The first writing genre of the year. To describe a person, you cover three layers: physical appearance, personality traits, and lifestyle (or job, hobbies, achievements). This task uses the vocabulary of qualities from Unit 1 and the simple present tense.
A good description of a person follows three logical paragraphs (or three sections in a single paragraph if shorter):
Name, age, nationality, profession, relationship to you.
"My best friend is Karim, a 19-year-old student from Casablanca."
Height, build, hair, eyes, face, style of dress.
"He is tall, slim, with short black hair and brown eyes."
Character traits, hobbies, qualities, achievements.
"Karim is reliable, sociable and very ambitious. He dreams of becoming an engineer."
| Category | Adjectives |
|---|---|
| Height & build | tall, short, medium-height, slim, slender, well-built, plump, overweight |
| Hair | short, long, straight, curly, wavy, black, brown, blond, grey |
| Eyes | big, small, almond-shaped, brown, blue, green, grey, hazel |
| Face | round, oval, square, with a beard, clean-shaven, with freckles, fair-skinned, dark-skinned |
| General | handsome (man), pretty / beautiful (woman), attractive, charming, elegant, smart-looking |
reliable, honest, sociable, generous, kind-hearted, hard-working, ambitious, mature, polite, modest, creative, imaginative, energetic, patient, self-confident, optimistic, adventurous, talented, gifted
stubborn, careless, lazy, selfish, impatient, shy, arrogant, pessimistic, talkative, strict, old-fashioned
The person I would like to describe is my best friend Yassine. He is an 18-year-old student from Rabat. He is in his final year of high school and he plans to study computer science.
In terms of physical appearance, Yassine is tall and slim, with short black hair and dark brown eyes. He has a round face and a warm smile. He usually wears casual clothes — jeans and a hoodie — and he looks both simple and elegant.
As for his personality, Yassine is extremely reliable, honest and creative. He is also very sociable: he loves meeting new people and helping them. In his free time, he plays football and reads science-fiction novels.
All in all, Yassine is the kind of friend everyone wishes to have. I'm proud to know such an ambitious and kind-hearted person.
Choose one of the following topics and write a paragraph of about 120-150 words:
Checklist before submitting:
☐ Identity (1-2 sentences)
☐ Physical description (2-3 sentences)
☐ Personality with at least 3 adjectives (2-3 sentences)
☐ Examples / details about their life
☐ A closing sentence with your feelings
☐ Simple present tense used consistently
☐ No spelling mistakes; punctuation checked
Identity → Physical appearance → Personality + life. Don't mix them up. Each layer needs 2 to 4 sentences.
Avoid repeating "nice" and "good". Reach for kind-hearted, generous, ambitious, creative instead. The richer the vocabulary, the higher the mark.
A description uses permanent traits, so the simple present is dominant: "He IS tall, he HAS got short hair, he LOVES football."
The Writing section is worth 10 points. Task 1 (4 pts) is often a guided paragraph with a given opening sentence — just continue. Task 2 (6 pts) is a free composition. For a description, aim for 120-150 words: not too short (penalty), not too long (mistakes accumulate).