Your friend has not fared well in the recent examinations. Write a letter to him / her expressing your concern. Give him / her some advice as to how to score better marks and offer to help him / her to improve his / her performance.

MODEL ANSWER

55, Diamond Avenue Kanpur 208001

14 March 2019

Dear Sumegha,

Your letter came yesterday and I have been thinking about it since. I am sorry about the results, and I am sorrier about the tone of what you wrote — you sounded as though you had decided something about yourself, and I do not think one bad term entitles you to.

Let me say the obvious thing first. This is a school examination in February. It is not a verdict.

Now the useful part. You told me last year that you study by reading chapters over and over, and I think that is most of the problem. Reading feels like work and produces almost nothing, because you recognise the page and mistake recognition for knowing it. Close the book and write down what you remember on a blank sheet. It is unpleasant and it works, and you will find out in ten minutes what three hours of reading never tells you.

Two more things. Do past papers under a clock, because half of what the examination tests is speed, and nobody practises speed. And go to your teachers with specific questions rather than general despair — "I do not understand electrolysis" gets you an answer, "I am weak in Chemistry" does not.

Here is what I can do. I will send you my Physics notes, which are better organised than my Physics. We can talk on the phone every Sunday evening and I will set you five questions each week and mark them honestly, which means unkindly. And if your parents agree, come and stay for a week in the summer and we will work through the chapters you have given up on.

Write back. And stop reading the same chapter.

Yours lovingly, Ritika

WHAT THIS QUESTION SPECIFICALLY REQUIRES

THREE tasks, and all three must be visible:

1. EXPRESS YOUR CONCERN
2. GIVE ADVICE on how to score better marks
3. OFFER TO HELP — concretely

The third is the one most often reduced to "I will help you if you need anything", which earns almost nothing. Name what you will actually do: send notes, call weekly, set questions, invite her to stay.

FORMAT: an INFORMAL letter — no receiver’s address, no subject line, close with "Yours lovingly" or "Yours affectionately".

THE ADVICE SHOULD BE SPECIFIC, and this is what separates a strong answer. "Work hard and be regular" is worth nothing; naming a method — close the book and write from memory, do past papers under a clock, ask precise questions — is worth a great deal.

TONE: warm but not pitying. A letter that spends 150 words consoling and 20 advising has the proportions wrong, and the question asks for advice and help, not sympathy alone. FORMAT AND MARKS DIVISION: see the Formal Letter and Informal Letter references in the Writing Formats & Marking (Reference) chapter.

USE THIS AS A MODEL, NOT AS AN ANSWER TO MEMORISE. The question asks for an ORIGINAL composition, and every year examiners identify scripts reproduced from guide books; a memorised answer can be penalised for plagiarism and will in any case read as borrowed. Study this piece for its STRUCTURE — how it opens, how the paragraphs are ordered, where the required tasks are answered, how it ends — and then write your own, about your own school, your own family, your own town. Your own specific detail is worth more marks than anyone else’s polished sentence.