About the ged writing exam10 docx

the same paragraph, revised to show variety in sentence

structure:

She is a teacher and lives on a ranch in Montana

with her cat and dog. Because she has family in

California, she travels there frequently.

Notice how much more interesting this paragraph is

now. The seven sentences have been combined into two,

and only one sentence starts with she. Many of the short

sentences have been turned into modifiers that make for

more varied sentence patterns.

Sentence structure and punctuation can also be used

to manipulate emphasis. The best place to put sentence

elements that you want to emphasize is at the end (the

“save the best for last” approach). What comes last is

what lingers longest in the readers’ ears.

He is tall, dark, and handsome. [The emphasis is

on handsome. If tall is the most important char￾acteristic, then that should come last.]

She is smart, reliable, and experienced. [The

emphasis is on experienced; if smart is the most

important characteristic, then that should be

last in the list.]

You can also use an em dash to set off part of a sen￾tence for emphasis:

He is tall, dark, handsome—and married.

Here, the stress on the last element is heightened by

the dash, which emphasizes the sense of disappointment

in the sentence.

Don’t Repeat

Repeat Yourself

On the sentence level, in general, less is more.

The fewer words you use to get your point

across, the better. Redundancy is the unneces￾sary repetition of ideas. Wordiness is the use of

several words when a few can express the

same idea more clearly and concisely. Avoid

both of these as you write your essay.

Wordiness and redundancy typically result

from three causes:

➧ The use of unnecessary words or phrases

Redundant: Turn left at the green-colored

house.

Correct: Turn left at the green house.

➧ Unnecessary repetition of nouns or

pronouns

Redundant: Riva she couldn’t believe her

ears.

Correct: Riva couldn’t believe her ears.

➧ The use of wordy phrases instead of

adverbs

Wordy: She spoke in a very convincing

manner.

Concise: She spoke very convincingly.

Don’t skimp on details, but try not to waste

words.

Step 6: Proofread Carefully

In the three-step writing process, the third step is to

revise and edit. What exactly is the difference between

revising and editing, anyway?

To revise means to carefully read over your essay and

make changes to improve it. Revising focuses on improv￾ing the content (what you say) and style (how you say it).

In other words, when you revise, you concentrate on the

“big picture”: your ideas and how you organize and pres￾ent them in your essay. Editing, on the other hand, deals

with grammar (correct sentences), mechanics (correct

spelling, capitalization, and punctuation), and usage

(correct use of words and idioms).

Editing is very important; your writing should be as

clear and correct as possible. But as a general rule, it

doesn’t make much sense to carefully proofread each

sentence, only to realize that you need to rewrite several

paragraphs.

However—and this is a big “however”—the guide￾lines are a little different on a timed essay exam, espe￾cially when the time is so short. Because your time is so

limited, revising should actually take place before you

write, while you are outlining your essay. As you outline,

–WRITING AN EFFECTIVE ESSAY–

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