PD3 Writing: Delprøve 1, the Personal E-mail — the Task That Breaks Grade Ties

Almost everyone preparing for PD3 skriftlig fremstilling trains Opgave A and Opgave B, and treats Delprøve 1 — the personal e-mail as a warm-up. That is backwards in one specific, expensive way.

The e-mail cannot pass you on its own. If you write only Delprøve 1 and leave, the highest grade available is 00. But when examiners are torn between two grades — 02 or 4, or the line between 00 and 02 — the e-mail is what they look at to break the tie. A good e-mail pulls you up. A weak one pulls you down. It is a small task with a decisive vote.

And the thing that decides whether it reads as good or weak is almost never grammar. It is whether your text sounds like a letter to a friend, or like a list of three answers.

The setup

The PD3 written production exam runs 2½ hours and all dictionaries are allowed. It has two parts, and you write both:

Delprøve 1 — a personal e-mail. A friend writes to you. Their message contains three points you need to respond to. There is no minimum word count for this task.
Delprøve 2 — a text on a general or societal topic. You choose Opgave A (describe a diagram) or Opgave B (write from experience). Minimum 200 words, three bullets.

Delprøve 2 carries the grade — its third bullet alone is roughly half the answer, and that is where B2 is genuinely tested. Delprøve 1 is where you protect the grade you earned there.

The grading rules nobody tells you

These come straight from the official assessment guidance for the written part of PD3, and they change how you should spend your time:

Delprøve 1 alone cannot pass. Only 00 or -3 is available if you answer nothing else.
Delprøve 2 alone is docked a full grade before quality is even weighed. Skipping the e-mail is never a strategy.
The e-mail is the tie-breaker between adjacent grades. This is its real function.
Examiners do not count your words. Minimums are guidance for you, not a counting exercise for them — only a serious deviation counts against you.
Answering off-brief costs marks even when the Danish is good. Respond to what was actually asked.

Point 4 is worth sitting with. A lot of candidates pad the e-mail out of anxiety, and padding is the exact opposite of what the top band rewards: precision, and a natural voice.

1. Reply to a person, not to a numbered list

Here is the single most useful sentence in the whole assessment guidance. The description of a just-passing e-mail says the text is typically organised as a list, with no natural reference back to the friend's message. The top description says the three points are answered in a personal, speech-like style, and that the writer refers back to the e-mail naturally.

So the difference between the bottom band and the top band is not vocabulary. It is a move — the reference back. You show, in your own words, that you read what your friend wrote before you answer it.

Weak (a list):

Jeg har det godt. Du skal melde dig ind i en klub. I skal leje en lejlighed.

Strong (a reply):

Du spurgte til flytningen, og jeg må indrømme, at den var mere kaotisk, end jeg havde regnet med.

Same information. One of them was written to somebody.

2. Vary how you refer back

There is a trap on the way up. The band just below the top describes exactly this: the points are answered with personal, spoken-sounding language, but the transitions are abrupt or the references back are stereotype — the same formula three times.

If every paragraph opens with "Du spurgte om…", you have found the technique and stopped there. Mix the forms:

"Du spurgte til…"
"Med hensyn til det, du skriver om…"
"Og så var der det med…"
"Til gengæld er jeg ikke i tvivl, når det gælder…"
"Det, du skriver om X, kender jeg godt fra…"

One direct reference, one woven in mid-paragraph, one that reacts before it answers. That is what "natural" looks like on paper.

3. Write the way you would speak

Talesprogslignende — speech-like — is the actual criterion, and it is easy to over-correct against. Many candidates have been drilled on formal writing all year and then write to a friend as if applying for a job.

What makes it sound spoken:

React before you inform. "Hvor er det dejligt at høre fra dig!" before the news.
Short sentences among the long ones. "Det tager tid. Men det kommer."
Small asides. "…og halvdelen af kasserne står stadig i kælderen."
Admit something. "Jeg må indrømme, at…", "Det fortryder jeg stadig lidt."
Everyday intensifiers: helt klart, faktisk, egentlig, heldigvis, i hvert fald.

What kills it: Hermed fremsendes…, Jeg skal hermed oplyse…, Vedrørende dit spørgsmål…. Save all of that for a letter to a kommune.

4. Give it a shape: react → answer → answer → answer → close

A working structure, one paragraph per element:

Opening — greet, react to their news, thank them for writing. Two or three lines.
Point 1 — answer with a concrete detail, not a general statement.
Point 2 — advise or comment, and give a reason or a small example from your own life.
Point 3 — take a position. "Hvis jeg var dig, ville jeg…"
Close — a forward-looking line and a warm sign-off.

Concrete detail is what carries this task. "Flytningen gik fint" says nothing. "Vi var tre dage om at pakke, og halvdelen af kasserne står stadig i kælderen" shows a person with a life.

5. A worked example

Say a friend writes that she is moving back to Aarhus, and asks how your own move went, what she should do about meeting new people, and whether she should rent or buy at first. A reply that would sit comfortably in the upper bands:

Kære Anne

Tak for din mail — hvor er det dejligt at høre fra dig! Og hvor lyder det spændende, at I endelig flytter tilbage til Aarhus.

Du spurgte til flytningen, og jeg må indrømme, at den var mere kaotisk, end jeg havde regnet med. Vi var tre dage om at pakke, og halvdelen af kasserne står faktisk stadig i kælderen. Men vi er faldet godt til, og der er heldigvis kort til både skole og arbejde.

Med hensyn til det, du skriver om at møde nye mennesker: meld dig ind i noget lokalt med det samme. Da vi flyttede, meldte jeg mig til en løbeklub, mest fordi jeg havde dårlig samvittighed — og det var faktisk der, jeg mødte de fleste af dem, jeg ser i dag. Det tager tid. Men det kommer.

Til gengæld er jeg ikke i tvivl, når det gælder boligen. Lej det første år. Så når I at finde ud af, hvilket kvarter I egentlig kan lide, før I binder jer til noget. Vi købte lidt for hurtigt, og det fortryder jeg stadig.

Sig endelig til, når I er landet — så laver jeg aftensmad.

Kærlig hilsen NN

Notice how little of that is advanced Danish. There is no rare vocabulary in it. What it has is three different ways of pointing back at her letter, one honest admission, one concrete number, and a reason attached to every piece of advice.

6. The clock

You have 150 minutes for both parts, and Delprøve 2 decides your grade. A workable split:

20–25 minutes on the e-mail, including a proofread.
Roughly 110 minutes on Delprøve 2, with about half of your writing there going into bullet three.
10–15 minutes at the end for the dictionary and a final read.

If the e-mail is eating 45 minutes, you are polishing the tie-breaker at the expense of the deciding vote. Write it, check it, move on.

Common mistakes

Answering the three points as three flat statements — the defining feature of the just-passing band.
Opening every paragraph with the same formula. Stereotyped references are explicitly named one band below the top.
Writing formally. The genre is a personal e-mail; formal register is a mismatch, not a safety net.
Padding for length. There is no minimum here, and examiners do not count.
Skipping it to buy time for Delprøve 2. That trades a tie-breaker for nothing.
Answering a question the friend didn't ask. Going off-brief costs marks regardless of language quality.
No sign-off. Kærlig hilsen, Mange hilsner, De bedste hilsner — pick one and end properly.

Phrase bank

Opening and reacting Tak for din mail! · Hvor er det dejligt at høre fra dig. · Undskyld, at jeg først svarer nu. · Hvor lyder det spændende. · Det var da ærgerligt at høre.

Referring back Du spurgte til… · Med hensyn til det, du skriver om… · Og så var der det med… · Det, du skriver om X, kender jeg godt. · Til gengæld er jeg ikke i tvivl, når det gælder…

Giving advice Hvis jeg var dig, ville jeg… · Jeg synes helt klart, du skal… · Prøv at… · Det kan godt betale sig at… · Jeg vil helt sikkert anbefale, at…

Backing it with your own experience Da vi flyttede, … · Det samme skete for mig, dengang… · Jeg har selv prøvet at… · Vi gjorde det omvendt, og det fortryder jeg lidt.

Sounding spoken Jeg må indrømme, at… · Helt ærligt… · Det tager tid, men det kommer. · Heldigvis… · I hvert fald…

Closing Sig endelig til, når… · Vi ses forhåbentlig snart. · Skriv, når du ved mere. · Kærlig hilsen · Mange hilsner

FAQ

How many words should the PD3 e-mail be?

There is no minimum for Delprøve 1. The 200-word minimum applies to Delprøve 2. In practice a complete e-mail that answers all three points naturally tends to land somewhere around 150–200 words, but length is not what is being measured — and examiners do not count.

Does the e-mail count towards my grade?

Not as a separate score, and not enough to pass on its own — answering only Delprøve 1 caps you at 00. Its role is to decide close cases: with a borderline Delprøve 2, a strong e-mail pushes the grade up and a weak one pushes it down.

Should I use du or De?

Du. It is a personal e-mail to a friend. De would be a register error here.

Can I use a dictionary during the written production exam?

Yes — all dictionaries are permitted for skriftlig fremstilling. They are not permitted in the reading comprehension exam.

Related guides

Practise PD3 writing in Bestå

Write PD3-format answers against the clock — both the personal e-mail and the longer text — then get feedback on structure, how well you develop your points, grammar and vocabulary, graded on the official 00–12 scale. Download free on iOS and Android.