IELTS Writing Task 1 in 6 Simple Steps

hi everyone Chris here from IELTS advantage and in today's life lesson what we're going to look at is writing task 1 academic if you're a general training person this is not for you you can go on our YouTube channel and check out a lot of free resources for general training but this is strictly for academic students and we're going to break everything down and simplify everything because when you guys see something like this so a question like this often you get very confused like what's happening here what do I even write about time is an issue you only have 20 minutes so a lot of people underestimate just how important it is to get this right and even though it's worth you know just a third of your total mark in order to be getting a 7 or above you need to get a good score for both task two and task 1 most of the students who I work with they focus solely on task 2 and they very rarely talk about task 1 and often this is the reason why they don't get the score that they need their task 2 is pretty good because they spend most of their time preparing for that area and most of their time during the test on that area but they don't spend enough time on task 1 academic so that's what we're gonna look at in today's lesson and we're going to give you 6 simple steps that you can follow in order to improve your task 1 academic performance all of the things that we're going to talk about today are covered in a lot more detail on our free fundamentals course we cover not only task 1 academic we cover toss to writing we cover task 1 general training speaking reading listening it's totally free all you have to do is just click the link above or below this video and you can sign up for a free course but let's get into this so why is this such a difficult task so you might get a line graph like this you might get a bar chart you might get just a table with data in it you might get a pie chart you might get multiple charts you might get processed diagrams you might get maps so one of the things that is quite difficult about this is people are not used to writing about data like this they're not used to interpreting the data trying to fine the key features writing overviews paraphrasing writing details paragraphs it's just unfamiliar to you but it doesn't need to be that difficult it's actually quite straightforward once you understand exactly what you need to do and you practice and prepare and then you'll be ready for test day so we're gonna give you six simple steps so step one understand the marking criteria you need to intimately understand what these mean so task achievement coherence and cohesion lexical resource grammatical range and accuracy understand what the examiners want because if you don't understand what the examiners are looking for then how are you going to give it to them so this whole step I could make a you know twenty or thirty minute video just on this so what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna skip this first step and I'm gonna make another video it's going to be a long like 20 25 minute video just covering this because this is a little bit complicated it'll be it'll be new to you and I think it deserves its own video so check out I'm gonna make that on probably Friday or Monday this week I'm gonna cover exactly what these mean and simplify the terms for you so that you can understand what the examiners are looking for and give it to them so check that out later this week step two once you understand what the examiners are looking for you know what the marking criteria means and you know how to give the examiners what they're looking for then we can start looking at the question step to understand the data why is this important well you have to write about the data if you don't understand the data how are you going to write about it how are you going to write about it effectively and the problem is that either students don't understand the data or more importantly don't spend enough time actually interpreting the data analyzing the data I'm thinking about it before they start writing so it's really important that you do this and let's have a look at a typical question so obviously this is not what a real IELTS question will look like for the purposes of my my jam board here I've just put a typical line sharp to help you understand it so when you first look at this a lot of people go into panic mode they're like oh this looks so complicated I've knit I don't know anything about this topic I don't know anything about this data but once you start looking at them and once you start getting used to them they're nothing to be afraid of really so let's have a look at this so we four lines we've got a blue line got a red line and green line and a yellow line and it just goes from mm up to it bottom so let's look at what the data actually says a blue line stays pretty much stable it stays running the same value around 2000 the red line starts off the lowest and then goes up to pretty much the highest so it just increases over time the green line fluctuates over time and goes up here to the highest point and then goes starts off here at its lowest point and then goes back down so it's fluctuates throughout time and the yellow one starts off the biggest and ends up the lowest and it goes down over time so once you start getting used to all of these line charts and bar charts and pie graphs and data it you start to see patterns so you must practice these questions and you must take the time to actually think about these and simplify them try and boil it down try and simplify it so that it's very easy for you to explain imagine you're speaking to somebody and you have to explain what this means in just one sentence or two sentences if I had to do this I would say well blue stays the same red goes up yellow goes darn I'm green fluctuates that's it once you break it down and simplify it it becomes much much easier to understand and then to write about but you must practice this it is a skill that you need to develop you need to look at lots and lots of questions and try to interpret the data and try and understand it and once you start to do that it becomes so much easier don't look at like one or two of them and then go in on test day and be like oh task one was really difficult task one was really difficult because you made it difficult by not looking at any other you know apart from one or two things that you did before the test look at lots of them look at ones with sample answers good sample answers and look at the data first interpret it think about what the main points are and then look at the sample answer and compare what you think with the sample answer and that will really really help you understand the data in terms of time I would spend at least five minutes just looking at the data thinking about it and planning out what you're going to write before you even start writing because the task one academic is not just a writing task it's a thinking task you have to think about the data and understand it before you start writing so give yourself that time don't look at it and immediately start writing like most people do because then you'll mess it up step 3 paraphrase the question so you're going to get some sort of data like this and then you're going to have the question above here first sentence your first paragraph is simply part of phrase the question so how do you get better apart phrasing the question so number one learn what part of phrasing is it's not just synonyms there's a lot more to it than that you can have a look at my website if you want just let's have a look at my website if you go into IELTS advantage you'll find all the help you need and just have a look and you can even type in here anything you're looking for so if you need help with paraphrasing just type in part phrasing and learn all about it just type in IELTS advantage paraphrasing and you'll get lots of information about how to paraphrase but this is the key step attempt to paraphrase lots of questions if you need to get better running what do you do you don't read a book on running you go running if you need to become stronger you don't read a book on how to lift weights you go and lift weights if you need to get better at paraphrasing paraphrase whenever I tell people this they they don't like it most students who I know they they say how do I become better paraphrasing they want me to tell them some secret tip or some like magic formula which doesn't exist just like anything else in life in order to get better at something you need to do it and you need to get feedback on it and then you need to take action on feedback so if you want to improve your paraphrasing learn how to paraphrase paraphrase get feedback from somebody who knows what they're doing a good teacher and then take action on that feedback so let's look at an example from one of my students so a student who I was working with recently and this was the question the graph shows the stock price of four different technology companies in the USA between 2001 and 2018 so I asked them to paraphrase this here's what they put chart eliminates value of cutting edge conglomerates in America in 2001 on 2018 so is this good well it's good that they attempted it they're way above 99 percent of all the students because 99% of other students wouldn't even attempt to paraphrase this but the key is that they made lots of mistakes and that's not a problem the key is that I gave them feedback and they took action on that feedback they learned from the feedback and then they really really improved on their part phrasing was no problem then they went on and got the score that they needed so let's have a look at some of the mistakes that they made so the graph chart so they're missing a article here so I said to them why did you not put an article in here why did you not put the here and they said well I didn't want to repeat any words why is that oh well my old teacher told me that you're not allowed to repeat any words well that's not true paraphrasing does not mean changing every single word and it certainly does not mean that you can't include like an article or a preposition or something like that if you repeat the the on the it's not like the examiner is going to look at your writing go oh my god they repeated a word they're terrible because there's a normal use of English and so that was the first mistake eliminates why did you use aluminates and they said oh I downloaded this list of online vocabulary and they told me that if I use a instead of shows then the examiner is going to be really impressed it's like they're not going to be really impressed and it is a big word but it's totally inappropriate to use that in in those circumstances the stock price sorry to read it up the stock price the value it's big difference between the value of a company and the stock price of a company so if you go and look up any company like the value of Microsoft right now is around a trillion dollars but their stock price is not a trillion-dollar stock price is tell you this not well let's look at Google Google stock is one thousand about a thousand dollars so their stock price and their value their overall value or two different things so you need to be very careful when you're changing things that it means the same thing so it's okay to use synonyms but make sure that you're using synonyms that actually mean the same as the thing that you're changing the value of a company and the stock price are two different things you could say stock value and that will be fine but they're two different things and cutting-edge conglomerates again you're trying to be too fancy this doesn't really make any sense no one would ever say oh I'm thinking of getting a job and a cutting-edge conglomerate like what the hell are you talking about you want a job an attack company oh yeah so by being trying to be too fancy and they misspelled this word and so this is wrong cutting-edge doesn't really mean the same as technology you know you can be a cutting-edge farmer you can be a cutting-edge baker it doesn't necessarily mean that you're a technology company again it's just because they're they're ex-teacher they're former teacher told them you know in order to get high scores you should use words like illuminates and conglomerates and all these big fancy words when really it's lowering their score and they're in a lot of trouble in 2001 on 2018 between 2001 to in 18 2 different things so this person learned that you can repeat words if it's ok to do that don't try and be too fancy just keep it simple accuracy over trying to use fancy vocabulary and make sure when you're changing something that it actually means the same and when you're changing it so you need to be very careful but the way to do it is to actually do it mess it up fail multiple times when you're trying to do this and then get feedback and take action on it and this person did a great job and got the score that they needed once they fixed all those mistakes step 4 write a clear and effective overview a clear overview on an effective overview what is effective mean well it has the key features in it what is clear when the person reads it they understand just read it once they can clearly understand what you think the key features are step 4 this is probably the most important step without a clear and effective overview you forget about getting a 7 or above you cannot do it many many people struggle for years with task 1 academic because they never learned this it doesn't matter how much work you put in it doesn't matter how good your grammar and vocabulary get it doesn't matter how good your structure is if you don't learn how to write a clear overview you're never going to improve so really really focus on this so there's many many ways that you can use many techniques many strategies that you can use in order to find the key features and that's what you need for the overview I'm going to show you one I can't show you everything and the techniques and strategies differ depending on whether it's a you know a map or a process diagram or multiple charts or pie charts or line graphs or differs a lot there's no one way to find the key feature but let me show you just one way and show you how easy it is once you know how and once you've been shown properly what to do so one way with a line graph over time is just to ask this question what is the purpose so the purpose of this is to show Changez and four things over time so from 2001 to 2008 een to show how four things have changed so how have they changed this one has stayed relatively the same this one has gone up this one has gone down on this one fluctuates doesn't need to be any more complicated than that guess what you put in your overview one goes up one goes down one fluctuates one stays the same that's it no detail you don't need to mention any values you just need to talk generally about what happened and what are the key features and there's four things here over time and all you had to do was just ask yourself that one question so I'm not demonstrating how to find the key features for any map or any process diagram or any type of data just for this type you just ask yourself one question you'll be able to find it pretty quickly step 5 write it clear and effective details paragraphs all right so first you write your introduction which is part phrasing in question then your overview now you need to write your details paragraphs and this is what it would look like alright the a lot of you right now in the comments are asking you put your overview there why not put your overview at the end where's the conclusion and at all these questions that we normally get to be honest it doesn't matter whether you put your overview here or whether you put your overview here it doesn't matter a lot of you worry about this and spend a huge amount of time worrying about this but spend very very little time thinking about whether you wrote a clear and effective overview on whether you wrote clear and effective details paragraphs focus on writing these effectively don't worry too much about where you put it because it doesn't really matter and in task one academic there is no conclusion there's an overview a conclusion is a summary of your main ideas there's no main ideas here because you you're not writing about what you think you're just reporting the data so you've done this you've done this and all you need to do this and this and the reason why I order them like this is because it's much easier to start off at a kind of 30,000 foot view introduce the general topic okay I understand what that is what are the key features go a little bit done and then go into the details you would never have a conversation with someone where you immediately jump into the details of a conversation you would introduce the topic talk about it generally and then go into the details so you're making it much easier for you to write the s or write the report and you're also making it much easier for the examiner to understand it because if you you know introduce the question and then talk about the details and then talk about the overview at the end it's a little bit confusing so that's what you do and how do you write about details again I don't have time to talk about this in a lot of detail but let's say for example you wanted to write about this green line how could you do that well you just break it up into different parts so from 2001 to this point it went from 2000 to about 6,000 then from this point to this point this point to this point and this point to this point I'm just breaking it down simplifying it would make it very easy for you to write up at that so details paragraph number one I would just pick two of the lines I talk of it then because there's four lines talk about that err the other two lines talk about that they're making it really clear and making the examiner aware that you are aware of organization and you've organized your thing effectively and then just write about them write about the key details don't over complicate it and once you've done all that step 6 check your work so the first five minutes should be just thinking and planning about the data and then the next ten minutes should be writing and you're not going to write that much you're only going to write between like 150 and 200 words you should be able to do that in you know 10 or 12 minutes and then the last sort of 5 to 2 to 5 minutes you're gonna check your work you're just going to go through this checklist is my paraphrasing effective on my key features correct is my overview clear or my details accurate on my detailed paragraphs clear is my grammar accurate is my vocabulary accurate and if you're able to do all of those things and check your work and fix a few mistakes and you're giving yourself a very good chance of getting the score that you deserve and here's a summary of the six steps number one understand the marking criteria I'll make another video on that Friday or Monday and depending on how much time I have number two I understand the data number three paraphrase the question number four right if an effect the we'll review then your details paragraphs then check your work and that's it and that just breaks everything down and makes it as simple and as easy as possible rather than you looking at something like this I'm being like I don't even know where to start I don't know what to do Oh time is running out let's just write the first thing that I can think of and you know don't worry about a task one isn't important anyway it is very very very important so as we mentioned at the beginning of the video if you want more detail on that you can check out our fundamentals course we even give you a task at the end of that and it covers tasks - speaking reading listening totally free just click the link above or below the video or if you want more information on IELTS go to our main website it's all free IELTS advantage com just type in aisle two advantage into Google and it'll take you there we have a nice little feature here or success stories you can get our resources up here task one has two speaking reading vocabulary listening everything you need in order to succeed in the IELTS test hopefully you find that interesting and valuable and if you need anything feel free to get in touch with us Chris at IELTS advantage is my email if you have any questions about the IELTS test feel free to get in touch you and all of that on our website as well thank you very much guys and see you again soon bye-bye

Channel: IELTS Advantage

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Keywords: IELTS, IELTS Writing Task 1, Writing Task 1 Academic, IELTS Writing Task 1 in 6 Simple Steps, Chris Pell, IELTS Advantage, www.ieltsadvantage.com, IELTS Chris, ielts test, international english language testing system, english, ielts writing, lesson, how to, ielts tips, band 7, ielts preparation, ielts task 1, ielts help, ielts lesson, ielts exam, IELTS Tips, IELTS Academic Task 1, IELTS Academic Writing Task 1, Task 1, IELTS E2, IELTS Liz, IELTS Jay, IELTS Task 1 Chart

Id: G8SUrKs-Nfs

Length: 22min 13sec (1333 seconds)

Published: Wed May 08 2019