Students who score lower than 24/30 pts on TOEFL writing have at least ONE of these problems

Why did I score 20-23 pts. on the TOEFL Writing Section?

Those aspiring to score higher than 24/30 pts. on the independent writing section of the TOEFL will need to demonstrate competency if they want to perform well. According to ETS’s rubrics, students will score in 3.0/5.0 (20-23 points) if these writers have problems in one or more of the following areas.

Addresses the topic and task using somewhat developed explanations, exemplifications,

and/or details

Displays unity, progression, and coherence, though connection of ideas may be occasionally

obscured

May demonstrate inconsistent facility in sentence formation and word choice that may result in

lack of clarity and occasionally obscure meaning

May display accurate but limited range of syntactic structures and vocabulary

In this article, I will explain each of these rubric points and give real student responses to illustrate what these problems look like and how to avoid them during the independent writing portion of the TOEFL exam.

Read More: Common pitfalls for writers who score 20-23 pts in writing