Paper 1 Q5 - Technical Accuracy
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Focus: Description / Narrative Marks: 40 Time: 45 mins
Accuracy of spelling
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Lots of students worry about their spelling. It doesn't have to be perfect but do your best to learn words that you know you have trouble with. Spelling is only one part of technical accuracy and you can still do well even if your spelling is poor.
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Variety of punctuation
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This is a weak area for most students. Your punctuation doesn't have to be complex. The examiner just wants to see a variety. Try using dashes and brackets as an easy way to add some variety into your writing, along with commas, question marks, exclamation marks and ellipsis. Don't be afraid of the semi-colon. Think of it as a semi-full stop. If you have two sentences that are closely related, change your full stop to a semi-colon.
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Accuracy of grammar
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Most students do well in this area and can write sentences that have correct word order, tense, plurals etc. Common mistakes include:
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- 'them' instead of 'those' e.g. I don't like them people who tell lies, should read I don't like those people who tell lies.
- wanna/gonna instead of want to/going to e.g. I wanna work with children should read I want to work with children.
- confusing have/has e.g. The people has to help each other should read The people have to help each other.
- could/should/would of instead of have e.g. She could of studied harder should read You could have studied harder.
- switching tenses e.g. I get up and looked out the window.
- you're/your e.g. You're studying hard / Your homework is excellent
- there/they're/their e.g. The book is over there / They're working really hard / It is their responsibility.
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Variety of sentences
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Make sure you include different sentence lengths, including minor (one word) sentences and also lists. A good trick is to use different types of words as the first word in your sentence, e.g. an adverb (-ly word), a verb (-ing word), a noun etc. This will automatically enhance your writing.
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​Top Tips!
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- Keep a list of words you regularly misspell and learn them.
- Variety is the key!
- Have 5 or 6 negative and positive sophisticated words to use in any description/narrative writing.
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