Why Should We Paraphrase?

When you look at a sentence that is well-written and you do not want to copy the sentence but want to convey the same meaning, you have little choice but to paraphrase. When you are paraphrasing, you are taking the idea, but you are not copying. Paraphrasing will help you write more easily in examinations such as TOFEL and IELTS.

Why is it difficult to paraphrase?

It is difficult to do because most students only try to change the words without understanding the background of the task or of the sentence. This is what makes it challenging. This is something that you must always avoid. This post will help you refine your paraphrasing technique.

Step 1 - Make sure you clearly understand the sentence.

This is an important step because you cannot paraphrase what you don't understand. If you are not able to fully understand the text or passage since it is too long or boring, then break it up to read it over a few seconds and reread until you understand it completely. Only then you can rephrase the phrases or sentences you want to copy effectively.

Step 2 - Identify the main idea of the text

This is the part which decides how well your paraphrased sentence is going to be. Here are some of the questions you need to ask yourself while paraphrasing:

• WHAT is the main idea of the text or paragraph?
• WHO is the text or paragraph about?
• WHAT is the text or paragraph about?
• WHEN does it take place?
• WHERE does it take place?
• WHY does it take place?
• HOW does it take place?

Step 3 - Keep the original text aside

This is very important. If you keep looking at the same text, you will not be able to think of your own words and form your own sentence structures. Put away the original text and write the answers to the above questions in your own words. Change the order of information but make sure that the meaning is the same.

Step 4 - Compare

Once your paraphrasing is done compare your text with the original to see if the meaning is the same and if it conveys all the information conveyed by the original text.

Method 1 - Introduce Descriptive words

Let us first look at this sentence and then figure out how to paraphrase by changing the descriptive words

In the sentence above, look at the descriptive words. When you choose descriptive words, make sure you capture the entire idea, not just one word. Here are some of them:

• Can be difficult - not just difficult
• suitable
• a large number

Here, it is important to choose can be along with difficult is because, the phrase can be indicates that it is not difficult all the time, but only sometimes. We can therefore replace the phrase can be with sometimes.

For the rest of the words, suitable can be replaced with perfect and a large number of can be replaced with many. Once that is done, this is how the sentence could look.

If you notice, the sentence, while following the same structure, and conveying the same information, does sound pretty different!

You have successfully paraphrased your first sentence. Now it is time to practice this method on other sentences and see how it works.

Remember!

Using the right words is important, but what is even more important is the right word choice.