A levél, amelyben minden benne van - és semmi
Students must write a 120-150 word informal letter in Hungarian to a friend, inviting them to a family celebration. The prompt gives four content points that must all appear: the date and place, what to bring, how to get there, and a request for a reply by a deadline. One student's draft opens with three sentences about the weather, describes the food in detail, mentions the date only in passing ('valamikor májusban'), never states the address, asks the friend to 'hozz valamit' without saying what, and closes without a reply deadline. It is 148 words, grammatically accurate, and uses varied vocabulary. The marking criteria weight content points, range, accuracy, and register.
1. The draft is accurate and within the word limit. Predict its band and justify the judgement against the criteria.
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It will land in a middle band, not a top band, despite strong accuracy. Content coverage is the limiting criterion: of four required points, only the date is attempted, and even that is vague ('valamikor májusban'), so arguably zero points are fully conveyed. The address is missing, the item to bring is unspecified, and there is no reply deadline. Range and accuracy are genuine strengths and should be credited, but they cannot compensate for missing information - the letter does not achieve its communicative purpose, because the recipient could not act on it. The weather and food passages show vocabulary but are off-task padding. The model reasoning: assess task achievement first, then language. A fluent letter that omits required content is a weaker answer than a simpler letter that delivers all four points.
2. Rewrite the plan for this letter so that all four points are covered within 120-150 words, and explain the trade-off you made.
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A workable plan: opening (1 sentence) → date and place with a specific address (2 sentences) → what to bring (1 sentence) → travel instructions, naming the transport and the stop (2 sentences) → request for a reply by a named date (1 sentence) → closing (1 sentence). That leaves room for one short personal remark, not three. The trade-off is deliberate: cut the weather and the food description entirely, because they consume words without earning content marks. Specificity is the fix - 'május 18-án, szombaton délután 3-kor, a Kossuth utca 12. alatt' instead of 'valamikor májusban', and 'hozz egy üveg bort vagy egy süteményt' instead of 'hozz valamit'. The reply deadline must be an actual date ('kérlek, május 10-ig válaszolj'). Register stays informal throughout (te-form, friendly closing). The reasoning to internalise: in a word-limited task, every sentence should be doing a job the criteria pay for.