INFORMAL LETTERS

A. WHAT TO WRITE?

No Format Description
1 Address - at the top right-hand corner of the letter
- put a comma after every line
- put a full-stop at the end of the address
2 Date - write below the address
3 Salutation - write on the left-hand side of the letter
- put a comma after the greeting
4 Content/Body - start with an introduction
- followed by the details in the next
paragraphs
- write a closing last
5 Closing salutation - write on the right-hand side of the letter.
- first word begins with a capital letter.
e.g. ‘Yours sincerely’, ‘Your friend’
6 Signature - sign clearly after the closing salutation
- no need to write your name below
SAMPLE LETTER

9, JlnMegah,
TmnSuriSetia, Address
40300 Shah Alam,
Selangor. Date
20 September 2011
Salutation
Dear Alif,
Thank you so much for the letter. I received it yesterday.
I hope that you are in the best of health. In your letter, you
asked my advise on how to manage stress.

Firstly, you must get a good sleep. You need an eight-

hour sleep every night. When you wake up, you will feel fresh
Body
and energetic. Then, you will be focused in class.

Secondly, ______________________________________
_____________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________

Besides that, ___________________________________

_____________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________
Ending _____________________________________________________

I hope that you’ll follow my suggestions so that you’ll be Closing

able to live a good and calm life. Well, I’ve to pen off now as I’ve salutation
a tuition class to go to. Until I hear from you, take good care of +
yourself. Bye Signature

Your friend,
Shan
Exercise

A. Azmi’s brother tore his letter into pieces.

Help Azmi to put them together to form a complete letter. Rewrite the whole
letter.
Then, I tiptoed back to my room and locked
20, JlnTupai, the door. I acted fast. Immediately, I took my
Tmn Hang Tuah hand phone and called the police. I was told
35600 Subang Jaya not to open the room door and advised me to
Selangor hide in the cupboard.

12 Feb
2017
My family was away attending
Dear a relative’s wedding in Johor. I
J didn’t want to go because of
o my PMR exam. So, I stayed at
s home to revise.
h
uYour friend,
a
,
I was doing my Mathematics at about 12 midnight. Suddenly, I
heard a noise coming from downstairs. I panicked. I quietly
Signature walked out of my room and I heard two guys talking in soft
voices. They were looking for something. I knew then, they
were thieves.

How are you doing? I hope that you are in the pink of health. As for me,
I’m doing fine here. The reason I’m writing to you is, to tell you about a
frightening experience I went through a week ago. Two guys tried to rob
my house!

I did as told by the police. I prayed hard that the police would
be there soon. A while later, I heard my room door being
opened slowly. I started trembling with fear and closed my
eyes tightly. I was so scared that the robbers would find me in
the cupboard.

I was glad that the whole thing was over. That night I slept in
Mr.Selva’s house. When my parents returned home the next
day, I told them what had happened. That was the most
terrifying experience I ever had.
 Well, that’s all from me. I hope to hear from you soon. Please
send my regards to all at home. Take care and bye.

Then, the cupboard door was opened abruptly. Before I could

scream for help, I was carried out of the cupboard. I heard
voices telling me that I was safe. I opened my eyes and I saw
three policemen standing in front of me. My neighbour,
Mr.Selva, was there too. They told me that they had caught the
thieves and thanked me for acting fast.

Model Question

Your younger brother is in college away from home. You are concerned about his
safety. Write a letter to him telling him to be careful and to look after himself.
You may include the following details:

 Don’t stay out late at night-lots of accidents take place

 Be selective of friends-join study groups
 Be careful with spiked drinks at parties-be careful of quick-fix pills- may be
drugs
 Eat well-drink lots of water-sleep well-study hard
 FORMAL LETTERS

A. WHAT TO WRITE?

No Format Description
1 Writer’s address - at the top left-hand corner of the letter
- name is optional
- put a comma after every line
- put a full-stop at the end of the address

2 Recipient’s name - write the recipient’s name, position and address

below
- underline the last line of the address
3 Date - write on the right-hand side of the letter.
- spell out the month in full
4 Salutation - write formal greetings like Dear Sir, Dear
Madam, Dear Mr. Jamal

5 Topic/Heading - write the subject heading of what the letter is

about.
- begin with a capital letter
- underline the heading
6 Body - write the main purpose of the letter for the
opening paragraph. There is no numbering.
- write contents in the following paragraphs.
Number the paragraphs
- the last paragraph is conclusion
7 Closing salutation - write ‘Thank you’
- first word begins with a capital letter.
e.g. ‘Yours sincerely’, ‘Yours faithfully’
8 Signature - sign after the closing salutation
- write your full name in block letters below your
signature
Sample Letter

30 Jln. 12/3,
Sender’s address
Taman Jaya,
30400 Ampang Sender’s address

Kuala Lumpur
_________________________________________________
The Manager,
Sender’s address
MajlisPerbandaranAmpang
12, Jln. Merbok
30410 Ampang Date
Kuala Lumpur 10 JULY 2011
Salutation +
Subject Dear Sir,
Uncollected Garbage Opening
paragraph/
I wish to complain about the uncollected garbage in my area. purpose
The garbage collectors have not been doing their work.

2. The garbage has not been collected for nearly two

weeks. As a result, there is rubbish dumped everywhere. The
Body
smell from the dump is terrible. The whole place stinks.

3. The garbage has attracted flies that swarm all over

the place. This is bad for everybody especially the children who
play outside the house. They can fall sick due to diseases
spread by the flies. Moreover, the drains are clogged with
rubbish. This makes it difficult for water to flow.
Signature
4. I would appreciate very much if you could take
Ending
immediate action to solve this matter.

Thank you.

Yours sincerely, Closing salutation +

Signature Signature
Given below is a letter asking permission to visit the UiTM library in Shah Alam during
the school holiday. However, it has been wrongly formatted. Rewrite the letter in the
correct way.

The Librarian,
UiTM Shah Alam,
JalanTuah, Seksyen 2,
40210 Shah Alam,
Selangor
_____________________________________________________________________________
The Secretary,
Sek.Men.Seksyen 19 Shah Alam,
Jalan Gelora 19/46
40300 Shah Alam
Selangor
13 June 2010

Permission to Visit the UiTM Library

Dear Sir/Madam,

1. We look forward to an early reply from you so that we can plan our trip to the university.

2. We also came to know that the library has a lot of old school books that it would like
to give them away. The purpose of this visit is to enable our club members to know the
advantages of using library facilities and the many sources of information available there.

3. A total of 25 students accompanied by two teacher advisors are involved in this trip.
We plan to visit on 30th June 2011 at 9 a.m. We would also be grateful if you could show us
around and the system used in the library.

4. On behalf of the English Language Society of my school, I would like to seek your
permission for our club members to visit your library. I hope that you could donate those
books to our school library.

5. Thank you.
Yours faithfully.
…………………………
(SECRETARY)
Paan ADIB
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________

TASK

You are the President of a Residents’ Association in Taman Jaya Shah Alam. You received
a complaint from some residents about school-going teenagers smoking and loitering at
various places such as the football field and at the back of some houses during school time.
Based on the following notes, write a letter to the principal of the school informing of these
students’ activities

Students Consequences Action

Smoking Involve in drugs Get police help
Making noise Involve in crimes Report to parents
Playing truant Weak in studies/ Counseling
Poor results
 REPORT WRITING

A. GUIDELINES FOR REPORT WRITING

1. There are many types of reports –
Newspaper report, chart and graph report, police reports, club activity report,
etc.
2. Write a title at the centre top of your report.
3. When sending a report to your principal or president of club/society,
state to whom you are writing to at the top left of the report. Write your name at
the bottom and below the name, write the date.
4. Write clearly and specifically. Be brief.
5. Write one idea, one paragraph
6. Remember to sign at the bottom of the report and write your name in
block letters below the signature.
7. Use past tense to describe the happenings.
8. Read through to check your spelling, grammar and punctuation.

B. SAMPLE ESSAY
You are the Secretary of the Interact Club in your school. Write a report on a
community service done by your society.

Community Service Programme at SinarHarapan Old Folk’s Home

The Interact Club carried out a community service programme on 12th August 2010.
The club visited SinarHarapan Old Folk’s Home at Jalan Kuching, Kuala Lumpur. A
total of 30 club members, accompanied by 4 teachers including the principal, Datin
Sharmini, participated in this community service programme.
The main objective of this programme is to instil a sense of respect, love and care
towards senior citizens. Another reason is to bring cheers to them who had been
abandoned by their children. Furthermore, this program enabled members to
volunteer their services to the old folks and also make them useful citizens.
At the home, we carried out many interesting activities such as cooking and feeding
the old folks, playing simple games and cleaning up their rooms. Besides, we also
presented some clothes and money to the home. Our school teachers and students
contributed the clothes and money.
All of us had a memorable time there. We promised to visit them another time. We
hope to have this kind of programme more often.
Masliza
(Masliza)
Secretary of
Interact Club
SMK Seksyen19 Shah Alam
Complete the map with the information from the above report.

INTRO OBJECTIVES

……………………………… …………………………………………………………………

………………………………. ………………………………………………....................

………………………………. ……………………………………………………………………
..
………………………………..

COMMUNITY
SERVICE

FUTURE PLAN

1.______________________
_____________________

2.______________________
ACTIVITIES _____________________

……………………………………………………………………...

………………………………………………..........................

……………………………………………………………………..

……………………………………………………………………..
TASK

MODEL QUESTION

Recently, the Interact Club in your school visited an old folk’s home. Write a report of the
visit for the school magazine. In your report, describe what took place at the home. Use the
following points to help you
- Date, time and place
- Activities carried out: painted old buildings
: cleaned their rooms
: cooked for old folks
: fed bedridden old folks
: chatted with them
: sang songs
: played indoor games
- What happened at the end?
: gave away clothes
: hugged everyone before leaving
: sad but promised to come back

When writing your report, you should

 use all the notes given
 elaborate on the given notes to make it interesting