Coursework: Planning, Drafting and Redrafting: Question 8
Syllabus W4, W5
A candidate is redrafting this paragraph from a coursework account of a school trip:
"Our class trip to the coastal nature reserve was a nice day out. The guide who showed us around was nice and answered all our questions. The weather was nice, which made the walk along the cliffs really enjoyable. We saw a nice variety of seabirds nesting on the rocks, and the visitor centre had a nice display explaining the local wildlife."
(a) State how many times the word "nice" appears in this paragraph. [1]
(b) Redraft the paragraph, replacing EVERY instance of "nice" with a more precise word or phrase suited to its specific context. Keep the paragraph roughly the same length and do not change its meaning. [4]
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Worked solution
Assessment focus
This question isolates a redrafting skill distinct from cutting repetition or varying sentence structure: replacing an overused, vague word with vocabulary precise enough to say something specific about each different thing it is describing.
Where “nice” repeats (part a)
The word “nice” is used five times, each time doing a different job that a single vague word cannot really do justice to: describing an overall experience (the day out), a person’s manner (the guide), a condition (the weather), a quantity and quality together (the variety of seabirds), and an exhibit (the visitor centre’s display).
Model redraft (part b)
“Our class trip to the coastal nature reserve was a memorable day out. The guide who showed us around was knowledgeable and answered all our questions patiently. The weather was mild and sunny, which made the walk along the cliffs really enjoyable. We saw an impressive variety of seabirds nesting on the rocks, and the visitor centre had an informative display explaining the local wildlife.”
Why this works
Each replacement is chosen for what “nice” was actually standing in for in that sentence, not just swapped for a generic upgrade: “memorable” captures a lasting impression rather than a vague pleasantness, “knowledgeable” and “patiently” describe the specific quality of the guide’s help, “mild and sunny” gives an actual weather condition instead of an unspecified positive judgement, “impressive” reflects the scale of the seabird variety, and “informative” says precisely what made the display worth mentioning. No content from the original paragraph (the trip, the guide’s helpfulness, the weather’s effect on the walk, the seabirds, the display’s topic) has been lost.
Common pitfalls specific to this task
- Using “wonderful” for all five instances, which fixes repetition but not precision, since “wonderful” is still a vague, all-purpose word.
- Correctly replacing four instances of “nice” but leaving one unchanged, most often the one attached to the visitor centre’s display near the end of the paragraph.
- Changing “a nice variety of seabirds” to something that alters the meaning, for example “a small variety of seabirds”, which contradicts rather than sharpens the original claim.