From a 50-word core to a full story
Decide what caused what before you polish any sentence. Exactly 50 words keeps only the chain: setting, earlier cause, events and outcome.
“We had been travelling for twelve hours when a message arrived: my passport was at gate 6. I had left it there. Because the desk would not announce names, the cleaner who found it asked staff to message me. I boarded just in time. Later, the airport changed its rules.”
Then expand it to 140–190 words, giving at least six adverbs a clear job, as in this model:
- Certainty: “I checked my bag twice. The passport had definitely gone.”
- Comment: “Fortunately, I reached the new gate just before boarding closed.”
Four past tenses, four time layers
Keep the main line in the past simple; step back only when needed:
- Past simple, main events: “The gate changed, I ran, and the door closed.”
- Past continuous, an action in progress: “Passengers were boarding when the alarm sounded.”
- Past perfect, an earlier completed event: “The crew discovered that a sensor had failed.”
- Past perfect continuous, an earlier activity up to that point: “They had been waiting for three hours when a gate was assigned.”
- Not with state verbs such as know: “She had known about the connection”, not “had been knowing”.
So and such: show the consequence
Both intensify and introduce a result with that. What follows decides the word:
- So + adjective or adverb: “The announcement was so unclear that half the queue moved.”
- So much with uncountable nouns, so many with plurals: “There was so much fog that the runway closed.”
- Such a + adjective + singular noun: “It was such a tight connection that I ran.”
- Such + adjective + plural or uncountable noun: “We experienced such severe turbulence that service stopped.”
Adverb pairs that change the meaning
These pairs look related but report different facts:
- Hard (with effort) and hardly (almost not): “I worked hard but had hardly slept.”
- Late (after the expected time) and lately (recently): “The train arrived late, and delays have increased lately.”
- Near (close to) and nearly (almost): “The hotel is near the terminal, and it is nearly full.”
- At the end (the final point) and in the end (finally, after difficulty): “At the end of the platform, I found the bag; in the end, we caught the flight.”
Apparently or actually: report, correct, comment
Comment adverbs show how sure you are and where a claim came from. Below, two colleagues revisit a misleading baggage alert.
- Apparently: heard or read, not confirmed.
- Actually, in fact: a correction.
- Fortunately, certainly: your own view.
- Eventually: finally, after a delay, never possibly.
- Position matters: “Clearly, he explained the delay.” means it is obvious that he did; “He explained the delay clearly.” means the explanation was clear.
Owen Apparently, the bag was deliberately removed.
Maya Actually, staff moved it carefully after the label tore.
Owen I had hardly read the second note. I nearly accused the courier.
Maya Fortunately, you checked. The bag eventually reached baggage reclaim.
Owen Lately, I have been reacting too quickly to incomplete alerts.
Maya Ideally, the system should display the reason beside the movement.
Common mistakes
Check your draft for these:
- “in the end of the flight”. Say “at the end of the flight”.
- “such a severe turbulence”. Turbulence is uncountable: “such severe turbulence”.
- “She checked carefully the tag.” A manner adverb should not split a verb and a short object: “She checked the tag carefully.”
- Had in every sentence. Use the past perfect for the step back, then return to the past simple.
A 10-minute daily routine
Use moments from your own day; write the full story at the weekend.
- 3 minutes: tell one moment from today in four past tenses.
- 3 minutes: add consequences with so, so many and such a.
- 2 minutes: one sentence each for hard/hardly, late/lately and near/nearly.
- 2 minutes: retell some news with apparently, then correct it with actually.
- Weekend: write a core, expand it and check they still match. Then discuss: “Does a good story need a clear ending, or can it leave a question open?”
What comes next
Next at B2, reply to health news in a personal email, weigh up adventure courses in a balanced post, or write a candidate profile led by three questions. At C1, explain a staging choice in a theatre review.