O-Level Editing: What Is Tested, and How
Editing is the first section of Paper 1 and it carries 10 marks.
What the syllabus says
In a given text of continuous prose of not more than 250 words, candidates identify and then edit grammatical errors by writing the corrections in the spaces provided. Errors in punctuation and spelling will not be tested in this section.
How the paper lays it out
The text is printed as 12 numbered lines, and the shape is fixed. In practice the instructions come to this: the first and last lines are correct; eight of the ten between them carry one grammatical error each; two of those ten are clean and you tick them; and you must not change the meaning.
Worth knowing before you start:
- Lines 1 and 12 are always correct. Do not spend time on them.
- Of the ten lines between, eight carry one error each and two are correct. You write the corrected word for the eight and a tick for the two.
- Eight corrections plus two ticks makes ten marks. A clean line is worth a mark, so a tick you were too nervous to write is a mark thrown away.
Three more things follow from the instructions.
Spelling and punctuation are not tested. If you spot a missing comma or a misspelt word, leave it. Hunting for them costs you the time you need for the real errors.
The errors are grammatical. You are looking for a word that is wrong in its sentence, not a sentence that could be written better.
You must not change the meaning. This rules out corrections that are grammatical but say something different, and it is the rule that decides several of the harder lines.
The errors tested in this section
These are the kinds of error the section sets.
| Type | Wrong | Right |
|---|---|---|
| Subject-verb agreement | The reasons for his delay was unclear | The reasons for his delay were unclear |
| Tense | She locked the gate and walks away | She locked the gate and walked away |
| Verb form | The gate had close behind us | The gate had closed behind us |
| Word form | He answered the question confident | He answered the question confidently |
| Preposition | He apologised of the delay | He apologised for the delay |
| Article | She waited for a hour | She waited for an hour |
| Singular and plural nouns | He collects stamp from every country he visits | He collects stamps from every country he visits |
| Pronoun | Her and her sister arrived late | She and her sister arrived late |
| Comparative and superlative | Of the two routes, this is the shortest | Of the two routes, this is the shorter |
| Conjunction | Neither the bus or the train was running | Neither the bus nor the train was running |
| Quantifier | There were less seats than last year | There were fewer seats than last year |
Check agreement first. A long phrase between the subject and the verb is a common way to hide an error, and it is the easiest kind to undo: cover the phrase and read the line again.
If you find you have written the same kind of correction four or five times, reread those lines. It is more often a sign that you have locked onto one pattern than that the passage really repeats itself that much.
How to work through a passage
- Read it once, whole. Some errors only show once you know what the passage is about.
- Find the subject of each verb and ignore everything in between. "The reasons for his delay" shortens to "The reasons ... were".
- Keep the meaning. A fix that is grammatical but says something new is the wrong fix. In "The queue at the stall are long", changing queue to queues mends the grammar and changes the sentence, so the answer is are to is.
- Do not improve the writing. A clumsy but grammatical sentence is not an error.
- Sound it out silently. Preposition and article errors are easier to hear than to see.
- Look for the word that is not there. Some errors are omissions rather than wrong words: "we listened the announcement" needs listened to, and "she became prefect last year" needs a prefect. These are the hardest to spot, because nothing on the page looks wrong. Your answer is the corrected phrase, so you do write two words, but you have still only mended one thing.
Two of the ten tested lines are correct. When a line looks fine, check its agreement and its tense once more, then tick it and move on. Forcing a change onto a correct line loses you the mark the tick would have earned.
Where to practise
Six passages, each with the correction and the reason for every line. Between them they cover every type in the table above.
- Practice 1: The School Canteen · agreement, preposition, tense, conjunction, word form
- Practice 2: The Community Library · article, conjunction, noun number, verb form
- Practice 3: The Park Connector · comparative, pronoun, quantifier, word form
- Practice 4: The School Band · agreement, preposition, tense, verb form
- Practice 5: The Hawker Centre · article, noun number, pronoun, word form
- Practice 6: The Science Laboratory · agreement, conjunction, comparative, preposition, quantifier, verb form