In the minds of ESL exam candidates, e ssay writing is one of the most daunting tasks they are required to complete, regardless of the level of the exam, the administering body or the ease with which they themselves use the language. The same applies to students who are asked to write an essay by their teachers at school.  In the previous sample essays posted on the blog, the main point I stress is the need to become acquainted with this form of writing (as opposed to writing a letter, review or report, for instance), to get a feel of what authorial voice is and how to organize and progressively express the arguments you wish to make in a coherent manner.  Unfortunately, the best way to prepare for exam writing or learn how to write good essays for school is to read as many essays from as many sources as possible, then write as

This is the fifth sample article candidates of the ECPE examination (Examination for the Certificate of Proficiency in English of the University of Michigan) My first post to deal with articles , explains what needs to be present in this type of piece of writing. As stated, examiners are looking for articles that elaborate on ideas and have solid arguments; are well organized; make use of a wide lexical and grammatical range; have an original ring to them (in other words, readers are able to distinguish the author's unique "voice").   Before reading, take a look at the following post if you haven't already done so. It will help you focus on the vital aspects you need to be aware of while reading the article and what you should make sure to use when you write your own.     The question appeared in Practice Tests for the ECPE Book 1 (revised 2021 version) and is accompanied by the following three writing prompts:  

This is the fourth sample article that conforms to the writing section requirements of the ECPE (Examination for the Certificate of Proficiency in English) of the University of Michigan.  My first post to deal with articles , explains what needs to be present in the piece of writing candidates compose. Examiners are looking for articles that elaborate on ideas and have solid arguments; are well organized; make use of a wide lexical and grammatical range; have an original ring to them (in other words,

This is the third sample article that conforms to the writing section requirements of the ECPE (Examination for the Certificate of Proficiency in English) of the University of Michigan.  Reading a variety of articles will help candidates and ESL students acquire a better understanding of what such types of writing involve. As mentioned in the first post to deal with articles , there are a number of points candidates need to bring to the table when it comes to writing. The main ones are: argumentation organization of paragraphs development of one's reasoning wide range of grammatical structures  lexical range  authorial voice Creating a solid piece of writing that will combine all these points requires a lot of hours spent reading

T he writing section of the ECPE ( Examination for the Certificate of Proficiency in English), administered by the University of Michigan, gives a choice between two topics.   In contrast with the previous post dealing with the ECPE writing section, this one offers a sample essay not article on the topic of online classes. To access the article for the same question, click on the image below.  

This is the fourth sample report (Task 1) which follows IELTS guidelines for the Writing section of the Academic Module.  This task does not refer to a graph or table, but deals with a diagram or map. Candidates in this case need to describe a process.  The diagrams in this post refer to the changes the town of Langley underwent by presenting an image of the town in 1910 and a second one in 1950. The sample written is much longer than what a candidate would have time to draft (over 300 words), but the reason for this is to give candidates more words to underline and add to their list of phrases to use in such types of writing tasks.   First, make sure to have read my post 

In the first article in this series of posts, Essay Writing: The Overall Organization of an Essay , I pointed out what the general layout of an academic essay should look like. Today, we're going to see how the first paragraph of such an essay should be organized. By way of reminder, an entirely different organization is possible, but for the sake of helping exam takers sitting timed EFL (English as a foreign language and not the English Football League!) examinations, I stick to one particular style so that test-takers can focus on one kind of layout which should save time. Note also that I'm writing about academic essays and not letters or emails, reports, proposals, newspaper or magazine articles, or narratives. Those varieties of written work have their own traits and therefore need to be discussed in separate blog posts (which I hope to eventually address at some later time). But for now, let's get back to our academic essay introduction.