Skills for Life Teaching Resources

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• Reading Entry 1-3
• Writing Entry 1-3
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  3. Skills Development
  4. Other Information
• Writing Levels 1 and 2
• Speaking and Listening Entry 1-3
• Speaking and Listening Levels 1 and 2

Answers and Discussion

 

Look at the discussion of the points raised by the sample narrative/description/letter task. What would you recommend to your students as the most efficient strategies for dealing with this task?

1. What did you do first?
   It's important to read the instructions very carefully, underlining the main points that need to be included. Candidates need to be clear about who they are writing to, why they are writing and what they are going to say.
2. Did you write a rough draft of your answer first, before putting it on the answer sheet?
   Planning what you are going to write is useful but can be very time-consuming. If you are going to advise your students to do it, tell them to make rough notes rather than write out the full message, so that they have enough time to write a complete answer on the answer sheet.
3. What did you have to keep in mind while you were writing?
   It's important for candidates to refer back to the instructions to check that they have included all the content points. They must also remember who they are writing to and what the purpose of the letter is. In this case, Mr Clay is a prospective employer, so the letter shouldn’t sound too informal. After completing the task, candidates should check that all content points have been included and the message has been addressed to the right person.
4. What happens if candidate produces too many or not enough words?
   In Skills for Life Writing papers all tasks include a guideline to candidates about how much they should write. However, this is not to be regarded as a definite instruction – it is there to help candidates rather than as a marking tool. Length of answer is a factor of task achievement and candidates might be penalised for over-long answers, where the extra material is considered to be irrelevant and therefore where a negative effect on the intended audience might be expected. Similarly, a candidate who produces considerably less than the suggested number of words is unlikely to have included all the features of content necessary to achieve the task. All Skills for Life Writing tasks are extensively trialled before they appear on a live paper, and care is taken that tasks do not tend to elicit answers that are significantly longer or shorter than the number of words the candidate is asked to produce.