It’s the ability to read an essay, article or paragraph and write the main idea in your words. And it’s one of the best ways for ESL students to learn English writing.
Why do I think so? There are three reasons.
Three Benefits for You
First, paraphrase writing makes you think. You have to read, think and write. Really, that’s not easy but you learn a lot of things quickly.
Second, paraphrase writing is not copying other people’s ideas. Hey, anybody can copy. Paraphrase writing makes you create something new.
Third, paraphrase writing uses six writing skills. So, you learn six skills at the same time when you study paraphrase writing.
Six Paraphrase Writing Skills
What are these six skills? You need to:
- Learn synonyms to increase your vocabulary power.
- Understand sentence patterns so you can write active and passive sentences.
- Know how to change nouns into verbs.
- Combine short sentences into one, or break a long sentence into two short ones.
- Replace words with their meanings.
- Delete unnecessary information.
Finally, put all of these skills together and you will be able to paraphrase complex ideas and stories.
Photo credit: soartsyithurts.
I would like to use some of the worksheets to help my students improve their academic writing skills – such as paraphrasing
Very informative and useful link in understanding the usage of voccabulary in IELTS
Aparna,
Thanks for the kind words. Glad to hear it is useful.
cheers
rob