With English paper 3 coming up you might be stressing about creating writing. 😳😳😳

So let's talk about some things you can do 🔥now🔥to improve your creative writing marks in an exam. 📈📈📈

This is what an exceptional essay includes, according to the marking guidelines for English HL paper 3 2020:

1. ✅ Outstanding/Striking response beyond normal expectations
2. ✅ Intelligent, thought-provoking and mature ideas
3. ✅ Exceptionally well organised and coherent, including introduction, body and conclusion

What does this mean for you? It means you need to make sure:

1. You use impressive vocabulary 🤩🤩🤩

This means that you need to be using ✨impressive✨ words correctly. Correctly is key though, as using big words incorrectly looks really bad 😬😬😬- and shows your marker that you don't actually understand what you are talking about. 🤦🏽🤦🏽🤦🏽

➡️➡️➡️ If you need help defining a word we can always help you on WhatsApp on +2760 070 3213. 📱📱📱

Here are some words to consider using:

• uncanny: surpassing the ordinary or normal, out of the ordinary
• tenacious: stubbornly, unyielding
  
• ruthless: without mercy or pity
  
• vapid: lacking significance or liveliness
  
• relentless: never-ceasing
  
• nostalgic: longing for the past or for familiar things
  
• capricious: given to sudden and unaccountable changes of mood or behaviour
  
• facetious: making light of serious issues
  
• ambiguous: unclear or inexact
  

And so many more! Dropping words like these into your writing will show that you have spent time thinking about language and how to 🎨express yourself🎨.

2. Your essay is structured well 🏆🏆🏆

For creative writing this means have a clear beginning, middle and end. 🙋🏽‍♀️🙋🏽‍♀️🙋🏽‍♀️

Ways that you can do this easily are:

1. Using lots of paragraphs. Every page you write should have 4-5 paragraphs. 🌟🌟🌟
2. Keeping your sentences short! Long sentences are really exhausting for your marker to read. And you want your marker to like you - not find you exhausting! 💫💫💫
3. Using clear markers of the beginning, middle and end. 🌙🌙🌙
   💚This means using phrases like "at first" or "in the beginning" to indicate the beginning.💚
   🧡Then using phrases like "after this", "continuing", or "once this had happened" to indicate the middle.🧡
   ❤️And finally, using phrases like "finally" (see what I did there?), "after all that" or "once all had been said and done" to show that the end has been reached.❤️

3. Your essay shows clarity of thought and ideas 💭💭💭

This is one of the hardest things to do, and the best way to do it is by ✨planning✨. My top tip is to look through some past papers and see what the essay questions are over a few years. Then write a practice essay that could work as an answer to a few of those essay questions across different years. 📝📝📝

Example 👇🏾👇🏾👇🏾

If doing this seems daunting, let's do an example together. Here are some essay questions from past papers:

• That day, I told myself that sticks in a bundle are unbreakable (English HL Paper 3 2017)
• 'It is only impossible until it is done.' (English HL Paper 3 2018)
• 'No bird soars too high if he soars with his own wings.' (English Hl Paper 3 2019)
• Impossible possibilities (English Hl Paper 3 2020)

All of these would allow you to write an essay about ambition, struggle, and overcoming difficulties. 🏃🏿🏃🏿🏃🏿

You could 🖊️write🖊️, 📝edit📝 and 🌟perfect🌟 and essay about a time you dealt with a really difficult situation. Then, in the last paragraph you could end the essay with a sentence like this 👇🏾👇🏾👇🏾

• That day was the day I learnt that sticks in a bundle are unbreakable - and if we stick together we will always win.
• That day was the day I learnt that it is only impossible until it is done - and I can do anything I set my mind to.
• And that day was the day I learnt that the old proverb 'No bird soars too high if he soars with his own wings' is still true to this day.
• That day was the day I learnt that there are no impossible possibilities - I can do anything I set my mind to.

See how you could write exactly the same essay for all four questions, but make it apply to each question just by changing the last sentence? 🙋🏽‍♀️🙋🏽‍♀️🙋🏽‍♀️

Practice this a few times yourself, and you'll see how easy it can be. Creative writing for exams doesn't have to be impossible, I promise! ❤️❤️❤️

And then edit and practice! 📝📝📝

Once you have done this make sure the essay you practiced is edited is edited, with lots of impressive vocab and good structure like we talked about before. 🖊️🖊️🖊️

Then, practice writing the essay and adapting it to different essay questions from past papers some more. 📚📚📚

This way, when you write you exam you can reuse the essay you were practicing, and just adapt it to the questions you get on the day - like you did with the past papers when practicing! 🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽 And of course we can help you download past papers on WhatsApp if you message +2760 070 3213. ❤️❤️❤️

Sending hugs and strength. You got this. 💛🤖

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