IELTS Live - Task 2 Writing - Planning for High Scores

hi students and welcome to today's live ielts class my name is adrian and i'm streaming to you from the carpathian basin i hope everybody is having a good week staying healthy and staying strong in this class we are looking at task two writing a brand new question and we're going to discuss how to plan to get those nice high band scores write an original essay with a strong introduction this is a members chat class welcome abhishek hi hassan of course everybody is welcome to watch to become a member click the join button next to the subscribe button if you don't see that you can send me an email and i can give you some more instructions my email if you have any questions there's adrian at aehelp.com hi victor hi david hi preet nick hill carolina beck john and janil beck john if i'm not mistaken you've done your exam correct me if i'm wrong let us know how that went if you don't mind sharing all right everyone um so this class as usual is presented to you by aehelp.com for academic ielts learning definitely visit us at aehelp.com uh spend a few dollars join the premium package do yourself a favor and use the materials there fantastic beck jen i hope it went well um and for general ielts check us out at g ieltshelp.com and again join the premium package there i'll show you how to do that in just a moment this is the academic a help dot com you can click that big red button to join there and this is the general with the green background at glshelp.com and you can click that big red button to join us there good we've got lots of members in the class fantastic all right everyone uh of course we have apps that link with our web portals academic ielts help app links to aehealth.com general i'll help app links to gltshelp.com so make sure to install those if you don't have them all right lots of members that's great i got kind of an interesting uh task two question for the day task two is very similar in the academic and general versions of the exam so it's suitable for both versions here we go students so let's take a look at today's question and let's work through it all right first steps first read the question carefully so here we go ielts task two writing you should spend about 40 minutes on this task practice that timing so you don't stress during the exam you have a good feeling of how much time has lapsed okay and then here we go people often believe information in the media such as news broadcasts and newspaper articles without question what are the advantages and disadvantages of this and give your own opinion write at least 250 words hmm okay all right so uh step by step then we've read the question if you're not exactly sure what the question is asking maybe read it one more time if you think you have a good idea what should you do next so you've read the question and what should you do next so what should you do after you read the question and this is something you should practice at home every single time you work through a task too and i highly recommend taking a minute to do this uh in the official exam as well yeah it's paraphrasing that's right abhishek so you always want to paraphrase the question uh why do you want to do that so why do you want to paraphrase the question so before you begin to write paraphrase the question why is it so important to do that abhishek says while you get more vocabulary and you can understand the question perfectly bec john says to understand it clearly absolutely i say this time and time again but i cannot say it enough one of the most common mistakes in the ielts exam writing section especially for students candidates that have good english is they are writing off topic or they do not completely answer the question and i can tell always in the essays and the examiners can tell that the student didn't pay enough attention to the question so by paraphrasing this uh the question uh you make sure that you really do understand it and you and you keep focused on the idea so um yeah so this way you are more certain that you understand the question and it helps to stay focused on the question when writing okay absolutely and then there are some other reasons that some of you said like uh good vocabulary it helps you gather some useful words that you can use in your essay helps you to think about your answer or start thinking about your answer already so definitely um now is it enough for the introduction to just paraphrase the question i've seen a lot of instructions online and i've seen a lot of students do this where their introductory paragraph is basically a paraphrase of the question and then they write something like this essay will discuss the benefits and demerits of believing in the media and i will include my own opinion so is that kind of an introduction acceptable so regime says no it's a bad idea yeah i mean it's acceptable but it's a bad idea why is it a bad idea so why is it a bad idea uh to just paraphrase and say i will write about this what's what's not good about that why doesn't that kind of an introduction get the higher band scores so victor says because it's unclear yeah it doesn't really you're right victor it doesn't really give your reader any valuable information about that question right exactly welcome mahi um yeah it doesn't guide the reader exactly so there's no real value in it okay and it's kind of a template the ielts examiners see thousands of those kinds of introductions and as soon as they see it they start thinking six six point five six six point five it's like if the candidate is going to be mechanical and unoriginal the examiner is going to be unoriginal and mechanical so if i write an introduction that's just a paraphrase and this essay we'll discuss the examiner will say fine 6.5 or 6 as long as it's a perfect essay okay so there's easier ways to get a high band score good okay all right uh let's uh let's do this so uh paraphrase this question for me people often believe information in the media such as news broadcasts newspaper articles without question what are the advantages and disadvantages now one way to paraphrase is you're going word by word like individuals frequently okay so word by word another way and once you're good or you feel that you are you know improving and fluent in english try to paraphrase by thinking of the whole idea and then not necessarily going word by word but doing kind of a general paraphrase of your own interpretation okay that's kind of the next level of paraphrasing and you should always be striving or reaching for that level of paraphrasing where rather than going word by word you're thinking of the entire idea and then interpreting it in your own words at the same time staying accurate to the details is everybody clear on that what i just said there so when you start your paraphrasing and you're improving you know go word by word or if you get stuck go word by word once you feel more confident really try to read a whole sentence or couple sentences and then interpret and paraphrase with your own words without necessarily sequencing okay everybody got that so it's good to to do that okay carolina says yes with the heart thank you all right so let's take a look at some of these paraphrases david says individuals generally rely on data found in the media like articles in newspapers tv programs and news on the radio without judging the veracity and origin of such information david that is a very nice paraphrase that's the kind of interpretive paraphrasing that i'm talking about well done david good job what are the benefits and negatives of this phenomenon and give your own opinion right david and what's my opinion okay good karolina says individuals often accept the information in the media such as news broadcasts and newspaper articles without asking if it's true or not what are the pros and cons of this and give your own thoughts okay that works carolina that's a nice subtle and exact paraphrase i like it victor says individuals frequently think that mass media information is broadcast in journals are without question are without flaw so victor i would change the word questions to flaw without flaw what are the positives and negatives of this trend give your own idea rajvir says individuals frequently trust the information published in the media such as new news broadcasts and newspaper articles without raising any concern very nice paraphrasing rajvir what are the pros and cons of this phenomenon and state your position well done that's a beautiful beautiful paraphrase regime really nice uh individuals frequently ascertained that the information in the means of mass communication like publishing and internet articles are factual let's get rid of that without question okay so are factual fact factual another way to say it's the truth what are the drawbacks and merits of this and state your position very good okay uh gineal certain individuals think that all the data in the media such as news reports and magazines uh statements are fact what are the benefits and deficits yeah sure so individuals accept or let's go frequently except the information given in mass media on tv and in publishings as the objective truth and do not question its reliability what are the pros and cons of this attitude and state your own thoughts on this okay good all right so that's my paraphrase yeah one of the words that comes to my mind when i read this right away is the word uh objective objective truth right hopefully some of you thought about that as well so objective truth subjective truth back those kinds of words coming into our thoughts okay great so now uh the next step and i think a couple of you said this a little bit early uh what's the next step here so where do we go from here we've got a good paraphrase and we have lots of members in here today so i won't be able to read all of your responses to every question i ask but please do give them i will try to rotate with different people for different questions so that everybody gets at least a bit of feedback from me okay but importantly even if i don't read it i still often will catch a glimpse of it so i might reference or refer to it later and also it's great practice for you so keep going okay all right um so everybody rajveer viktor abhishek you're all on the same page you're saying topic controlling idea yeah very important so identify the topic never start writing a paper without knowing exactly what the topic is because that's just silly you could be writing about a different topic and that's not going to fare well by any means so identify the topic and controlling ideas okay and there's actually a lot of so you know we focus on ielts preparation but for those of you going into university and studying abroad i highly highly recommend doing some research online and just looking at some practice materials for identifying the topic and controlling ideas i'm sure that if you search the internet ask mother google for how to identify topic and controlling ideas of essay questions or exercises identifying topic and controlling idea of essay questions i'm sure that you'll find lots and lots of materials online for that okay so identify the topic in the controlling ideas yeah definitely that's what we want to do so what's the topic here what are we talking about that's what you have to think about is what are we talking about right so uh david says the topic is the information in the media rajvir says people often trust information available in the media um information in the media okay i think you can simplify it so keep it concise some of you have half the topic some of you are a little bit off top topic so bec chan says media abhishek says media information mass media objectivity hassan i think you're the closest uh so far nick hill says information given in the media romaine very good romaine says reliability of uh media yeah i agree that would be the topic so uh trust in the media okay that's what we're talking about we're talking about people's trust in the media or another way to say it so there's a few different ways you're basically paraphrasing the topic what romaine said reliability of media and we're talking about mass media so we don't have to spell that out but that's what we're talking about specifically okay we're talking about media more specifically we're talking about the reliability of the media okay um and from what aspect so when you're thinking about the controlling idea uh what you want to ask yourself is what about the reliability of the media so uh what's the controlling idea here okay so what about it what about the reliability of the media okay so carolina says people believing without question yeah carolina that's almost there um yeah hassan says trusting media without question is good or a bad thing exactly and then our opinion will become part of that yeah so the good and the bad of trusting media without question and you don't have to write this in there but uh including my opinion so keep that in mind okay that's just part of it because your opinion will be either one or the other or maybe some other element okay good all right okay um so let's go through a couple of our critical thinking steps in this case so what's the first question that we would want to ask and again for a lot of people you know that watch these lessons they say oh well this is slow and i don't have time for this in the ielts exam it's absolutely not true when you practice this it becomes quite fast and you save a lot of time just for kind of um my curiosity um beck john i know you did a lot of practice uh before you sat the alts exam did you do this during the ielts exam that you just had i think like a week ago right um so did you did you go through these steps when you got to this task too do you remember your question i'm really really curious and then i'll check out what everybody's writing there i can see that you know most of you have the right right thing but i want to include some real life experience here so if you don't mind sharing beck john um let us know what happened so did you do this and uh and did it help so did you still have enough time were you able to finish your task to essay okay so behind says the question was about a gift yeah and you did do this and did it help beg john did it help you to develop a better essay do you feel that you wrote a better essay because you went through these steps so back john says yeah i finished it yeah feedback is really important students everybody uh wins when we have real life feedback i mean i can give you a lot of information in these classes but of course real life experience is potentially the greatest teacher of all right so back john says yeah absolutely okay good thanks beck john so that you know that that uh makes my information reliable and i'm always hoping it is so thanks for confirming that and thank you for sharing okay all right um very nice hassan hassan says humans can process 2 500 thoughts in a minute i think we can do it quickly enough yeah i agree so uh controlling idea good and the bad okay so the what yeah everybody's saying what what is trust in the media information says abhishek and you're right so what is trust in media information and it might seem like a silly question or an easy question but don't assume that you know the answer before you ask yourself okay so we shouldn't even trust our own brains a hundred percent um what is trust in the media information so what does that mean what does it mean that we trust the media information how would you define that so if i asked you like what does it mean that you trust the information in the media what would you what would you say to me as a response for that so hassan says people take what they hear or see in the news as granted information okay yeah it's all right oh it says it is the process when people believe the information that comes from media resources such as tv uh internet or newspaper yeah okay try to be even a little bit more robotic like even a little bit more scientific when you're um giving these answers so beck john says relying on the information in the media okay relying on what they hear or read in the newspaper yeah okay victor says people believe the information without doubt that they see or hear in mass media maybe hassan without using critical thinking but that's not necessarily true they might use critical thinking some people right so what is trust in the media information um i would say it's accepting that the information shown in a media is exactly as it happened and is the factual truth let's say okay so it is empirical okay uh everybody remembers that word empirical yeah that would be a good word to remember in this case okay so it is empirical all right um why do uh people believe the media to be true so why do people hold mass media to be the truth okay so why is that why would people say like oh yeah i saw it on tv so it has to be true why do you think and this goes back to the four sources of knowledge that i discussed sometime in the past and these are really good to think of you would learn these in social sciences like psychology and sociology the four sources of knowledge so why do people hold mass media to be the truth uh abhishek says because it is observed it's seen right we believe our eyes right muksuu says because it's official information yeah so those are two of the truths or sources of knowledge because it is observed with our eyes right that's what empirical is it is presented by experts authority okay and there's even one more so the four sources of knowledge this is an important piece of information for those of you who aren't familiar with it is it is given by or the same information is given by several sources everyone says it's true so the reason why we tend to believe the media is because we see it so we say hey look there it is it's happening we forget that we're not actually directly seeing it but we're indirectly seeing it so we think that it's empirical arguably it's not it's presented by experts like when a doctor says that hey you have the kovid then you must have the kovid because the doctor said it um so we tend to believe authority if the media says it if the expert politician on the media says that's the way it is then we say well it's the expert you got to believe them and the other one is that you have the same information given by several sources i saw it on tv i read it in the newspaper and i just heard it on the radio and i read it in a blog on the internet so it must be true everybody's saying the same information right um so that's three of the sources of knowledge that we have in our world the fourth one is intuition that's where we just feel that something is true and all the knowledge in the world that we ever learn uh is accepted through one or multiple of those means the media is very powerful because it combines these three very effectively right okay that's just uh some more deep learning for everyone um so what's the next question here we have a very important question coming up uh what's the next question to ask here what is the right question carolina says how carolina uh robbie shack says that too give me the full question here what do you mean how uh so rajvir says how do people trust the media yeah okay um here if you're thinking about the answer to that rajavir or bekjan you realize that there might be a little bit of a better how question so victor says how people trust mass media i i think we can add a little bit more to these questions to make it more accurate i would ask the how question like this how can we see so this would be my question here i think this would get me thinking a little bit more deeply and getting me uh some more um valuable information to this so how can people see that individuals trust the media without question okay uh rajiv says how do media agencies make people believe the information i think regime that's a good question to ask as well that could be another how question i haven't often mentioned this but you can ask multiple why and how questions as long as they're staying on topic okay so that's not a bad question rajvir all right so this is what i would ask here how can people see so how do we how do we know this how do we know that individuals trust the media without question so os says because their mind is changing after they see or read the media items or articles yeah anybody else answers to that one so how can people see that individuals trust the media without question what else happens hassan says the media uses the fallacy of generalization so that people trust it easily yeah i think hassan that would answer rajvir's question uh rajiv says people see it on social media uh ferdav says many individuals like the videos yeah i agree so they that shows the support or belief uh carolina says everybody says and shares the same information yeah so uh people share the information they get from the media with others and act according to its truth right so we'll behave according to what we see uh in the media so a simple example the weather forecast says that it will rain tomorrow and you see everybody go out of their homes with an umbrella right maybe it's still sunny but everybody's waiting for the rain oops we made a mistake but now you have thousands of people walking around with umbrellas okay so uh we act according to the information that we see because we believe that it's the truth okay um what are the advantages so let's get into that what are the advantages of believing in the media there must be some otherwise i'm sure we would have given up a long time ago right media wouldn't be around if there wasn't some truth to it so what's the advantage what benefit do we get from checking the media so nikhil says well we can be aware of the weather yeah rajiv are very good so it helps us better plan um our events uh beck john says it helps us to be cautious uh nick hill says conditions yeah so helps us plan better and optimize our experiences right so we optimize our experiences if i check the weather forecast and it says it's going to rain and i take my umbrella and it does rain i avoid getting wet and i avoid catching a cold or the flu so it helps me to experience the world a little bit better more enjoyably because i'm aware of the situations right okay um good yeah so i like how all of you picked up on that uh fordov saying an umbrella with us when it's necessary or when it's needed yeah by the way now that some of you are thinking of this simple example of the weather forecast and the umbrella when it's raining what kind of strategy did i use there to kind of quickly think about this question and i've talked about this strategy before so can somebody tell me what strategy i use there to uh think about this question this task too victor says visualizing yeah it's part of visualizing uh very good rajvir so rajvir says it's bottom-up processing so i'm thinking of a specific example yeah and that's uh that's an important side note here's for some of you that might be new so in order to think of good ideas for task 2 essays think up down as well as down up okay what i mean by that is when people think up down they think of believing in the media um taking it for granted it's the truth uh the media tells me that it's going to rain tomorrow so i take my umbrella with me down up is um i believe it's going to rain tomorrow because i saw it in the media so i take my umbrella with me i trust the media because they're experts okay so don't just think from general to specific but think from specific to general now i know some of you know that some of you it's kind of new um yeah janelle's saying general to specific and specific to general exactly now an important extra little point here is when you are thinking of specific uh to general okay [Music] always aim to come up with a simple example okay so here it would be like um weather forecast versus covid19 okay covid19 it's a really popular topic in the media these days there's a lot of clout around it a lot of confusion some people don't know what to believe anymore about how dangerous it is or how many people have it or what's true what's not true so covet 19 would seem to be a very good example uh for this question did any of you think about covid19 when i presented you with this question so were some of you thinking like yeah okay one of the one of the topics these days that's really tough to figure out what's true and what's not true happening in the world is coveted 19. did any of you think about that when when you read this question ferdov says sure yeah okay so yeah and i mean it's a workable example right of course it came into my mind as well it's a workable example but it's very complex it's very murky it's quite a tricky quite a tough um example okay and rajiv says yeah it's a hot topic these days of course right but don't get kind of um how should i say this distracted or mesmerized by a hot topic or a popular topic there might be another idea that's much more simple and when you're in the ielts exam your goal is to get a band-aid band 9 or as high of a band as possible and to do that you want to think simple you don't necessarily need to think of a hot topic that could be too complex so here the weather forecast and believing the weather forecast is a much more simple and elegant uh specific example for this question in a 250 word essay does everybody see that so does everybody get what i'm saying i would if i thought about both of these i would go maybe i'll leave this for another day uh the examiner will probably read a lot of this kind of information for these task twos anyway and i'll just stick with weather forecast here i'm gonna be able to express myself more clearly accurately and i think it's just gonna be a better 250 300 word essay you see what i'm saying there okay good so everybody gets that perfect yeah so keep your mind open all right keep your mind open okay all right so what are the negatives of believing in the media okay so danielle says it's easy to infiltrate negative information okay keep it simple lots of fake news but what's negative about that carolina so if we have fake news what's bad about that what's bad for the individual uh rajvir says it wastes people time and energy yeah sure okay so can be a waste of time and energy yeah and time and energy are very valuable for us absolutely it's no small uh value there victor says people will be confused bec says confined people's activity yeah so it can manipulate people yeah absolutely um i can say it can manipulate people to suffer loss of time health finances and time health finances and um yeah i think that's we can kind of coin everything under all of those right so uh false information can manipulate people to lose their time lose their health lose their money right so um all of those right cause damage okay uh so what's your opinion so what do you think what should we do with this yeah it can defame people absolutely so what should we do with this so should we believe should we not believe what's the right attitude here how would you include your opinion okay um it doesn't ask you which is greater beck chun it just says what is your opinion so always take a look at the question here it's a little bit trickier than that so what are the advantages and disadvantages of this and give your own opinion okay so carolina says research before sharing information yeah okay yeah so victor says we should not believe very deeply uh janniel says more pros than cons it doesn't ask you which are more it just says what's your opinion right okay so hassan says believe the media but only after questioning okay yeah so my opinion would be always apply logical critical thinking to information that you hear yeah so always apply the same kind of critical thinking that we're practicing in these classes right so ask what is this media why am i being presented this information how am i being presented this information and think deeply before you act at the end of the day we have to make decisions we can't just sit in one spot idly and do nothing that's even worse but definitely before jumping to conclusions and believing it to be the truth we want to think critically about it okay so now we are ready for our thesis all right and let's get right into it so here i have the advantages disadvantage is my opinion and i ask you to put together a thesis uh statement for me romaine says believe in the simple and basic information and question those which can have consequences in our personal life i like it roman i think that's a good opinion as well so the everyday information maybe just believe it right if it says it's gonna rain tomorrow then take an umbrella but if um there's some more complex information like the stock markets crashing sell all of your assets or whatever you might want to think a little bit more deeply before taking action yeah absolutely yeah ferdov says watch the media but before believing it to be the truth think critically yeah absolutely okay give me some thesis statements so taking all of these into consideration try not to over complicate it keep in mind it's just 250 minimum for high band scores you're writing closer to 300 okay so especially for a question like this it has three parts carolina says nowadays individuals can find information in different platforms like newspapers and the internet some cons are that people do not confirm the veracity of this information which could contain fake news on the other hand trustworthy media like well-known newspapers bring accurate and valid validated information to the public okay and your opinion carolina it's missing so get that in there okay uh hassan says uh i if i always apply critical thinking this would be hard for example the prime minister died today i would have to do a lot of research for many resources so that i can trust that info hassan that's a good point and i think that's why romaine said that basic information and i as weird as this sounds the prime minister died today that would kind of fall under that basic information maybe just say yeah okay that probably happened it doesn't have a necessarily a direct impact on my life per se but anything that's going to have a drastic effect on my life like kovid right maybe do a bit more research on what it is how it works and where the sources are coming from okay so good point a son and i think um definitely that's what uh romaine was speaking about all right uh furdov says although certain individuals ascertain that information and media is always true i however believe that is important to think critically before trusting it for dogs that thesis is not accurate to the question okay so this thesis should start with the advantages of uh relying on mass media as the factual truth is that people can better plan to optimize their experiences however the negatives are that they can be manipulated to so that's kind of how it should look okay uh rajvir says the advantages of believing in mass media are better planning and experiences and its disadvantages are loss of time health and finances um yeah rajvir yeah i didn't i didn't want you to really over complicate this i just wanted you to take those answers and stick them together when you go through these steps that's what you should be doing um rodriguez says in my opinion people should think critically before trusting any information yeah and if we take a recommendation from romaine we could say especially information impact directly impacting our lives yeah okay excuse me my nose was twitching for a minute there i was waiting for that sneeze okay uh betjen says the main disadvantages of trusting information in the media like news broadcasts and the internet or loss of time and finances whereas the merits which are are better planning and experiences yeah thank you carolina thank you maxood okay david says even though the advantages are clearly evident because believing in such information can help us plan better and optimize our experiences in my point of view the disadvantages are more relevant since manipulation can affect people's thinking that could work david okay you're taking a little bit of a different approach but that could work okay so the advantages of relying on mass media as the factual truth is that people can better plan to optimize their experiences however the negatives are that they can be manipulated into losing their time money and finances i think that people should always apply uh critical thinking to news they hear in the media especially when making important life decisions okay great so there's my thesis and i just wanted to show you something a little bit different here uh my thesis in this case are three sentences okay so i decided hey you know what i'm just going to do it in three sentences really have a clear approach to this essay the advantages of relying on mass media as the factual truth is that people can better plan to optimize their experiences however the negatives are that they can be manipulated into losing their time money and finances i could join this with a semi-colon and a however but you know what it's totally fine like this is still considered band nine i think that people should and here i could maybe join it with an and could start to be a bit of a run on but it's fine three sentences i think that people should always apply critical thinking to news they hear in the media especially when making important life decisions so i took a page uh from you there romaine um okay so with this thesis uh it should be clear what we're going to do in the essay now just a little bit of homework for tomorrow members right the hook in the background okay so i'll leave that to you this time and then we'll start with the body paragraphs in tomorrow's class at this time okay so i'll have a hook and a bit of a background because i have a nice long thesis here i'm going to keep my hook and background fairly short okay and then uh we'll start with like i say body paragraphs and then working towards the conclusion everybody's doing a great job i'm so very happy to see the improvement in the english the communication the thinking of many many of our members it's fantastic it's really what motivates me uh to get up here day in and day out and and teach these classes it's fantastic it really is you're very welcome abhishek uh for all of our viewers you can join our premium packages at ahelp.com for academic outs and glshelp.com for general ielts and coming up in about 35 minutes i will host a listening uh section lesson parts one and parts two where everybody can join the chat thank you david uh hopefully i'll see all of you soon bye for now i'm adrian signing out momentarily from budapest 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: cgGS1ekI3Ko

Length: 52min 0sec (3120 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 01 2020