Producing a Great Piece of Transactional Writing

Only when a student has read an exam question really carefully (see first post in this series) and planned their arguments and counter-arguments (see second post), are they ready to start writing.

An an English tutor, time and time again I meet bright students who have not been shown the importance of preparation before they start to write.

Here's another past paper English Language GCSE transactional writing question - worth 25% of the final grade for most exam boards.

Write a speech for your peer group with the title ‘How to stay safe online’. 

A student has started a response to this task. “We are all using the internet more than ever, but how safe is it? There are dangers out there but there are also ways we can be safe when we are using the internet and interacting with people online."

Continue this speech using your own ideas. 

The focus is on staying safe online, not just about using the internet.  Arguments about freedom and responsibility (for example) need to be planned and balanced for top grades.

When writing up, topic sentences are important for this kind of writing, but a range of sentence types, including a wide range of advanced punctuation like colons and semicolons, will help produce an excellent result.

I have published two ebooks to help students with their writing: The Five Sentence Types Workbook and A Dash of Punctuation, both available on Amazon.

I offer a free 30 minute introductory session if you are interested in online tutoring, and my tutees currently range from Year 5 to a student applying for an Master's degree.