托福考试作文评分标准

在OG第3版的211页上，有如下一道题目：

Do you agree or disagree with the following statement?

Always telling the truth is the most important consideration in any relationship.

Use specific reasons and examples to support your answer.

这是一道很典型的托福独立写作题。在这道题后面，OG列出了如下一段话，这段话是出卷人写给考官的，告诉考官考生可能会怎么写，应该怎么改。

This topic supports a variety of approaches. Some writers disagree with the statement and describe instances where to them it is appropriate to lie; typically these include white lies, lies to avoid hurting others, and lies in a business context 【which often have more to do with not disclosing proprietary information than with outright lying】。 Others take the position that lies be get more lies and undermine trust. These writers present examples that support the statement. Still others look at both sides of the issue, often delineating or classifying situations where they consider lying appropriate and others where they consider lying inappropriate or more consequential. The telling of stories—real and hypothetical—is not inappropriate; it is reasonable to illustrate one's ideas on this topic with examples.

通过上述的段落，我们得出两个信息：独立写作可以写中立;独立写作中，可以用具体的例子来写，哪怕是编造的例子都可以。

在OG的213页和212页中，分别有以下两篇文章。读者们可以在不看到分数的情况下，先读以下两篇文章，看看到底哪篇好。

【第一篇】

Some people believe that it is one of the most important value in many relationships to tell the truth all the time. However, it cannot be always the best choice to tell the truth in many situatioins. Sometimes white lies are indispensible to keep relationships more lively and dilightly. There are some examples to support this idea.

Firstly, in the relationships between lovers, it is often essential to compliment their lovers on their appearance and their behavior. Even though they do not think that their boyfriend or girlfriend looks good on their new shoe s and new clothes, it will probably diss them by telling the truth. On the other hand, little compliments will make them confident and happy making their relationship more tight.

Secondly, parents need to encourage their children by telling lies. Even if they are doing bad work on studying or exercising, telling the truth will hurt their hearts. What they need is a little encouraging words instead of truthful words.

Thirdly, for some patients telling them their current state of their desease will probably desperate them. It is accepted publically not to let the patients know the truth. They may be able to have hope to overcome their desease without knowing the truth.

In conclusion, it is not always better to tell the truth than lies. Some lies are acceptable in terms of making people's life more profusely. Not everybody has to know the truth, and it will lead them more happier not knowing it. In these cases, white lies are worth to be regarded as a virtue of people's relationships.

【第二篇】

Always telling the truth in any relationship is really the most important consideration for many reasons. I could say that when you lie to someone, this person will not trust you anymore and what is a relationship based on? Trust, confidence, so the sense of relationship is being lost. Another point is that if the true is omitted once, it will surely appear sometime, somewhere and probably in the most unexpected way, causing lots of problems for the ones involved. So, the truth is the basis for everything.

First, confidence is the most important aspect of a friendship or a marriage, or anything like that, so, once it is lost, the whole thing goes down in a way that no one can bear it. To avoid losing confidence, there is only one way, telling the truth, lying will just help throwing it away. For example, a couple decided to go out on the weekend, but the man has a party to go with his friends to where he can not take his girlfriend and then he lies to her saying that he is sick and can not go to the date. She undertands him and they do not see each other in that weekend, but he goes to the party and has much fun. Suppose on monday, the girl talks to a friend that saw him at the party and asked why did not she go with him. She found out the true and all confidence was lost, the basis for their relation is now gone and what happens next is that they break up or if they do not, he will persist on lyes and someday it will end.

What happened to this couple is very common around here and many relationships, even friends and marriages end because of something like that. Some may argue that lying once or another will not interfere anything an d it is part of a relation, but I strongly disagree, the most important thing is the true, even if it is to determine the end of a relation, it must be told. There are more chances to end something lying than saying what really happened.

初看这两篇文章，我想会有相当比例的读者会认为第一篇好，原因是五段式，结构清晰，而第二篇只有3个段落，不合常规。但是，翻看OG的212页和213页，可以看到第一篇的原始分是3分，也就是Fair档，而第二篇的原始分是4分，可以上到Good档。

那第一篇很多人认为写得好，为什么分数那么低呢，托福考试作文评分标准到底是怎么样的呢?原因就在于论证展开不充分，虽然中间有3个段落，但是每个段落，尤其是文章的第3、4段，像蜻蜓点水般点过，一点都不具体。导致整篇文章只有264个单词，字数不够。反观第二篇，首先不是中国考生常写的5段式作文，中间只有1个段落，很明显第二段的第一个单词First都是多余的。但是为什么可以上到4分呢?在文章中，作者用了一个很具体的例子来支持展开。但是，这个例子本身是编造的，而且是有漏洞的。

细心的读者可以从“Suppose on monday, the girl talks to a friend that saw him at the party and asked why did not she go with him”这句话中找到逻辑的混乱和硬伤。本来这个Party就是不能带女朋友去的，那为什么男朋友的朋友还会问“你为什么不去”这样的话?这个思路上的混乱和前后矛盾太明显了。但是，这样的文章都可以拿4分，原因何在?论证充分具体，语言错误少。