Writing a Letter

The holiday season is all about getting back in touch with those you care about, near and far. In many cultures, especially in the United States and Canada, letters are the usually the preferred form of communication. Many families go to great lengths to even take the right photo to grace the front of their letters!

So for this lesson, we will look into just how to go about writing letters:

Each letter has a main purpose or reason for writing the letter and these can be divided into a number of categories.

1. 􀂃 Thanking someone
2. 􀂃 Complaining about someone or something
3. 􀂃 Apologizing about something
4. 􀂃 Inviting someone to something
5. 􀂃 Leaving something – a job, a club, your country
6. 􀂃 Applying for something - a job
7. 􀂃 Recommending someone or something
8. 􀂃 Requesting help (asking for information)

There can be overlapping question types. For example, you night be leaving for a holiday and ask your friend to stay at your house to look after it. This is ‘leaving’ and ‘requesting’. So, read the instructions carefully.

The Tone of a Letter
Setting the tone of a letter is an essential part of writing a good letter. There are varying levels of
formality and informality but for the purposes of the letters you need to write in the IELTS exam
we can work with two - formal and informal.

Formal Letter
The formal letters will be writing to someone you don’t know or someone you don’t know very well. This could be to a store to complain about a product that you bought - to a company to apply for a job - to a fitness club to tell them that you want to stop your membership and so on.

Informal Letter
The informal letters will be writing to someone that you know well and are on first name terms with. This could be to invite them to a house warming party - to ask them for information about a university that they attended - to thank them for a lovely weekend spent together and so on.

Setting the Tone
The tone of the letter is set by:

• 􀂃 The way you begin the letter 
• 􀂃 The way you end the letter 
• 􀂃 The type of vocabulary used 

Beginning/Ending a Letter
Formal Letters
If you do not use the name of the person you are writing to you can use:
Dear Sir / Yours faithfully,

• Dear Madam / Yours faithfully, 
• Dear Sir or Madam / Yours faithfully, 

OR

If you do know the name of the person you are writing to but use their family name rather than their first name you can use:

• Dear Mr. Smith / Yours sincerely, 
• Dear Mrs Smith / Yours sincerely, 
• Dear Ms Smith / Yours sincerely, 

N.B.

Don’t forget to add the comma after faithfully and sincerely.

It is also possible to you use – Best regards – Best wishes – when you use a family name to start the letter. These expressions are becoming more informal but would be seen as too formal for writing to good friends.

Informal Letters
If you know the person well and write to them using their first name you can use:

Dear John / See you soon,

• Dear Mary / Take care, 
• Dear Susan / Love, 
• Dear Anne / Best wishes (this is becoming more formal) 

With these endings remember that you must also use only your first name to end the letter. Using  your family name is too formal when writing to a friend.

Formal letters
For more formal letters it is a good idea to start your letter with an opening statement that explains why you are writing. This is much better than just starting with the first bullet point. One simple but effective way of doing this is to write:

• 􀂾 I am writing to you in connection with my membership at your health club. 
• 􀂾 I am writing to you regarding your complaint about the noise coming from my house last weekend. 
• 􀂾 Further to my letter of the 15th August, I am writing to you again to complain about my apartment. 

Informal letters

• 􀂾 I hope you and your family are well. 
• 􀂾 I finally found time to write you. 
• 􀂾 I hope all is well and you are enjoying life.

Vocabulary
While the way you begin the letter: sets the tone,

- Dear Mr. Smith
- Hi John

You need to continue this tone in the main paragraphs. You do this by the vocabulary and the phrases that you choose. While some words and phrases are more neutral and can be used in both formal and informal letters others are clearly one or the other.

Formal Letters
Never use contractions like - I’m, they’ve and so on.

Informal Letters
Contractions can and should be used as this shows the examiner that you know they can be used in informal letters.

Expressions like:

More Formal  

I rarely go there now

I really appreciate your help

Come to my house on Friday

I really had a lovely time last Saturday

Last week I saw my ex-boyfriend

More Informal 
I only go there once in a blue moon
Thanks for your help
Call in sometime for a chat
 It was great to see you
Last week I ran into my ex

Main Purpose of the Letter
The main purpose of the letter is stated in the first sentence of the information given to you. This  gives you the direction as well as the tone of the letter.

If you see the word ‘manager’, ‘boss’, ‘bank’, and so on then the letter is going to be formal.

If you see the word ‘friend’, ’classmate’, ’flat mate’ and so on then the letter is going to be informal.

When you write your letter it is important not to copy phrases from the information given to you. The examiner will not count these words and so this might mean that some students fail to reach the minimum of 150 words. DO NOT COPY!

It is OK, however, to use the key words, or most important words, as these provide the focus for the letter and can help you to develop the bullet points that follow.

Three Bullet Points
Each letter comes with three bullet points that MUST be answered in your letter.

For reasons of Cohesion and Coherence (one of the criteria used to judge your writing) it is a very good idea to use a separate paragraph for each bullet point.

So, three bullet points means three paragraphs. Each of these should be developed equally as much as possible with each paragraph being about 40 - 50 words.