WRITING: How to do a good writing exercise

Before you start writing, read the topic and the points you have to mention carefully and then make an outline with the ideas that come to your mind. Do not start your writing directly without doing an outline previously, because you can find yourself trying to change the order of paragraphs by using arrows or similar symbols that teachers normally hate. Once you have made your ideas brainstorming,  put those ideas in order of importance and once you have the outline ready, you can start writing following a structure like this one:

1. Paragraph 1: Introduction:

•          Topic
•          Summary of main points
•         Thesis statement

2. Paragraph 2: most important idea or in favour idea (if it is an argumentative writing)

3. Paragraphs 3-4: second most important idea or contrasting idea.

Maybe, we will need another paragraph to express a new idea if we have a third point to state.

4. Conclusion: a summary of what we have mentioned before or the ending for a narrative writing.

Ø  Try to be coherent. If you are writing about an event in the past, do not use verbs in future, for instance, and  try not to mix people's names and their pronouns.

Ø  Use connectors to join sentences or to introduce a new paragraph: and, but, so… (joining connectors); First of all, Secondly, Furthermore, Moreover, However, Nevertheless,  Finally… (introducing a new paragraph or adding or contrasting connectors).  There is a wide variety of connectors that you can use to avoid repetitions.

In the following video, you will see what teachers take into account when correcting and marking a writing exam.

The link is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wo9adagcwkA