Paper 1

Writing
O Level
1123 ENGLISH LANGUAGE

Beaconhouse Defence Campus
English Department
Writing (Paper 1)

• Section 1
Directed Writing

• Section 2
Creative writing
 Section 1

Directed writing
 Directed writing

•  Marks: 30

• Word Limit: 200­ 300 words

• Time: 30­ 45 min
 Directed Writing
Types of function/ Situational writing:

• Letters (formal & informal)
• Reports (informative, investigative)
• Accounts 
• News report
• Magazine Articles
• Speeches (Persuasive & Informative)
• Leaflets
 Directed Writing

• Only one situation is set. 

• Read the question carefully.

• Do not ignore any details and do not 
change important facts in the situation.
• Elaborate all the content points provided 
as each point is of 5 marks.
Directed Writing
 Directed Writing
Consider the following questions:

Audience (Who am I writing for?)
public, principal, teacher, friend, company manager, town council,
police etc


Purpose (Why am I writing this?)
to explain, inform. instruct, convince and persuade, sell, give an
account of something I witnessed, to complain about something, etc


Format (How is this piece to be written?)
report, letter, account, article. statement, review. speech etc


Language (What is the tone I should use?)
formal, informal, persuasive, suggestive, informative, argumentative etc
 Directed Writing

 Five paragraphs should be formed.

Introduction (reiterate the situation)

Body (elaborate the three content points in

separate paragraphs)
Conclusion
Leave a line after each paragraph.
Paragraphs should all start from the left.
 Directed Writing
• Students should collect and read the samples 
of each type of function writing.
• Gather helpful phrases (opening and closing 
phrases; starting of new paragraphs etc.).
• Practise such type of writing.

• Create their own situational writing 
questions.
 Formal Letter
Helpful Phrases
Type of Letters Opening Closing
Complaint  I am a resident of the  I seriously hope that 
Gulshan­e­ Iqbal and  you would look into 
I am writing in to  the complaints that I 
complain about... have raised and 
remedy the situation 
as soon as possible.

Thank you.
 Invitation On behalf of the  We sincerely hope 
school, we would like  that you will accept 
to invite you to our  our invitation and we 
Annual Speech and  look forward to your 
Prize Giving Day to  presence on that day.
be held on March 15th 
in the school hall. Thank you.
 Marking Scheme
• Marks: 30
Task Fulfillment (Use Band Descriptor): 15 marks
Language (Use Band Descriptor)            : 15 marks

• Please indicate the TF mark first at the end of the 
essay, then language marks e.g. 10 + 12 = 22/ 30

• Candidates who address only two points must be in 
Band 3 or below for TF. 
Language

• Variety of Sentence Structures

• Appropriate Tenses

• Wide Vocabulary

• Accurate Punctuation

• Correct Spellings

• Linked Paragraphs
Task fulfillment
• Inclusion and elaboration of three content points

• Appropriate format
• Suitable tone and register

• Apt beginning and ending

• Given information used to justify personal opinion
• A clear understanding of the task and content
 Section 2

Creative writing
 Creative writing

•  Marks: 30

• Word Limit: 350­ 500words

• Time: 45min – 1 hour
 Creative writing
• Types of Essay

Descriptive
Narrative

Argumentative

Discursive
Abstract / one word / themeless

Personal Opinion
 Creative Writing

 Five topics are set.

 Candidates will choose any one of the five topics.
 They should read the questions carefully and choose the
topic which gives them the best chance of writing an
essay of the required length.
 It is advisable to make a plan.
 Planning or any rough work should be crossed out with a
pencil.
 Creative writing
• Minimum 6 and maximum 10 paragraphs should be 
formed.

• Introduction: The essay must have a good beginning to 
capture the attention of the reader.

• Body: The middle section of the essay should convey the 
main steps in the story or the details of the description or 
the main points of the argument.
 Creative writing
• Conclusion: Finally, the essay should have a strong 
ending. It may provide the conclusion to an argument, 
or it may move to the general view after some precise 
description of details, or it may provide the climax or 
round off a story.

• Use transitions to connect the points and paragraphs.
 Marking Scheme
• The 'best fit' principle is applied, as in the following 
table. 

• Emphasis is on quality of Language; comments on 
Content used to adjust mark within 8 Bands.
Creative writing
Language

• Variety of Sentence Structures

• Appropriate Tenses

• Wide Vocabulary

• Accurate Punctuation

• Correct Spellings

• Linked Paragraphs
Content
• Compositions should be interesting and 
consistently relevant to the theme.
• Discursive and argumentative essays are well 
developed, logical, based on facts and figures. 
• Descriptive essays have well­developed imagery 
(mental picture). 
• Narratives are complex, sophisticated and may 
contain devices such as flashbacks.
Reference:
www.cie.org.uk