Key Idea: Writing skills are five habits for Paper 1: plan, choose the text type, hold the register, link your ideas, and check for common errors.
Planning your answer
- Choose & decode — Take two minutes. Decode the text type, audience and register.
- Brainstorm — Find three points.
- Order — Put them into the structure of the text type.
- Note — Key words and connectors. Five short lines, no full sentences.
| Family | Text types |
|---|---|
| Personal | blog, journal intime, courriel |
| Professional | lettre formelle, rapport, proposition |
| Media | article, critique, interview, discours, dépliant |
| Reader | Register |
|---|---|
| A friend | Informal: tu, «Salut !», «Bises» |
| A company or a teacher | Formal: vous, «Madame, Monsieur», «Cordialement» |
| A blog audience | Semi-formal |
| Job | Connectors |
|---|---|
| Addition | de plus, aussi, en outre |
| Contrast | cependant, pourtant, mais |
| Cause | parce que, car, puisque |
| Consequence | donc, c'est pourquoi, par conséquent |
| Sequence | d'abord, ensuite, enfin, en conclusion |
| Example | par exemple, en effet |
| Mistake | Criterion |
|---|---|
| Wrong or mixed register (tu/vous) | C |
| Ignoring the text type you were told to write | C |
| Too short (under 250 words) | B |
| Ideas listed but not developed | B |
| Tense and agreement slips | A |
In the last five minutes, check in this order: words, register, conventions, verbs, ideas.
You write a «rapport». Which family is it? Professional, with the formal letter and the proposal.
Your email starts «Madame, Monsieur» and ends «Bises». What is wrong? The greeting is formal but the sign-off is informal. Keep one register all through.
Your text lists five ideas but explains none. Which criterion suffers? B, Message: each idea needs a reason or an example.
How do you build a paragraph? Topic, then develop it, give an example, and end with a link to the next one.
Can «Car…» start a sentence on its own? No. It joins a cause inside a sentence.