How many marks lost for using the wrong form in iGCSE English Language Transactional Writing - any examiners here?

[Nivvers2001]

He answered the question, write a guide to settling into a new school (or something like that) but seems to have written it in the form of a letter and/or speech, using "Dear Students" as the opener and signing off, "Yours sincerely" but also using personal examples and persuasive language. How many marks will he lose for using the wrong form? Sounds like he did use well structured paragraph to give information and advice, eg. join clubs, try new subjects but may have been too emotive in parts. Basically we need to know how bad it is. He was predicted a 9 so is gutted although the rest of the paper went very well.

It sounds like he did it as a personal guide rather than an official type guide. I don't know if that is actually wrong if it wasn't clear in the question, you would need the exact wording of the question. Live in hope they think it was an interesting/innovative approach. Sorry no idea how much he might be marked down if they think he approached it incorrectly. Ask his teacher what they think?

You don't automatically lose marks, because all marking is done positively, but it means one or more assessment objectives may have not been fully met.If the rest of the content is good, it may not in the end affect the grade- but it might, so be prepared. When I was at school, and I did the same for my pupils when I was a teacher, the letters RTQ were put on the board along with times etc. It stands for 'Read The Question'!

My History teacher went one better than RTQ. We were taught to 'answer the question, the whole question, and nothing but the question!'.