Select any one of the following. (Do not spend more than 20 minutes on this question.)
Your grandmother has taught you a special skill. Write a letter thanking her. Explain how you will use that skill and why it is important to you.
Topic: Informal letter (letter of thanks)
Answer
MODEL ANSWER
14, Lake View Road Kolkata 700029
12 March 2025
Dear Thamma,
I have been meaning to write this letter since the day I got home, and I am only sorry it has taken me three weeks.
Thank you for teaching me to make your tomato chutney. I know you thought I was humouring you when I asked, and I know you noticed that I burnt the first batch and blamed the gas. But I have made it four times since, and on Sunday Ma tasted it and went very quiet and said it was almost yours.
I am going to keep making it. I have written the whole method out in the back of my chemistry notebook, which Baba says is where it belongs, and I have promised my friends a jar each after the boards. When I go to college I intend to take the recipe with me, so that something of home travels too.
It matters to me more than the chutney does. You learnt it from your mother in a kitchen I have never seen, in a town that is no longer in this country, and now I have it. Nothing else I own has come that far.
Do take care of your knee, and please do not climb on the stool to reach the top shelf. Ask someone.
With much love, Ria
WHAT THE EXAMINER CHECKS FIRST
This is an INFORMAL letter, so the format differs from a formal one in three specific ways: the receiver’s address is NOT written there is NO subject line the close is "With love", "Yours affectionately" or similar — never "Yours faithfully" Writing a formal-letter format here is the commonest way to lose the two format marks outright.
The question sets THREE content requirements, and all three must be visible:
- thank her for the skill (name the skill specifically)
- explain HOW you will use it
- explain WHY it is important to you
Give each its own paragraph. A letter that only says thank you earns perhaps half the content marks.
Tone is assessed. An informal letter to a grandmother should sound like one — particular, affectionate, a little conversational. Generic phrasing ("you have always been a great inspiration to me") reads as a template and scores lower than one concrete memory.
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.