IELTS Live - Task 2 Writing - Clear, Confident, Band 9

welcome to today's live ielts class my name is adrian and i'm streaming to you from beautiful budapest i hope everybody has had a good week so far working hard studying lots finding some time to relax staying healthy and strong hi kyber hi rovney hi rocky hi kush karen thank you for the salutations and hello welcome everyone this class is presented to you by ae help dot com for academic ielts success make sure to visit us there check out our premium package check out our free course and for the general outs visit us at g i e l t s help dot com that's general ieltshelp.com on both of these websites we have lots and lots of great help for you to improve this is the academic one here with the blue background click that big red button to join the premium package for the general version of the test it's the green background click that big red button to join us there of course both of our websites are supported by applications from your play stores academic aisles help links to aehealth.com and general ielts help from apple and google play linked to gileshelp.com hi nazir hi rashika nice to see our members in the class that's fantastic if you ever have questions students always just send me an email feel free be confident i will answer as soon as i can usually within 24 hours my email is adrian aehelp.com in today's class we are looking at task 2 writing i will tell you what to do how to do to really maximize your score and stay confident throughout the writing process tomorrow members will do a task one and uh for everybody we'll start the task two today and then we'll likely be finishing it up tomorrow so first things first when you get to your task two you should always read the question really carefully okay i'm gonna brighten up our day a little bit here there we go a little bit brighter i'm feeling fantastic koosh thanks for asking uh so let's read the question this question was sent to us by one of our students i believe perhaps a member here is the task 2 question so task 2 writing you should spend about 40 minutes on this task that's great always spend the 40 minutes because it's worth two-thirds of your writing score prevention is better than cure period boom okay a lot of information there um researching and treating diseases is too costly so it would be better to invest in preventative measures to what extent do you agree or disagree okay so there's our question now we want to paraphrase this to make sure that we understand it okay so paraphrase this in your own words paraphrasing can be useful for your essay and it's definitely useful for your planning because you make sure that you understand the question and you also collect useful vocabulary and you start thinking about your answers so think about your answer okay so uh paraphrase the question so step one paraphrase now um this doesn't mean that your paraphrase is your introduction okay um i know that a lot of students learn this from different places but this is not necessarily your introduction because that would be too simple for high band scores okay so if you're one of those students who just paraphrases and says this essay will discuss both the benefits and negatives of investing money into preventative measures um then you are not writing the correct introduction okay so uh first let's just paraphrase in our own words to make sure that we understand this okay so step one paraphrasing i'm going to do that right now as well with you okay so stopping illness before it starts is better than treating the sick okay investigating and curing illnesses is much too expensive and it is wiser to spend money on effective ways to avoid illness okay sure to what degree do you think this to be true or false okay so there's my paraphrase i can see that saswati has been working hard to paraphrase as well um saswati says uh it's better to be safe than sorry it would be great to take preemptive measures um than experimenting in healing illness as this is expensive to what extent do you support or contradict this idea very nicely swati i like your use of the word preemptive measures instead of preventative preemptive is a nice paraphrase for that michael fan or member says precaution is much more important than elimination investigating and alleviating illness is expensive therefore the time and money should be spent on precautionary approaches notice this nice vocabulary students that we're getting from all of these paraphrases like prevention can be called pre-emptive and precaution okay good nice vocabulary good well done okay and different word forms of course precautionary and so forth and michael uh fed is also using the word alleviate instead of cure okay and we use that quite often it's a nice word alleviate illness very nice okay i can see some of you are preparing for these classes that's great beck john says prevention is beneficial is more beneficial than treatment scrutinizing and recuperating from illness is expensive so it would be beneficial to capitalize on preventative actions very good bec chen i corrected a little bit of the grammar but otherwise that was really nice marasa always lovely to have you in class marasa says interjection is preferable to treatment investing in treating illness is exorbitant exorbitant therefore it's better to spend money on preventative steps to what level do you approve or disprove of this very good all right nicely done students so we've done some good paraphrasing we gathered some good vocabulary we're clear on the question now let's identify the topic so uh what are we talking about here so what is the topic what are we talking about okay identify the topic that's always your second step okay identify the topic and the controlling idea or ideas okay so what's the topic in this case uh what are we actually talking about yeah so the topic is uh disease yeah we're talking about illness right yeah um you're right michael fenn the simplest way to talk about this is illness all right that's the actual topic okay so illness or avoidance of disease alex that's a nice one as well i like samuel so samuel says funding for disease so yeah that's probably the most accurate topic okay so funding for counteracting disease counteracting is a nice word here because counteracting could be prevention or it could be intervention as well okay so that's often the technical words used by the medical field uh prevention and intervention right so topic funding for counteracting disease and what is the controlling idea okay so that's definitely your topic funding for counteracting disease and what's your controlling idea okay let's see if you can identify that accurately uh again students keep in mind that you should never start writing before you know your topic and controlling idea clearly as you will likely write off topic which will get low band scores even with great english okay so always make sure to stop and figure out your topic and controlling idea before you begin okay muhammad azad says prevention is better than cure okay priyanka's saying i'm not sure help me out here okay if you're not sure this is always when you want to reach out to somebody else and ask um keep in mind if funding is the topic right then that's going to be a part of the controlling idea so i would say the controlling idea is funding for uh prevention is a better idea than funding for intervention okay so that would be um the controlling idea okay that makes the most sense all right again you have to be specific you have to be specific here right all right so hopefully that makes sense all right okay um so what is funding for counteracting disease okay the answer for that um it should be clear so money spent finish my sentence what is it so right now uh what we're doing for those of you who are joining is we looked at our task two questions and we're planning our essays so we're figuring out what to write before we begin writing because we want to write a confident essay clearly and confidently and we want to write it with good information okay so harpreet says it's buying medicine uh maxed back says it's investing money kyber says the action which individuals do in order to prevent uh the effect of disease okay so samuel says it's money spent for infrastructure research uh equipment uh yeah okay so funding it's money spent for research infrastructure um education production to minimize the harm of diseases in the human population okay what's the next question so what's the next question let's keep it simple yeah let's not forget cure or remedies as marasa says yeah so next question is why do we fund counteracting diseases okay so why do we do that um of course the first answer that comes to mind is to decrease human suffering right and improve quality of life okay sure what would be another um answer okay uh very good rajvir so rajvir says hey girls and guys let's take it a step further let's think critically let's visualize let's picture this uh to improve productivity right absolutely to yeah so thinking beyond the humanitarian aspect of uh improving quality of life and decreasing suffering we also want to make sure that humans as a population are productive right so that we can keep growing food we can keep developing and prospering absolutely so how do we do it okay again students you really want to ask the right questions think about this now yes in the real ielts exam you don't have time to write all this down i realize that i know that i'm not crazy but at home you definitely have to practice doing this on paper or on your computer and in the exam you have to go through these questions really quickly in your head so that you get the right ideas for your essay okay so how do we fund counteracting diseases all right so beck john says by allocating government funds okay and beck john even be specific right by allocating billions of dollars in government funding absolutely so we're not talking about a bag of potatoes here okay all right murasa says by giving a high quality of educations to researchers and doctors yeah so by building universities with public money to train doctors sure that's okay let's not it's going a little bit off topic um and also um through donations yeah charity and um also through uh private investment as well right so through charity and through the private sector so don't forget students there's also billions of dollars spent by the private sector on this for example pharmaceutical companies right okay so that's going on as well great so now we have a much clearer idea of what's going on okay i'm sure a lot of you you know you thought about this and you had a kind of an idea of what it means to fund counteracting diseases but now that you really went through the steps it's uh it's going to be much clearer just like your math teacher always told you to show your work in middle school and high school when you're practicing task two at home students you have to show your work because that's how you develop your critical thinking that's how you think faster for the ielts exam and you come up with better ideas and coming up with better ideas is one of the fastest ways to improve your band scores is that clear is everybody did everybody follow my line of thought from your math teacher telling you to go through each of the steps for the formula and show your work it's the same concept for task two writing okay so uh this is just a tip here okay so tip like your middle school math teacher said show your work which means go through the steps of critical thinking and write down questions and answers for your planning when you prepare for ielts at home okay so show your work go through these steps and of course while you're doing this you're practicing your writing in a very nice structured way so make sure to do that okay all right um okay so let's keep going here uh now the controlling idea so uh what is investing money into prevention that's the focus here so answer that for me what does it mean to invest money into prevention instead of intervention now we know an intervention means curing a person once they're already sick but what does it mean to invest money into prevention okay what does that mean in your own words and this is important because this will be the content of your essay so hari says it's focusing funds on precautions okay um spell it out so when you're thinking about this think of definitive paraphrasing so it means spending money to and finish my sentence don't just use the word precautions spell it out in simple terms okay boomi that's how we do it by eating a balanced diet okay keep it simple so spending money uh simple as beautiful students it's not easy but it's beautiful zen says guidelines for how gen hygienic conditions that's more of the how okay just pal says awareness okay still don't see it yet so spending money to keep people and here's the word starts with an h what's the missing word spending money to keep people and now some of you are going to be like oh man really yeah i gotta think like that for all just keep it simple because then you get those points those band scores yamarasa that's right healthy okay healthy so spending money to keep people healthy that's the key word if you don't come up with that word in your thinking you're at a disadvantage okay when you when a hundred students get this task to question those students who come up with the word spending money to keep people healthy will have a much better chance of getting an extra band score even if they're on the same level okay so spending money to keep people healthy why we already answered this why spend money to keep people healthy okay um the answer there we already have that is good quality of life and productivity okay now how so how can we spend money to keep people healthy okay um so you gave me a lot of good ideas i saw a lot of answers for that already okay so some of you said [Music] vaccines okay that's a good answer what would be some more uh rajvir says good quality nutrition so provide the public with quality nutrition yeah absolutely okay um what else uh sammy building hospitals would not be prevention okay building hospitals would be intervention boomi says proper hygiene so education of nutrition and good hygiene hygiene means a students to um to keep clean okay it's like washing your hands when they get dirty and so on okay so that's proper hygiene h-y-g-i-e-n-e okay um what else let's see uh yeah boomi very good regular exercise physical examination so regular exercise sports facilities okay uh regular checkups sure those are the different ways all right lots of ideas now so now we're flowing uh with ideas so we've come up with the what why and how for the topic the controlling idea now we need to take a position so again the question to what extent do you agree okay also laws regulations to decrease smoking and negative behaviors as well so um now you can tackle this question so now that you've gone through the what why how for the topic and the controlling ideas now you can accurately answer this to what extent do you agree that money should be spent on prevention instead of intervention so ahmanjad says i fully agree with this statement arza says i completely agree that spending on precaution is the better option yeah okay um completely agree is a good idea as well uh i might say mostly agree just because if people do get sick then it is important that we still have doctors and nurses working to cure diseases so um answer completely agree or mostly agree i would say now i'm going to show you how to do mostly agree here as well some of you going well what is he going to do with mostly agree okay good so when you completely agree what you need to do for the thesis so the next step okay step three is write a direct thesis with two clear points about the reasons that you completely agree with this statement now this is the most important sentence of your essay so make sure it's good okay it's the last sentence of your introductory paragraph all right so this is where you shine okay uh so hattie says i strongly disagree because it's hard to keep all people from illness and if someone got sick they may infect the whole community okay hattie we're going with the strongly agree side here you can go with the disagree side it's a tough argument but you could do that as well okay always choose the easy argument all right so samuel says i partially agree since there might be newer types of diseases resistant to preventative measures okay again let's go with the strongly or mostly agree this time students because we can't do all of the variations at the same time and i think strongly agree is the easiest argument always choose the easiest argument for ielts students ielts is not the place to explore your philosophical side okay you can do that in university or in your work don't do it on ielts on ielts always choose the easy answer okay so becca says many individuals think that prevention is better than the remedy personally i agree with this statement since it's cheaper and more efficient okay saswati says some people claim that there should be more funds provided for prevention of disease compared to their treatment i completely agree with this statement because prevention is more cost effective and helps eradicate disease good so those are some good thesis statements saswati um yeah very nicely done good thesis statement bec chan and saswati well done okay all right so marasa says i strongly agree that spending money on prevention is better because it not only enhances quality of life but also saves money that's a very nice thesis statement mara so marasa says i strongly agree i'd be careful with saying completely because as some of you have said yeah i mean you can't completely stop uh funding for curing diseases that probably wouldn't be the smartest plan but strongly agreeing with prevention i think even most doctors and nurses would agree with you they would say yeah that's why we tried to focus on prevention so i strongly agree that prevention is better than intervention as it not only improves quality of life but it also saves lots of money okay so paying attention uh to parallel grammar form uh good that works okay so that works all right okay so our thesis statement is good um we're on the same page now again students some of you might say hey adrian's out to lunch investing into cures are important as well sure no problem but for this class let's focus on this uh thesis statement because it's sensible and it's easy to write about so before i continue with starting my introduction i want to make sure that first person voice is okay notice how i'm using i here i is called the first person voice of the author because the author is speaking directly from their own subjective position now should i use i or not uh that depends on the question okay so always double check the question to see what voice of the author you should use okay if you're not familiar with voices of the author please research that it's very important for writing so uh read about first person second person and third person voice of the author there are some very strict rules in writing about this okay so make sure you're familiar with these voices so here it says uh spend 40 minutes on this task prevention is better than a cure researching and treating diseases is too costly so it would be better to invest in preventative measures to what extent do you agree or disagree so it is asking for your personal opinion give example explanations and examples to support your opinion when you see the word you and your appear in the question that gives you a very strong indication that this is indeed a first person okay so that double appearance of the pronoun you your it's a first person so it's asking specifically so we're good here we're good with the first person voice okay all right uh so then we can now keep going and all of that wonderful planning that we just did with the topic and the controlling idea becomes very useful for us in our essay so when some students think oh this planning but it's wasting time no no there's a wise saying the y saying goes a little bit of planning goes a long way i'm not the first person to say this nor did i invent this it has been around for many a year so and it's very very true it's not by accident okay so a little bit of planning goes a long way and that's very true for task two okay so a little bit of planning goes a long way um those kinds of tips and tricks on how to kind of stick together an essay that you might learn from some books or some courses the students they're really not effective for the high band scores so i highly recommend avoiding that especially if you're going for band sevens or higher okay there's no way that they will give you a band 7 when you write preventing disease is more important than intervening this essay will discuss the pros and cons no it's not going to get a good mark okay you need to do better all right so let's start the introduction let's do better okay the introduction starts with a hook the hook don't overthink it it's a simple 8 to 12 word sentence that introduces the topic in some interesting way to the reader okay now of course this is again where all of our planning comes into play and you know that our topic was funding for counteracting disease so think about funding for counteracting disease and give me a topic or give me a hook that would be interesting and that has to do for with funding for counter acting disease okay when you know the steps to writing um then you can become very quick okay so uh obviously i teach i'll so it's clear for me but for me to write a 300 word essay for task 2 at the band 9 level takes about 20 minutes not even 15. okay satisfying times chaby says the advancement in science leads human kinds to rethink about diseases in a different way compared to old generations too complicated chaby keep it simpler you have about 20 words there keep it to just a few words okay all right rajvir singh says governments around the globe spend billions of dollars each year to cure illnesses very nice hook regime very nice hook catchy it mentions the topic right because you're talking about funding the billions of dollars very good yeah bec chan is asking um like sir how much critical thinking and planning do we need to do in our mind in the actual exam that's a really good question so i'm going to just derail and sidetrack to that for just a moment so this question just came from uh one of our students uh beck john bechten says how much time should i actually spend on planning task two okay that's a very good question all right the answer is uh anywhere from uh three to five minutes okay now again beck john in the ielts you're not writing these down so five minutes of planning is actually quite a bit okay so five minutes on planning 35 minutes on writing and maybe one or two minutes on review if you if you have the time still okay that's what i recommend that's how you should uh spread your time definitely have some clear ideas before you start okay all right great great good one okay all right the hook the hook the hook keep the hook simple um elvis says medical investment is an important matter nowadays sure okay keep thinking about medical funding alvas it's not bad uh samuel says how do we plan just scribbles yeah samuel if you have some really good ideas that come to mind you might scribble down a couple words but most of it is mental during the exam right okay muhammad says every year people spend millions of dollars to stay in good health um okay how about this students uh let's uh let me throw a hook out there for you and again this comes with practice so nobody's born writing fantastic essays keep that in mind okay so uh funding the war on illness is the greatest is oh one of the biggest expenses incurred by both individuals and society all right that will catch your reader's attention so funding the war on illness is one of the biggest expenses incurred by both individuals and society would you agree with me would you agree that most people in their lifetime especially in our old age one of the the biggest amounts of money that we spend in our life is to fight sickness whether it's for medication hospital care doctors therapy and so on and not only for us as each individual person trying to stay healthy and strong until the very very last breath but also for society so ask yourself this question if you look at an essay and you read this sentence does that make you want to read more are you thinking okay i want to see what the next sentence is telling me i want to see what the next sentence is telling me that's what good writing does okay and the ielts is not an esl exam i have to keep saying this because so many students think that ielts is an esl exam and english is a second language exam ielts is not an english as a second language exam it's an english proficiency exam which means it's measuring your ability to use the english language as a native speaker with college university high school skills okay so it's not an esl test so they the ielts people aren't really concerned too much about your um grammar or vocabulary they're concerned about how well are you using it in your writing okay all right yeah alex physiotherapy okay so that's our hook okay that gets you reading now uh what comes after the hook the background the background is definitions and importance okay now this is easy if you've done some good planning because definitions means defining the controlling ideas and talking about the importance of the question okay that you're being asked so that's the background that's the background okay so here when we look for definitions we usually get that from the whys okay so remember our why questions why do we fund counteracting disease to decrease human suffering improve quality of life to improve productivity okay that's one of our whys maybe look at the other y as well and the house and you have all the definitions and importance that you could want okay so the next one it's the same right why spend money to keep people healthy good quality of life and productivity so clearly that is the background okay so here we go with the background okay write your background students i want to see your background as well and then i'll write mine john says every government allocates a certain amount of money to prevent and cure diseases thereby keeping citizens healthy very nice back john very nice okay i see you've taken a second stab at it as well good uh rajvir says millions of people experience serious health concerns each year so it is solely responsibility of governments to assist them in these bad times to improve their lifestyles is that that'll work as well regsphere i don't agree that it's just governments i think the private sector also invests but that's details in the ielts you can still get a ban nine even if you don't write that okay satisfying time says although searching for a cure for disease may look like the correct approach at first glance investing money to prevent getting sick is the fur in the first place is better to improve uh life expectancy and productivity yeah quality of life rather than life expectancy satisfying times yeah good so nice some nice answers there marasa baraki says governments each year spend millions of dollars on prevention and intervention to keep people healthy right we're at both sides here it's the introduction to the question okay so background for me here would be [Music] not only governments but also the private sector invest billions of dollars on both uh prevention and intervention of diseases to maintain public health thereby um improving quality of life or life quality let's say keep it a little simple quality and productivity okay because life quality and life productivity those both work so this is again your band nine example here okay um and then the importance of the question here so what's the importance of the question well maximizing the return on investment is in the interest of all people okay so maximizing the return on investment in the healthcare field is in the interest of all people here i put in in the healthcare field because that's more specific and healthcare doesn't necessarily mean intervention it could also mean prevention as well right so that would be my background and then here my thesis just comes into play and there it is the full introduction okay so that's your band nine introduction now again students i make that look simple but that comes with practice okay and why am i writing quickly now and clearly because i've done all that planning so now it's just a matter of putting together the ideas in this standard structured persuasive essay okay so take a look at it here's the introduction funding the war on illness is one of the biggest expenses incurred by both individuals and society not only governments but also the private sector sector invests billions of dollars on both prevention and intervention of diseases to maintain public health thereby improving life quality and productivity maximizing the return on investment in the health care field is in the interest of all people i strongly agree that prevention is better than intervention as it not only improves quality of life but also saves a lot of money okay that will get you a band nine now i have a little bit of repetition here with prevention intervention so i might do a bit of more paraphrasing here okay with prevention intervention or as preemptive measures rather than interactive measures something like that but overall it's definitely at a high level okay tenzin says please explain the background one more time so sure tenzin no problem okay the introduction depending on the style of essay okay so the introductory paragraph in an essay is like the opening scene to a movie okay so think about it that way in an opening scene to a movie you are introduced to the context like for example the year and place as well as the characters okay so the elements of the movie okay also movies start with a hook some interesting situation like an explosion which keeps you in your seat to watch the rest of the movie okay so i hope you get my analogy here um a good introduction does similar okay with hook plus background which is the context right the players the definitions uh plus the thesis okay which will keep the reader reading all right so that's a good introduction and i think somebody just asked how many words should a good introduction have in a 300 word essay 50 to 80 words zen federic you're right it's about 50 to 80 words so if you look at my introduction it's roughly 50 to 80 words okay i would guess it's actually somewhere around 65. um now again remember uh students that uh the question for task 2 says 250 words minimum so higher level essays band 789 they're usually closer to 300 words okay so 50 to 80 words if you're writing only like 25 words which are basically prevention is a really important approach to health and this essay will explain why it's way too short for an introduction okay in the real world not too many people would keep reading that essay okay um students uh tomorrow i will be back at the same time to finish the body paragraphs and the conclusion with you all right so uh here we go everyone uh if you have any questions again uh send your questions to adrian at aehealth.com and to learn the correct ways to write uh make sure to join us at ae help dot com for academic ielts and help.com for general we just had a student write us an email like two minutes before this class and they said thanks i used your writing strategy and got a band eight uh all the way up from a band 6.5 so it works it's proven we have students sending us emails thankfully all the time with great improvements in the writing band scores have a fantastic rest of your day everyone make sure to join me tomorrow to learn a bit more about the body paragraphs and the conclusion stay safe stay healthy stay strong prevention is better so eat your vitamins bye for now everyone i'm adrian signing out from budapest see you tomorrow you

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Keywords: IELTS, Task 2, writing, essay, paragraphs, sentences, vocabulary, introduction paragraph, band 9, body paragraphs, conclusion, IELTS description, English examination, writing IELTS, writing for task two, second part of writing, writing strategies, IELTS task 2, Lesson, Teacher, Learn, Student, Lessons, Learning, Free, Intro, Tutorial, IELTS task 2 explain, IELTS task 2 learning, IELTS task 2 explanations, plan, planning, understand, skills, strategies

Id: 7t6CWIQVM4I

Length: 53min 40sec (3220 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 25 2020