep practising sentence corrections and grammar exercises from various books, which do not help them crack the paper in the examination. English, for sure, has dozens of cryptic grammatical rules, many of which the CSS examiner does not test. Without any doubt, the CSS precis papers are not set out to test grammar rules; they, instead, are set up to check the clarity of the written expression of an aspirant.

Without any doubt , writing is the primary tool that helps aspirants present their thoughts on the given topic on the exam paper. Therefore, cracking both English essays and precis papers demand aspirants must have a good command of English written communication skills. Regardless of the aspirants’ qualifications and how much knowledge they have from reading quality books, they quickly fail both papers if they do not know how to give their thoughts words grammatically correct, fluently, and coherently. It is a fact that even the most learned aspirants cannot understand the flow of coherent ideas and can make occasional errors – especially in essays and precis papers – and that is where Sir Syed Kazim Ali comes in. For years, he has been the best CSS English teacher in Pakistan, with the highest success rate of his students.

About the course

Sir Syed Kazim Ali has introduced a special course English Essay and Precis Course for CSS Special . This course is specially designed for aspirants who have planned to take the Special CSS and want to dive deep to grip English writing skills, including English grammar, essay writing, precis writing, and communication skills from basic to advanced levels. It is a perfect course if your level is between beginner and intermediate, and it helps you identify your strengths and weaknesses. So, whether you’re looking for your write-up evaluation or extensive coaching to take your writing skills to the next level to qualify for a competitive exam in Pakistan, Sir Syed Kazim Ali has an English language program to suit your needs.

Although hundreds of aspirants want to join Sir Kazim for their English papers preparation monthly, the available seats are only 50. To secure admission to the course, aspirants must submit an online form and a paragraph on the given topics. As you know, getting admission in a course introduced by Sir Kazim has always been challenging; your entry is strictly based on paragraph writing.

Here, You will Find the Following:

• ✓ Course Details
• ✓ What will you learn?
• ✓ How to register for the course?

Studying Competitive English with Sir Syed Kazim Ali Always Makes A Difference

Contact Mam Zaineb at WhatsApp 0300-6322446 & Get Your Seat Reserved Now.

Course Details

What will you learn in this course?

• ✓ Grammar and Language Focus
• ✓ Synonyms and Antonyms
• ✓ Vocabulary Usage
• ✓ Tenses, Voices, Narration
• ✓ Sentence Correction
• ✓ Punctuation and Translation
• ✓ Paragraphs Writing
• ✓ 20-Marks Question Attempting
• ✓ Precis Writing
• ✓ Comprehension
• ✓ Essays Writing

In this course, students learn grammar, precis, comprehension, 20-marks question attempting, and essay writing in detail. Moreover, students practice and get the last 10 years’ past papers evaluated individually by Sir. Each of the students is given individual time for his write-up evaluation Course Specialty

Course Syllabus Details

The following are the parts of the course that students cover in this session.

English Language Focus (Basics to Advanced)

• ✓ Grammar & Sentence Structuring
• ✓ Sentence Varieties & Sentence fragments
• ✓ Structural & Clauses Contraction
• ✓ Nouns and Pronouns
• ✓ Adjectives and Adverbs
• ✓ Comparisons and Degrees
• ✓ Modal Verbs and Their Usage
• ✓ Gerunds and Infinitives with Their Usage
• ✓ Conjunctions and Conjunctive Adverbs
• ✓ Structures after Verbs, Adjectives, and Adverbs
• ✓ Parts of Speech with Their Particular Usage
• ✓ Speeches: Narration and Voices
• ✓ Phrases and Clauses and Their Usage
• ✓ Misplaced Modifiers & Adjustments
• ✓ Faulty Parallelism & Adjustments
• ✓ Verbal Concepts, Errors & Usage
• ✓ Academic Diction, Mood & Tone
• ✓ Journalistic Diction, Mood & Tone
• ✓ Story Diction, Mood & Tone
• ✓ Articles, Demonstratives, Modifiers & Quantifiers Usage
• ✓ Punctuation & Punctuation Expressions
• ✓ Conditional (All Types – Rules, Errors, and Usage)
• ✓ Auxiliaries & Modals (Rules, Errors, and Usage)
• ✓ Prepositions (Rules, Errors, and Usage)
• ✓ Phrases & Clauses (Basic to Advanced)
• ✓ Advanced Usage of Phrases & Clauses
• ✓ Sentence Analysis, Transformation & Synthesis

Want to learn essays by Sir Kazim’s students?

If you are curious about how Sir Kazim’s students write essays and always qualify for the essay papers in the CSS and PMS examinations, let’s explore this section. Here you will find many essays written by Sir Kazim’s students who qualify for the paper and also learn how to attempt the essay paper.  Click to Land on CSS and PMS Solved Essays

Vocabulary In Focus

• ✓ 750 Modern Vocabulary Words (Appropriate Usage)
• ✓ 500 Plus Idioms & Phrases (Appropriate Usage)
• ✓ 500 Confusing Words (Appropriate Usage)
• ✓ 350 Phrasal Verbs (Appropriate Usage)
• ✓ 150 Proverbs (Appropriate Usage)
• ✓ 300 English Expressions (Appropriate Usage)
• ✓ 250 Smilies & Metaphors
• ✓ 200 Uncommon Words & Phrases
• ✓ 500 Most Used Synonyms
• ✓ 500 Most Used Antonyms
• ✓ 500 One-word Substitutions

Basics of the Wiring Process

• ✓ What is sentence structuring?
• ✓ What level of grammar do you need to start writing?
• ✓ How to use contemporary vocabulary appropriately?
• ✓ How to get focused & organize your thoughts?
• ✓ How do you get ideas & collect information?
• ✓ How to establish a thesis statement?
• ✓ How to write all comprehensive topic sentences?
• ✓ How to grab examiners’ attention?
• ✓ How to organize your thoughts coherently?
• ✓ How to write catchy titles and teasers?
• ✓ How to start and end a paragraph?

Elements of Paragraph Writing

• ✓ What is a paragraph?
• ✓ What is the writing process?
• ✓ What is a topic sentence?
• ✓ What is a stance, and how to take it?
• ✓ What is the way to support a stance?
• ✓ What is paragraph unity?
• ✓ How do we write coherently and relevantly?
• ✓ How to connect sentences and paragraphs?
• ✓ What are connection and transition words?
• ✓ What is the effective way of writing paragraphs?
• ✓ What are effective sentences, and how do write them?
• ✓ What is a narrative paragraph, and how to write it?
• ✓ What is a descriptive paragraph, and how to write it?
• ✓ What is an argumentative paragraph, and how to write it?
• ✓ What is a comparison paragraph, and how to write it?
• ✓ What is an exemplification paragraph, and how to write it?
• ✓ What is a cause-effect paragraph, and how to write it?

Essay Writing Process

• ✓ What is an essay?
• ✓ What is an outline?
• ✓ What is the thesis statement?
• ✓ How do we write a thesis statement with specific evidence?
• ✓ What is the topic sentence, and how to write it?
• ✓ What are unity and connectivity?
• ✓ How do we write introductory paragraphs?
• ✓ How do we write a coherent essay?
• ✓ What is a narrative essay, and how to write it?
• ✓ What is a descriptive essay, and how to write it?
• ✓ What is an argumentative essay, and how to write it?
• ✓ What is a comparison essay, and how to write it?
• ✓ What is an exemplification essay, and how to write it?
• ✓ What is a cause-effect essay, and how to write it?

Precis and Comprehension

• ✓ Introduction to precis writing
• ✓ Elements of a good precis
• ✓ Requirements of a good precis
• ✓ Putting the titles of a good precis
• ✓ The uses of tenses in precis writing
• ✓ Last ten years solved precis
• ✓ 30 precis writing exercises by Sir Kazim
• ✓ Introduction to comprehension
• ✓ Elements of a comprehension
• ✓ Requirements for a good comprehension
• ✓ The writing process of a comprehension
• ✓ The last ten years solved comprehension
• ✓ 30 comprehension practice by Sir Kazim

How to join the course?

• ✓ Each interested student has to fill out an online form on the Howfiv website, let’s click on the Contact Mentor .
• ✓ Fill in the fields (Fields with stars are mandatory to fill)
• ✓ Select CSS, PMS English Essay & Precis Course in the field of “What do you want to learn”.
• ✓ Select Batch Coaching.
• ✓ Write a 100 to 300 words paragraph on any of the given questions “ Why do I want to learn English ” or “ Why do I want to take CSS, PMS exam(s)? in the message box
• ✓ When done with paragraph writing, submit your form.
• ✓ The purpose of paragraph writing is to judge your level of English.
• ✓ If our e-system finds your paragraph suitable, it will email it to Sir Kazim, telling him where your English writing skills stand.
• ✓ Within 2 days (sometimes 4 to 5 working days), a representative will approach you on the given WhatsApp number.
• ✓ If your writing skills are of intermediate level (F.Sc. level), the admin calls you for complete registration.
• ✓ If selected, the representative will send you the Zoom link and ID for your first Online Class with Sir Kazim.
• ✓ Congratulations! You have stepped into your desired course.
• ✓ Contact Sir Kazim’s assistants on WhatsApp at 0332-6105842 or 0300-6322446 in case of any difficulty or seek more information about Online Courses.

Interested in knowing how Sir Kazim’s students write?

If you are interested in knowing how Sir Kazim’s students give their ideas and thoughts words, let’s explore this section. Here you will find hundreds of articles and solved CSS and PMS past papers question by those students who scored the highest marks in their compulsory and optional subjects because of their writing skills.  Click to Land on CSS Solved Past Papers

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What is CSS?

• Overview: CSS first steps

CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) allows you to create great-looking web pages, but how does it work under the hood? This article explains what CSS is with a simple syntax example and also covers some key terms about the language.

In the Introduction to HTML module, we covered what HTML is and how it is used to mark up documents. These documents will be readable in a web browser. Headings will look larger than regular text, paragraphs break onto a new line and have space between them. Links are colored and underlined to distinguish them from the rest of the text. What you are seeing are the browser's default styles — very basic styles — that the browser applies to HTML to make sure that the page will be basically readable even if no explicit styling is specified by the author of the page.

However, the web would be a boring place if all websites looked like that. Using CSS, you can control exactly how HTML elements look in the browser, presenting your markup using whatever design you like.

For more on browser/default styles, check out the following video:

What is CSS for?

As we have mentioned before, CSS is a language for specifying how documents are presented to users — how they are styled, laid out, etc.

A document is usually a text file structured using a markup language — HTML is the most common markup language, but you may also come across other markup languages such as SVG or XML .

Presenting a document to a user means converting it into a form usable by your audience. Browsers , like Firefox , Chrome , or Edge , are designed to present documents visually, for example, on a computer screen, projector, or printer.

Note: A browser is sometimes called a user agent , which basically means a computer program that represents a person inside a computer system. Browsers are the main type of user agents we think of when talking about CSS, however, they are not the only ones. There are other user agents available, such as those that convert HTML and CSS documents into PDFs to be printed.

CSS can be used for very basic document text styling — for example, for changing the color and size of headings and links. It can be used to create a layout — for example, turning a single column of text into a layout with a main content area and a sidebar for related information. It can even be used for effects such as animation . Have a look at the links in this paragraph for specific examples.

CSS is a rule-based language — you define the rules by specifying groups of styles that should be applied to particular elements or groups of elements on your web page.

For example, you can decide to have the main heading on your page to be shown as large red text. The following code shows a very simple CSS rule that would achieve the styling described above:

• In the above example, the CSS rule opens with a selector . This selects the HTML element that we are going to style. In this case, we are styling level one headings ( h1 ).
• We then have a set of curly braces { } .
• Inside the braces will be one or more declarations , which take the form of property and value pairs. We specify the property ( color in the above example) before the colon, and we specify the value of the property after the colon ( red in this example).
• This example contains two declarations, one for color and the other for font-size . Each pair specifies a property of the element(s) we are selecting ( h1 in this case), then a value that we'd like to give the property.

CSS properties have different allowable values, depending on which property is being specified. In our example, we have the color property, which can take various color values . We also have the font-size property. This property can take various size units as a value.

A CSS stylesheet will contain many such rules, written one after the other.

You will find that you quickly learn some values, whereas others you will need to look up. The individual property pages on MDN give you a quick way to look up properties and their values when you forget or when you want to know what else you can use as a value.

Note: You can find links to all the CSS property pages (along with other CSS features) listed on the MDN CSS reference . Alternatively, you should get used to searching for "mdn css-feature-name " in your favorite search engine whenever you need to find out more information about a CSS feature. For example, try searching for "mdn color" and "mdn font-size"!

CSS modules

As there are so many things that you could style using CSS, the language is broken down into modules . You'll see reference to these modules as you explore MDN. Many of the documentation pages are organized around a particular module. For example, you could take a look at the MDN reference to the Backgrounds and Borders module to find out what its purpose is and the properties and features it contains. In that module, you will also find a link to Specifications that defines the technology (also see the section below).

At this stage, you don't need to worry too much about how CSS is structured; however, it can make it easier to find information if, for example, you are aware that a certain property is likely to be found among other similar things, and is therefore, probably in the same specification.

For a specific example, let's go back to the Backgrounds and Borders module — you might think that it makes logical sense for the background-color and border-color properties to be defined in this module. And you'd be right.

CSS specifications

All web standards technologies (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, etc.) are defined in giant documents called specifications (or "specs"), which are published by standards organizations (such as the W3C , WHATWG , ECMA , or Khronos ) and define precisely how those technologies are supposed to behave.

CSS is no different — it is developed by a group within the W3C called the CSS Working Group . This group is made of representatives of browser vendors and other companies who have an interest in CSS. There are also other people, known as invited experts , who act as independent voices; they are not linked to a member organization.

New CSS features are developed or specified by the CSS Working Group — sometimes because a particular browser is interested in having some capability, other times because web designers and developers are asking for a feature, and sometimes because the Working Group itself has identified a requirement. CSS is constantly developing, with new features becoming available. However, a key thing about CSS is that everyone works very hard to never change things in a way that would break old websites. A website built in 2000, using the limited CSS available then, should still be usable in a browser today!

As a newcomer to CSS, it is likely that you will find the CSS specs overwhelming — they are intended for engineers to use to implement support for the features in user agents, not for web developers to read to understand CSS. Many experienced developers would much rather refer to MDN documentation or other tutorials. Nevertheless, it is worth knowing that these specs exist and understanding the relationship between the CSS you are using, the browser support (see below), and the specs.

Browser support information

After a CSS feature has been specified, then it is only useful for us in developing web pages if one or more browsers have implemented the feature. This means that the code has been written to turn the instruction in our CSS file into something that can be output to the screen. We'll look at this process more in the lesson How CSS works . It is unusual for all browsers to implement a feature at the same time, and so there is usually a gap where you can use some part of CSS in some browsers and not in others. For this reason, being able to check implementation status is useful.

The browser support status is shown on every MDN CSS property page in a table named "Browser compatibility". Consult the information in that table to check if the property can be used on your website. For an example, see the browser compatibility table for the CSS font-family property .

Based on your requirements, you can use the browser compatibility table to check how this property is supported across various browsers, or check if your specific browser and the version you have support the property, or if there are any caveats you should be aware of for the browser and version you are using.

You made it to the end of the article! Now that you have some understanding of what CSS is, let's move on to Getting started with CSS , where you can start to write some CSS yourself.