Sample ID: First Battle of Kossovo:

This answer would receive full credit: Fought in the summer of 1389 between the Ottoman Turks and the Serbians, the First Battle of Kossovo was the beginning of the end for an independent Serbia. Although the Ottoman Sultan, Murad I, was killed, the Turkish army triumphed over the Serbs, destroyed the Serbian army, and afterwards executed the Serbian king. Serbia held onto its precarious independence for another seventy years, but never fully recovered from the loss at Kossovo. Serbian poets still sing sad songs about this battle, lost over six hundred years ago.

This answer would receive no credit: This was an important battle and had important consequences for the Kossovans, and that was very important to history. The people of Kossovo are still feeling the effects of this battle, and it affected a many many people on both sides. The problems of the people of Kossovo are still in the news today, so it was important, maybe even more important than the other battles of Kossovo.

Notes: a short-answer essay, or an ID (short for "Identification"), must be substantially correct to merit any credit. To be substantially correct it must offer specific information that refers explicitly to the topic. Further, in an answer that is substantially incorrect, points will not be assigned for a few bits of arguably correct information here and there amid the flotsam and jetsam of an incorrect answer. That is, even if the preposterously bad answer above included a correct date, or mentioned the Turks, it would not receive points because it would still be little more than non-specific information that could refer to any event in history. No curate's egg will receive points; that is, a bad egg is still a bad egg even if parts of it are excellent.