Writing Tips

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Tip #1

Speech is when you put something into “speech marks” and it shows that someone is
saying something.
I see this kind of writing when children start preparations for their selective school or
scholarship test.  In fact, sometimes I read whole stories that are practically written in
speech.

Unfortunately, using speech marks doesn’t help you get better scores.

It’s bad for written expression, especially the hugely competitive selective school /
scholarship test.

Here’s why.

Speech in writing is used to tell us – for example, telling us if someone is happy.  The
thing is that we can instead show that someone is happy without speech.

When we write without speech, the writing sounds much better.  Here’s the proof:

With Speech: Without Speech:

My mum asked “Why don’t you play with The toy lay motionless and discarded on
your toy anymore?” and I said “I don’t like the ground while on the other side of the
it anymore” room, my mother gazed at it fondly,
reminiscing of the times when I used to
play with it and rambunctious laughter
echoed throughout the house.

See how in the “without speech” area, the writing has more “feel” to it (and it’s longer). 
You can sense and understand how the mother and child are feeling.  Words like
“discarded” and “reminiscing” add to a sense of something that is lost and
“rambunctious laughter” reminds you of the time when the toy once made this child
happy.

In the section “with speech”, you don’t get this atmosphere at all.

When speech is used, it’s sometimes the ‘easy’ way out. When we get rid of speech and
replace it with a sentence that shows what’s happening and creates atmosphere, what
we end up with is often something that’s higher calibre.

Here’s another example.

“Mum, I really want to go to the movies with my friends tonight”.

In the sentence above, a child is telling his mother that he really wants to go to the
movies. But do we really get a sense of how much this child wants to go to the movies?

Not really. So… how else can this be written? How about…

My stomach churned as she scanned through the movie’s poster. I was so close now to
gobbling down overflowing popcorn while sitting on the edge of my seat watching a
horror film – all that was now needed was to hang in there for her decision.

You can see that the second part doesn’t tell us that the child “wants to go to the movies
with my friends tonight” but instead shows us that. We know that he is super nervous
and really looking forward to it.

Replacing your speech with a ‘showing’ sentence in your test is something that would
stand out in the written expression section of a selective school and scholarship exam.

And you want your child’s writing to stand out (in a good way) in the exam because you
want to ace this part.
Atmosphere and creating a tone is the key difference between a written expression that
gives your child an A+ score VERSUS written expression that doesn’t make the cut (you
don’t get a selective school or scholarship offer).

And it’s not just for exams – publishers (people who make books) have rules about the
number of times quoted speech is used.  In a 80,000 word manuscript (draft book copy),
there may be only one set of quoted speech!

You child will be writing around 250 words in their exam so using zero or one set of
direct speech is more than enough.
So today’s writing test tip for A+ scores is – Avoid the use of speech.

Tip #2

If you’re doing another selective school or scholarship test, chances are you’ll have one
written expression test and if may be creative writing, discussion writing or
argumentative writing.

To help you do better and not lose out on marks for the writing component of the test –
here are three easy mistakes that you can try to avoid in the real exam (these are
mistakes that I see a lot of during preparation!):

Mistake #1 – Avoid Telling the Story, but instead Show!

The A+ scorers ‘show’ in their story, they hardly ‘tell’. For example, “Xiao went to the
beach to meet Bruce” is a telling sentence. A showing sentence could be “Twitching his
fingers and twiddling his thumbs, Xiao shuffled through the burning sand towards
Bruce, who was waiting eagerly for him at the water’s edge”. The difference? The
‘feeling’ aka tone or atmosphere. With the ‘showing’ sentence, not only do you know
that Xiao met Bruce, but… he was nervous. You could pretty much picture Xiao meeting
Bruce in your head, but with the ‘telling’ sentence, you don’t get any of that. Want to
score well in your creative writing and stand out from the rest? Then avoid telling and
learn how to show!

Mistake #2 – Don’t Misinterpret the Question.

This is a common problem in persuasive writing / argumentative writing. Let’s say that
a question that asks you to write an argumentative writing piece on “Global laws should
be in place to prevent whaling”. Most often a student would then write arguments on
why “Whaling is bad”. But…these are two different things. The first is whether or not a
global law is the right thing to address whaling, and the second thing is whether or not
whaling is a bad practice.
Our mind often links up law with doing the right thing and so most people thing ahh,
this is asking me about to write about whaling being bad’. Wrong! it’s asking you to
write about a global law. Even if you’ve written a fantastic piece, if you’ve written it on
the ‘wrong’ topic due to misinterpreting the question – it’s the surefire way to lose
marks!

Mistake #3 – Avoid too many Events and/or Activities in A Single Paragraph.

Have you ever ordered a coffee? Well… imagine if the person making your coffee
decided you might enjoy a hybrid instead like a coffee that includes a green smoothie,
ice cubes and to top it off, ice cream and a marshmallow. It would be horrid (although,
consumed individually, those things would be ok).
The result is similar when students put too many events/activities in one paragraph. It’s
confusing and the quality of what’s expected goes down. The paragraph then becomes
just a concoction of a number of different things, but it’s not one or another. Sometimes,
a coffee should just be a coffee. And a paragraph should just contain one main event
that’s build upon and developed.