Writing Concisely!

"I am writing to you to suggest to you some ideas on school activities about zero waste. " Which word(s) is/are unnecessary?

• you

• some ideas

• to you

• about

"I, a Green Ambassador of our school, had recently participated in a speech on Zero Waste Nation, and would like to give two humble suggestions on how our school can improve to change the bad habits we have on wasting material."

Re-write the sentence above to make it concise.

Answer explanation

"I, a Green Ambassador of our school, had recently participated in a speech on Zero Waste Nation, and would like to give two humble suggestions on how our school can improve to change the bad habits we have on wasting material."

Unnecessary words:

"had": simple past tense will do

"humble": this comes across in your tone

"can improve to change the bad habit" : awkward wordy phrasing

Suggestion:

..."how our school can prevent wasteful habits"

"As Green Ambassador of our school..."

"The reason I chose having an Urban Farm in school is because I have been noticing how many students have been wasting a lot of food during recess and lunch."

Rewrite this sentence to make it concise.

Answer explanation

"The reason I chose having an Urban Farm in school is because I have been noticing how many students have been wasting a lot of food during recess and lunch."

Unnecessary words:

- "The reason"

- the present progressive tense, "have been noticing"

Suggestions:

- "I noticed"

- "many students waste a lot of food during meals"

"Over the course of my entire stay as a student in this school, I have observed students of all levels wasting precious materials like food, paint, textbooks, and much more."

Why is the underlined clause unnecessary?

Answer explanation

"Over the course of my entire stay as a student in this school, I have observed students of all levels wasting precious materials like food, paint, textbooks, and much more."

There are other ways to phrase it more concisely.

Suggestions:

- In all my years here...

- Over the course of 4 years...

- (Or just delete it entirely.)

"The first activity that I suggest starting is starting an urban farm in our school garden."

Why is this sentence so infuriating?

• "starting" is used twice no effect

• "that" is used unnecessarily

• "in our school garden" need not be mentioned

"After planting, we got to harvest them and share them with our family and friends after they grew."

Which word(s) or phrase(s) is/are unnecessary?

• "we got to"

• "After planting"

• "after they grew"

• "After planting" and "after they grew"

"I am writing this email to suggest choosing to build the Senior Activity Centre for the community centre as majority of the residents who live near the community centre are seniors."

Rewrite this introduction to make it concise!

Answer explanation

"I am writing this email to suggest choosing to build the Senior Activity Centre for the community centre as majority of the residents who live near the community centre are seniors."

Suggestions:

"I would like to suggest building..."

"Community center" is used twice in the same sentence. Replace it with its pronoun, "it".

"...seniors can get to meet new people and bond with them."

How would you rephrase this portion to make it concise?

Answer explanation

Suggestion:

seniors can meet new people and bond with them

"If the Senior Activity Centre gets chosen to be built, I would like to suggest letting people volunteer to help organise and carry out the Senior Activity Centre’s activities."

Which words/phrase are unnecessary in the underlined portion?

"By sitting in a place like this, it helps them to concentrate more like for example in some households their family members tend to make noise which affects their studies but by sitting in the multifunctional space, it helps them to focus without any distractions."

Please re-write this very wordy sentence above to make it concise!

Answer explanation

By now you should know how to shorten this sentence! :)