English Language Writing Skills

By Danso Kwasi Nti Samuel (DAS). Study the complete course source, examine every model and practise alongside Professor Jarvis.

Course printed page 488 PDF page 494 of 505

For tables, matching columns, IPA and original formatting, open the course PDF above.

Common Challenges and How to Overcome Them

Including Too Many Details

It is difficult to decide which details are important. We can do this by:

   ü underlining or highlighting key points.

   ü to asking: “Is this detail necessary to understand the main idea?”

Copying Instead of Paraphrasing (re-stating in own words)

To avoid copying directly from the text we need to:

   ü read and then put the text aside before writing.

   ü reword sentences by changing the structure and using synonyms(nearest in meaning)

Making the Summary Too Short or Too Long

We may write too short summaries that miss important information or too long ones that

include unnecessary details. We must:

   ü Provide clear length guidelines (e.g., 4-6 sentences for a passage, or 1-2 sentences per

      paragraph).

   ü Show examples of both too detailed and concise summaries for comparison.

Examples of Summary Writing

Example 1:

There was a little girl named Anna who loved to paint. Every day after school, she would sit

by the window and paint pictures of the trees and flowers outside. One day, her mother

entered her painting into a contest. Anna won first prize, and her painting was displayed in

a big art gallery. She was very happy.