Imrpove Writing & Paper 1

The Basics about Paper 1

• Paper 1 asks students to produce a written commentary on one of two unseen texts within one and a half hour.
• Pasages for analysis may be complete pieces of writing or extracts from larger works. There is also the possibility of commenting on a visual text or extract from a longer piece. Possible text-types for analysis include: advertisements, opinion columns, brochures, extracts from memoirs, or travel writing.
• Each individual text is presented with two guiding questions.
• The official Paper 1 counts for 25% of the final grade. It is assessed externally.

8 Ways to improve your writing"

Clauses at the beginning of a sentence: good idea, but avoid really long ones. 
There is nothing more boring than a series of sentences that all start with the subject of the sentence

Avoid 'it' as the subject of a sentence. 
Sentences that start with 'it' or dummy subjects, such as 'there is...' or 'there are...', are quite weak.

Use the right verb tense. 
This may come more naturally for native speakers of English. Nevertheless, many people make mistakes in the verb tense that they use. Be sure to know when to use each tense, such as the present simple, the present perfect, etc.

Use (relative) clauses. 
Using clauses in general is a good idea, as we saw in the first tip. Using relative clauses, which expand on ideas further (like this one), are also a good idea. Relative clauses make use of words such as 'which', 'who' and 'where'

Watch out for wordy sentences. 
It is good to read and reread your own work. Often times during self-evaluation, you see sentences that are not clear or 'run on'. Wordy sentences can be cleaned up with punctuation and parallel constructions (Tip 7).
Instead of: "If everyone in the building were to just clean up their own garbage and  if they  just sorted it properly then the recycle man wouldn't have to go through everything, then we wouldn't have to pay extra fees for this service."

Never start a sentence with 'But'. 
Although you may see sentences that start with 'But' in other works, you should avoid starting sentences with it for academic purposes.

Use parallelisms. 
Parallelisms are sentences or phrases that contain parallel syntactical structures. These usually contain lists of noun phrases or clauses with similar structure. For example: "I decided not to (1) use PowerPoint, (2) read notecards or (3) memorize a script." Notice how ideas 1-3 all contain a verb and an object. They all line up nicely in parallel.

Use active verbs.
In persuasive and academic writing and speaking, active verbs sound much stronger than passive verbs. Passive verb phrases use the verb 'to be' and the past participle of another verb. For example "The house was built by me." The active form of this phrase would be: "I built the house."