This module is about writing a new piece for a named reader, using a source you have been given. You choose what to use, reshape it in your own voice, hold a clear position, treat the other side fairly and stay inside what the source supports. It connects the reading skills in reading across viewpoints with the writing skills in audience, purpose and register.
Check the current syllabus on the Cambridge page for the exact task types and assessment arrangements for your year. The skills here are general and apply to whichever directed writing task you meet.
What do you need to know first?
You should be able to read a passage and pick out its main points and viewpoints. The work in reading across viewpoints helps here, along with summary selection and synthesis.
It also helps to know the basic forms: a speech, a letter and an article each speak to the reader differently.
An orienting example
Here is a short original source.
The town council will close the library on Sundays and Mondays from January. It expects to save RM90,000 a year. Saturday is still the busiest day, and a youth group calls the library the only quiet place in the district where students can study.
Task: Write a speech for your classmates asking them to sign a petition against the closure.
A weak answer retells the article in order. A strong answer asks four questions before writing.
- Who is reading? Classmates, so choose details that matter to them: the closure days and the quiet study space.
- What is the information for? It becomes evidence for the petition, in a speaking voice.
- What is my position? Firm but constructive.
- What must I avoid? Adding a survey or number that the source never gave.
That thinking takes a minute and changes the whole answer. The lessons below teach each of these questions as a separate skill.
In what order should you study the lessons?
- Select source material for a stated audience. Start here, because every other choice depends on knowing what to keep.
- Transform information rather than retell it. Once you have the details, put them in your own words and order.
- Develop an appropriate stance from given material. Your reshaped facts need a position to work for.
- Address an opposing point accurately. A firm stance is stronger when it deals fairly with the other side.
- Distinguish invented support from a permitted inference. Finish by checking that your support stays inside the source.
Then attempt the directed writing and source use practice set. The summary selection and paraphrase studio and the writing revision compare view both support this module.
Common traps
- Following the source’s order. Your reader does not need the article’s structure.
- Copying with small changes. Swapping a few words does not change the voice.
- Drifting position. Decide your stance in the plan and check it in every paragraph.
- Straw men. Restate the other side as the source does.
- Invented evidence. A made-up figure weakens trust. Use reasoning marked as inference instead.
How to use the practice set
Write each answer in full before opening the model, and compare by decisions, not wording. If you chose a different detail, ask whether it still fits the audience. The set ends with a routing list that sends each kind of error back to a lesson.
If you want help applying this to your own drafts, see online one-to-one English First Language tuition.