Informative Essay

Planning

You made a writing plan. The plan includes notes (not full sentences) for the introduction and the main body.

You did not use first-person pronouns (I / we).
You did not use contractions (they’ve => they have; won’t => will not; isn’t => is not).
Does the text connect ideas with transition words? For example:
- Compare and contrast: like, similar to, compared to, although;
- Examples: for example, for instance, such as, Another example of XXX is YYY;
- To conclude: in summary, to sum up, in conclusion, as a result
You use a wide range of grammatical structures correctly.
You use a wide range of vocabulary correctly and you paraphrase words you don’t know. You don’t use German.

The text has an informative title, which gives the reader a first idea of what the text will be about.
The writing is factual: I didn’t present opinions (I think ..., … is good / bad / cool …) or fiction, just facts.
Does the introduction hook the reader, for example with an unusual detail or a question?
Does the introduction end in a thesis statement (one sentence, which tells the reader the claim of the text)?
Does the main body present subtopics with a new paragraph for every subtopic? (For most tasks you write in class, you will only have time for two subtopics.)
Does every body paragraph start with a topic sentence. The topic sentence presents the main idea or claim of the paragraph in one sentence.
Does every body paragraph present reasons (explanation) and examples to support the topic sentence (i.e. supporting sentences).
Does the text have a concluding paragraph, which sums up the main points and restates the thesis statement in a new way?
Does the text answer the question / fulfil the task you were given (= beantwortet der Text die Frage / erfüllt der Text die Aufgabe die dir gegeben wurde)?

For the structure of a paragraph, see also the checklist for writing a paragraph.

You included an estimate¹ of the word count.
You skip every second line, and you skip two or more lines between paragraphs.