Need help with FOR XML in SQL Server2008?

Can't say for sure but it would seem that, as far as your course is concerned, 'well-formed' includes a requirement for a top-level element, which is what ROOT provides. Might take a look at a href="http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms190922.aspx" rel="nofollow"http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/…/a