IELTS Writing Task 1 - What to write!

hi again I'm Adam welcome back to ink vidcom today's lesson is for the IELTS students who are going to be taking the IELTS test it's for everybody to be honest with you this lesson is useful for anybody who needs to do some writing but it's especially for those of you who are going to take the test and because it's for the test I'm going to start speaking in a little bit more natural speed I'm going to kill two birds with one stone get a little bit of listening practice and some information okay so let's get started IELTS academic task task 1 what is this task ask you to do it asks you to look at an infographic what is an infographic information graphic it's going to give you a bar a bar chart or graph diagram a pie charts a table all kinds of things it's going to ask you to take this graphic visual with whatever information is in it convert it into words and sentences ok very straightforward now if you look on in vidcom excuse me Emma a colleague of mine did a great lesson on how to score high on on this task excuse me watch that video but this is a little bit different she was talking about how to write I'm going to tell you what to write okay one of the most difficult aspects of this task is looking at this information graphic and knowing what information to pick out and include in your report okay and that's what it is it's a report now because we're talking about a report it's very important to remember that a report is not an essay it has very different structures it has very different requirements okay let's start what are we going to write they asked you to write a minimum of 150 words your target is 170 to 190 150 is just not enough and you don't want to go under because why lose points that way aim for 170 to 190 you'll get everything you need to say now let's look at the introduction okay very different from an essay your introductions going to be very short one to two sentences once you start your third sentence you're saying too much you're saying more than you need to say what do you have to say in the introduction what am I looking at that's all they want you to do in the introduction what am I looking at I'm looking at a graph I'm looking at a table this table shows this table demonstrates this diagram shows illustrate demonstrates you don't need that many words illustrates demonstrate shows whatever they wrote in the task use one of the other words in your introduction okay basically that's what you're doing you're rephrasing the task they tell you what you're looking at they say look at the following graph about this and that and summarize what it says okay this graph shows blah blah blah okay now I me we this is a very common mistake people make in your introduction in your entire report for task 1 there should never be the word I there should never be the word me or we this is not about you this is about the infographic only now because it's not about you there is absolutely no opinion you will not reach any conclusions you will not make an analysis you will not try to understand what's going on you will not make any inference you will not take this information to understand other information you will not make any predictions or what's going to happen after this information is explained you're not going to explain anything all you're going to do is show me what is in the infographic right are you going to give me an explanation are you going to give me the meaning of what you're looking at no you're not you are only going to give me facts ok I'm the greater for example I'm grading your your task 1 your report I don't care if you understand what you're looking at all i care is that can you take this information and explain it to me in good English this is an English test not an intelligence test it doesn't matter if you understand it or not can you convert to the infographic into words and sentences that's it now having said that keep your introduction in fact keep your whole report but especially the introduction very simple very straightforward you don't need fancy language you don't need very high-end vocabulary you just need to have different vocabulary you need to have good sentence structures and give me the information that you see now before I look at the body of the report I want to actually look at the conclusion okay you can have your introduction you're going to have your body what about the conclusion now this is a bit of a trick question do you see all these things I wrote about the conclusion that's what you're going to give me nothing there is no conclusion in task one because you're not reaching any conclusions you're not explaining anything all you're doing is giving me information you have an introduction paragraph very short one or two sentences you have one or two body paragraphs that's it okay don't try to get too fancy don't try to show off your intelligence that's not what they're looking for English test remember that okay now obviously the most important part what do I put in the body let's look at that okay we're going to look at two things when we're looking at your report body first we're going to look at some things that you can look for some things to pick out some information to include in your report and after that we'll look at how to split up your two paragraphs or one paragraph depending on the situation so what are some things to look for in your report let's say you're looking at graphs okay so first thing always pay attention to your axes your XY axes what is the information here what is the information here what is going up here what is going up here with that in mind what are the ranges let's say you're talking about time you're talking about 1960 to 2010 you have a 50-year range make sure you mentioned that Rach if it's going all the way across if it's a short range mention that but what about that range what are you mentioning within that range all kinds of things peaks and valleys so again let's go like this this is a peak this is a valley another way to look at it is highs and lows if if a graph is moving up and down pay attention to the peaks pay attention to the valleys if it's very steady peaks and valleys no problem you can mention the stability aspect of it okay now here I also mentioned plateaus you're going up up up up up up and flat up up up up up flat this is a plateau means where things flatten out and stay stable don't change too much on this axis okay on this axis everything continues forward this is usually time or number of like increase in a sales percentage for example it could be many things this is any variable that can be this is the range within which you measure things usually okay Peaks valleys highs and lows now you're also looking for patterns how things are the same like if you're comparing two or three things or five things or six things what are the patterns what are they all doing the same trends is another way all of them are trending up all of them are trending down some are trending up some are trending down you're going to be comparing and contrasting but you keep these very general okay if you're comparing five things and you find four of them share a pattern don't talk about each of them individually put all four into one lump group these four countries from the West are all increasing there's military spending the one country in the South is decreasing okay so the trends lump them together then you look for the anomalies now what is an anomaly it's something out of the ordinary if you have a pattern everybody's going up up up but one is going down that one is the anomaly it is outside the pattern outside the trend exception is another way to say anomaly something that goes against the trend here you will get a little bit more detailed and give me specific numbers or whatever their variables are to talk about how it is the exception what is the exception what is the change of direction what is the pattern that it the thing or the pre person or the place itself is following now if you have tables tables have columns and rows pay attention to the headings in the columns and the rows they're going to tell you a lot of information you might want to include that you could just put that into your introduction if it's a very general thing if it's very important to what's going on you put that into your body as well now if you're looking at a diagram excuse me a diagram usually shows a process or a cycle a lifecycle of an ant or a moth okay what you want to do is you want to identify the start of the cycle or the process you want to identify the finish or the end of the process and you want major steps along the way you don't need to tell me every little bit of detail remember it's 170 words there's only so much you can say don't try to include everything major steps milestones what is a milestone a milestone is when something reaches a specific point in a process so a moth for example the mother moth or the adult moth lays eggs mmm that's one milestone the eggs hatch into larvae that's another milestone six weeks pass by they eat the leaves blah blah blah little details not so important next step the larvae start building their cocoon around themselves that's a milestone time goes by they get fed this and that the other another next milestone the cocoon opens the wings come out these are the steps you want to make you don't want every little detail major steps and milestones now when you're comparing things you always look for the similarities and you always look for the differences you were going to spend more words on the differences than you are on the similarities because the similarities you can say all of them do this one of them does this this and that in that specific order in this specific time the differences are more detailed the similarities are more general same as patterns and anomalies it's the same idea okay so these are all the things you're going to be looking for again you don't need everything you don't want to tell me what every piece of the puzzle is doing so let's say you're comparing five different countries here you don't want to tell me this country did this this country did that this country did this this country did that this country do that No hey you don't have time B you don't have space in terms of words and see it's not important okay you want to tell me a B and C or doing this way D is going the opposite way that's what you want to tell me okay so that's all the information you're going to look for now how do you split up your paragraphs let's look at that okay so now we have to think about how to split up our report one of the problems people have is they don't know when to switch to a new paragraph right so again there's no rule you'll have to feel it out when you're doing it but here's a suggestion if you're only looking at one chart or one graph or one pie chart table etc you can split it in two ways one in the first paragraph look at all the trends all the patterns all the things that are basically similar in the second paragraph focus on the major differences the anomalies and exceptions okay that's the easiest way to split it another way is it in your first paragraph again even in the table you're going to have two or three things in a graph you're going to have two or three different things in a different variables etc in first paragraph focus on one thing like you're comparing two countries focus on the first country what it's doing in the graph second paragraph focus on the second one okay again it's a little bit straightforward to be honest just say it's simply what you're looking at focus on one focus on the other now if you have two charts it's actually much easier when you're comparing charts it takes you a little bit longer to get all the details and information pick out all your trends and anomalies but in the first paragraph talk about chart one in the second paragraph talk about chart two with slight comparisons as necessary or another way to do it and the first paragraph compare the two in terms of all the similarities all the trends all the things that are they are doing similar in the second paragraph look at all the major differences now some of them one is going to be linked to the other you're going to have for example the type of food eaten in one country and that the agricultural expansion in the same country how does one affect the other the more food that's eaten the more crops are grown okay you have to make some sort of connection don't go beyond what is given to you okay don't bring your ideas into it even if you're correct even if you're an economics major and you're this is all simple for you you can take this little bit of information and write me a whole economic theory don't that's not what they're asking you to do one two this is happening at the same time this is happening okay even if it's very obvious don't really mention any connection one does not lead to the other this happens at the same time this happens okay now if you're talking about a diagram that shows like a life cycle in this case I would recommend one paragraph start explain this major big the major steps and the milestones and finish you don't need two paragraphs because there's nowhere to split it a life cycle is a one process thing right the moth lays the eggs actually I'll do it another way here's the cycle lays the eggs eggs become larva start building cocoon hatch from the cocoon feed for whatever start all over again lay eggs again this is a cycle this is one paragraph there's nowhere to split this up you don't have to have three paragraphs in the report to or fine you still have your introduction what am I looking at I'm looking at the lifecycle of a moth and then body say what's going on now when you've done all this what do you have to do you have to write your conclusion a trick question no no conclusion once you've said everything there is to say once all the information has been delivered that's it you're done go to your essay good luck with that okay if you have any questions you can go to ink vidcom I'll give you a little bit of a review quiz there you can ask more questions and I'll see you again soon you you

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Keywords: writing skills, comprehension, pronunciation, engvid, native speaker, vocabulary, native English, αγγλικά, IELTS task 1, IELTS, English lesson, TOEFL, conversation skills, English grammar, ESL, англи́йский, lumosity, anglicky, inglês, Learn English, English pronunciation, anglais, accent, Subject (grammar), slang, إنجليزي, inglese, Englisch, angielski, İngilizce, grammar, English, speaking, Emma, engvid IELTS, IELTS Writing, English classes, EnglishTeacherEmma, Học tiếng Anh, Education, inglés

Id: CK_PE9ILJjQ

Length: 15min 53sec (953 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 07 2014