Writing Exam Preparation EAP Activities, Worksheets and Games
In this productive essay conclusions worksheet, students practice writing and revising an essay conclusion based on peer feedback. Students begin by completing a text about essay conclusions with words from a box. Students then read an unfinished essay, without a conclusion, and answer questions about it. Next, students use their answers to write a conclusion for the essay. After that, students exchange their conclusion with a partner and answer questions to help give each other feedback. Finally, students return the conclusion to their partner, who rewrites their conclusion based on the feedback.
In this comprehensive writing exam preparation activity, students practice their editing and revision skills by identifying common writing errors, explaining them, and making corrections. First, students read and underline three errors in each paragraph of an essay, focusing on error types written on the board. Next, in pairs, students compare answers and discuss why each underlined word, phrase or sentence is an error and suggest corrections. Working together, students then compare their identified errors with those in an 'error' column on a worksheet. Following that, students complete the worksheet by identifying the type of error, explaining why it's incorrect, and then correcting it. Afterwards, elicit answers and explanations from the class and write the corrections on the board. Finally, pairs discuss why editing and revision skills are important for writing essays and then give feedback to the class on their answers.
In this collaborative outlining activity, students generate, organise and expand on ideas for answering essay questions and then present their developed outlines. In the activity, groups rotate around stations, building essay outlines together. At each station, the first group reads the essay question, chooses a stance or focus and writes it clearly in the appropriate box. After three minutes, the groups rotate to the next station. At the new stations, groups read what is already written and add new ideas or expand on existing ones. Groups can work on the sections in any order and write in multiple sections during each turn, building on weaker sections for a more balanced response. The process continues until each group has visited every station. Groups then return to their original station, review the added ideas and prepare to present them to the class using a framework. Next, each group presents their outline to the class. Afterwards, groups discuss one idea from another group’s work they found useful and how they might use it.
In this punctuation errors worksheet, students learn to identify and correct common punctuation errors to improve their ability to construct grammatically correct sentences. First, students match each type of punctuation error to its explanation. Students then read sentences and write the punctuation errors they contain. Next, students read about how to avoid the most common writing exam punctuation errors. After that, students rewrite sentences, applying the correct punctuation. Students then move on to read an extract from a student's writing exam paper, identify the errors, and rewrite the paragraph so that the punctuation is correct. Following that, students choose a topic and write a short paragraph that has one introductory phrase, a compound sentence, a complex sentence, and a relative clause to practice the different comma rules. Finally, students swap worksheets with a partner and review their paragraph for punctuation errors, giving feedback and suggesting improvements.
In this free writing exam preparation game, students review key writing concepts by answering quiz questions in different categories. This Jeopardy-style game covers quiz questions on five writing categories with questions of varying difficulty levels. Start by choosing a square to begin the game, e.g. essay structure 100. Read the quiz question to the class. The first student to put up their hand and give the correct answer wins that square for their team. Write the winning team's name in the square. If a student gives an incorrect answer, their team is out of the round and can only answer again if all the other teams give a wrong answer. The winning team then chooses the next square, and all the teams race to answer as before. The team with the most points at the end of the game wins.
This useful writing exam preparation activity introduces students to four common writing exam task types, familiarising them with their purpose and general structure. First, in pairs, students turn over one task card representing a common writing task type (explaining a process, opinion essay, problem-solution essay, or summarising data). Students then complete the purpose, introduction, body and conclusion on the card with four corresponding task instruction strips, writing the sentences on the card. When a pair completes a task card, they show it to you. If the answers are correct, they move on to the next task card. If not, students go back and revise their mistakes accordingly. The activity continues until all the task cards are completed with the correct instructions. After that, students reflect on the activity by discussing three task-related questions in their pairs. Finally, pairs share their responses with the class. As an extension, students choose one of the task types and write a plan in response to the task instructions.
In this engaging writing exam preparation activity, students organise an essay writing process into timed segments and then collaboratively plan and write the essay. First, in groups, students allocate specific times to each stage of the writing process, explaining their reasoning and assigning a group member to write each stage of the essay. The times should total 45 minutes. Next, groups choose an essay question and have 45 minutes to write the essay, following their proposed timing structure and ensuring smooth transitions between paragraphs. When the students have finished, they discuss reflection questions and give feedback on their time management strategy to the class. Finally, elicit the timings and key considerations at each stage of the writing process from the class and give the suggested answers.
