This week you wrote an informative piece explaining how you handle disagreement with someone close, drawing on your own experience. Now you'll read another student's piece and judge how strong it is. Working through how assessors evaluate informative writing builds your ability to apply the same lens to your own work.
Part 1
The Assessor Scorecard for
Informative – Informative piece
Strong informative writing about personal experience requires honesty and specific detail. It shows what actually happens — not what should happen — and explains what emerged from the messy reality.
Ideas & Content
Specific, concrete detail — the actual steps you took and what changed.
Patterns drawn from real experience, not guesswork — what makes it worse, what helps.
Understanding developed across multiple instances, not just one event.
-
Concrete, specific detail: ideas grounded in what actually happened, not general principles.
Structure & Cohesion
A clear architecture — chronological, thematic or by outcome.
Transitional language that moves the reader between ideas.
No jumps between examples or time periods without signposting.
-
Clear logical progression: reader can follow the explanation from start to finish.
Audience & Purpose
Peer-to-peer voice — written for another Year 8 in crisis.
The emotional reality named, not just the practical steps.
No suggestion that one solution works for everyone.
-
Peer-to-peer voice: written for another Year 8 in crisis, not for adults or a general audience.
Language Choices
Active voice that names what you did, not passive constructions that hide it.
Precise verbs — 'I asked if we could talk' over 'we had some conversations'.
No euphemism, no jargon and no performing — conversational but honest.
-
Active, precise voice: readers know exactly what you did and why it mattered.
Conventions
Clear sentences without run-ons or fragments.
Paragraphing that reflects the organisation of ideas — new point, new paragraph.
Accurate spelling and grammar throughout.
-
Technical accuracy: clean, error-free writing supports your credibility with the reader.
Part 2
Today’s Marking Targets
Task in one sentence
Write an informative piece for another Year 8 in serious conflict, explaining from your own experience what makes conflict worse, what helps and what you have learned.
Let’s Focus
Three strands matter most this week: Audience & Purpose, Ideas & Content and Structure & Cohesion. The peer voice decides whether the reader feels you get it. Concrete detail decides whether the advice is real. Clear organisation decides whether they can follow your thinking.
Audience & Purpose
Strong writing this week speaks directly to a peer in crisis. The language is conversational but not dismissive. You acknowledge the emotional reality alongside the practical reality. You anticipate what the reader is worried about and address it.
What markers scan for
- A peer-to-peer voice — not advice from above.
- Acknowledgment of how hard this is for the reader.
- Language and examples relevant to Year 8 experience.
Score Bands
-
Basic
Writing sounds generic or aimed at a general audience; tone is too formal or too casual.
-
Strong
A clear peer voice; the writer acknowledges the difficulty and uses Year 8-relevant detail.
-
Excellent
Sophisticated awareness of audience in crisis; language is conversational, trustworthy and emotionally aware.
Ideas & Content
Strong writing is grounded in specific, concrete experience. You explain what actually happened, not abstract principles. You show patterns based on multiple instances and develop your ideas — not just the outcome but the process that led there.
What markers scan for
- Specific detail about what you actually did, not vague summary.
- Patterns drawn from real experience — what makes it worse, what helps.
- Conclusions backed by specific examples, not stated without evidence.
Score Bands
-
Basic
Ideas are vague or generic; few specific details about what actually happened.
-
Strong
Specific examples are given; the writer shows what they did and what happened as a result.
-
Excellent
Concrete details throughout; patterns are clearly grounded in specific instances.
Structure & Cohesion
Strong writing is organised so the reader can follow the thinking. The structure might be chronological, by category or by theme — whichever you choose should be clear and consistent. Transitions help readers see relationships, and the ending shows what was learned.
What markers scan for
- A clear overall structure — chronological, thematic or categorical.
- Transitions that signpost time shifts or topic changes.
- An ending that synthesises what's been explained, not just stops.
Score Bands
-
Basic
Organisation is unclear or jumps between ideas without signposting; the reader struggles to follow.
-
Strong
Clear overall structure; ideas are connected and the ending shows what was learned.
-
Excellent
Sophisticated organisation; transitions are natural and the ending integrates and shows growth.
Now read · Student sample
Navigating Conflict with Someone Close
Year 8 sample · \~300 words
Student sample for assessment
Written by a Year 8 student in Thornbury, Victoria, Australia.
My best friend and I had a huge fight last year about something small—I lent her money and she forgot to pay me back. It wasn't about the money though; it was that she didn't seem to care. I got angrier the longer I didn't say anything, and by the time I brought it up I was furious. We didn't talk for three weeks. Three weeks felt like forever when you see that person every day at school. The worst part was realising what I'd done wrong. I had been waiting for her to notice I was upset, like she should somehow know. I made jokes around her to show I was hurt, but she didn't get it. The anger just built up inside me instead of going away. I learned that keeping things bottled up makes everything worse. Every time I'd see her in the hallway, the anger would spike again because it had nowhere to go. I decided I had to actually talk to her properly. I was terrified. We sat down after school and I told her exactly what was bothering me—not in an angry way, but in a way that showed her how hurt I felt. She said she genuinely hadn't realised how upset I was, and she felt terrible. It turned out she'd thought I was just being distant on purpose. We'd both been misunderstanding each other the whole time. Once we actually listened to what the other person meant, everything shifted. What I've learned is that the conflict isn't usually about the thing you think it is. It's about being misunderstood. And staying silent about misunderstanding just makes the silence grow bigger. When something bothers you, saying it early—before you're furious—is way easier than waiting. It's scary to be vulnerable, but it's scarier to lose someone over something that could have been fixed if you'd just talked.
