One idea per paragraph, and evidence that fits it

The shape of a paragraph that works

A paragraph makes one point. The first sentence says what the point is, in your own words. Then comes something that shows it - a detail, an example, a short quotation. Then a sentence saying what that shows. Then, if the task needs it, a sentence linking back to the question.

Four sentences, and every one of them has a job. If you cannot say what job a sentence is doing, it is probably the sentence to cut, and cutting it makes the paragraph better rather than shorter.

The most common problem is not that a paragraph is too short. It is that it contains three points, each with no evidence, because each new idea arrived before the last one had been finished.

• Sentence one - the point, in your own words.
• Sentence two - the evidence: an example, a detail, a short quote.
• Sentence three - what the evidence shows.
• Sentence four - back to what you were asked.

Make the first sentence do the work

The first sentence should be something somebody could disagree with. The advertisement uses colour is not a point; the advertisement uses colour to make the product look safe rather than exciting is a point, because it says what the colour is doing.

Write it without naming the technique. If you can say what is going on in ordinary words, you understand it; the technical word can go in afterwards and it will be in the right place.

And write it about the thing you were asked about. A paragraph whose first sentence is about the text in general, when the question was about how the text persuades, has started somewhere else and will have to travel back.

Evidence that fits the point

Pick the evidence after you have decided the point, not before. Choosing a quotation you like and then building a point around it is how paragraphs end up saying something you did not mean.

Keep it short. A few words is usually enough, and a long quotation eats the space where your explanation was going to go. The person reading has the text in front of them; what they need from you is what you think it means.

Then say what it shows in your own words. That sentence is where the marks are. A paragraph with a good point and a good quotation and nothing joining them has left out the only part that could not have been copied.

Plain words, on purpose

Long words do not make writing better and they often make it worse, because a long word used slightly wrongly is more noticeable than a short word used correctly.

Say the sentence out loud in your head. If you would not say it that way to somebody, it is probably harder to read than it needs to be. Short sentences are not simple writing - they are clear writing, and clear is what gets marked.

Cut the openings that say nothing: in this essay I will, it is clear to see that, this shows us that the composer. Start with the point. You will find the paragraph is the same length and has one more idea in it.

Checking your own writing in two minutes

Read only the first sentence of each paragraph, in order. Those sentences on their own should make sense as a short answer to the question. If they do not, the problem is the order of your paragraphs or the point of one of them, and it is much easier to see this way than by rereading the whole thing.

Then check that each paragraph has something specific in it - a name, a number, a quoted phrase, a detail. A paragraph with nothing specific is an opinion, and you can usually fix it by adding one sentence rather than rewriting it.

Last, look for the paragraph that is doing two jobs. Split it. Two clear paragraphs are always better than one crowded one, and splitting takes ten seconds.

Where it usually goes wrong

Five habits. Every one of them can be fixed in the writing rather than in the reading.

• Three points in one paragraph and evidence for none of them.
• A first sentence nobody could disagree with.
• A long quotation standing in place of an explanation.
• An opening phrase that delays the point by half a line.
• Never saying, in your own words, what the evidence shows.

What to practise next

Take something you have already written and rewrite three of its paragraphs in the four-sentence shape. Do not change what you were saying - only the shape. Reading the before and the after next to each other is what makes the shape stick.

Then write the first sentence of five paragraphs for a task you have not done, and nothing else. Fifteen minutes, five sentences. If those five make sense read one after another, the piece is already planned.

Check yourself

Three questions on what is above. Have a go before you open them - reading an answer you have not tried to give is the version of this that does nothing.