NAPLAN cheat sheet

Narrative structure: orientation (who, where, when), complication, series of events, climax, resolution.

Persuasive structure: introduction with thesis, three or more body paragraphs each with a claim and evidence, counterargument, conclusion restating thesis.

Paragraph unity: one main idea per paragraph; topic sentence first, supporting details, concluding or linking sentence.

Cohesion devices: pronouns (it, they, this), synonyms, repetition of key terms, transition words (however, therefore, in addition).

Sentence variety: simple, compound (coordinating conjunctions for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so), complex (subordinating conjunctions because, although, while, if).

Punctuation for effect: short sentences for tension, dashes for emphasis, rhetorical questions in persuasive writing.

Audience and purpose: narrative aims to entertain; persuasive aims to convince; informative aims to explain; adjust tone and vocabulary accordingly.

Show, don't tell: replace adjectives with actions and sensory details (e.g., 'her hands trembled' instead of 'she was nervous').

Editing checklist: subject-verb agreement, tense consistency, comma splices, run-ons, spelling of homophones (their/there/they're).

Main idea: often stated in the first or last sentence of a paragraph; if not stated, infer from repeated ideas.

Literal vs inferential: literal answers are directly stated; inferential answers require combining clues with background knowledge.

Author's purpose: to inform, persuade, entertain, or instruct; identify by looking at language choices and text structure.

Text structure: chronological, cause-effect, compare-contrast, problem-solution, description; signal words indicate structure.

Fact vs opinion: facts can be verified; opinions contain evaluative words (best, should, beautiful) or beliefs.

Vocabulary in context: use surrounding words, definitions, examples, or contrasts to determine meaning of unfamiliar words.

Summarising: identify key ideas and supporting details; exclude minor details and examples.

Evaluating evidence: check whether claims are supported by reasons, examples, or statistics; note bias and exaggeration.

Subject-verb agreement: singular subject takes singular verb; plural subject takes plural verb; ignore intervening phrases.

Tense consistency: maintain the same tense within a sentence or paragraph unless a time shift is signalled.

Pronoun agreement: pronoun must match antecedent in number and gender; avoid ambiguous pronoun references.

Comma rules: separate items in a list, separate introductory phrases, join independent clauses with a conjunction, set off non-essential information.

Apostrophes: possessive singular (the dog's bone), possessive plural (the dogs' bones), contractions (it's = it is; its = possessive).

Homophones: their/there/they're, your/you're, to/too/two, its/it's, whose/who's, affect/effect, practice/practise.

Spelling strategies: common prefixes (un-, dis-, re-), suffixes (-ing, -ed, -ly), doubling final consonant (running), dropping silent e (making).

Sentence boundaries: avoid comma splices and run-ons; use full stop, semicolon, or conjunction to join clauses.

Quotation marks: enclose direct speech; punctuation inside quotation marks; new paragraph for each new speaker.

Order of operations: BODMAS/BIDMAS - brackets, orders (powers/roots), division and multiplication (left to right), addition and subtraction (left to right).

Fractions: equivalent fractions by multiplying numerator and denominator by same number; add/subtract with common denominator; multiply straight across; divide by multiplying by reciprocal.

Percentages: percentage of a quantity = (percentage ÷ 100) × quantity; increase/decrease by percentage = original × (1 ± rate).

Ratio and proportion: simplify ratios by dividing by highest common factor; unitary method for scaling.

Area and perimeter: rectangle area = length × width; triangle area = ½ × base × height; circle circumference = 2πr, area = πr².

Volume: rectangular prism = length × width × height; unit conversion: 1 cm³ = 1 mL, 1 m³ = 1000 L.

Mean, median, mode, range: mean = sum ÷ count; median = middle value when ordered; mode = most frequent; range = highest − lowest.

Probability: P(event) = favourable outcomes ÷ total outcomes; sum of probabilities of all outcomes = 1.

Algebra: solve linear equations by inverse operations; expand brackets using distributive law; factorise by common factor.