IELTS Writing Task 2 | Band 6.5 Student Gets 1-1 Help

[Music] okay Sona so let's have a look at this question so you previously did the test and writing is your main obstacle to getting the career of your dreams and so you've got a 66.5 before so what we intend to do with yourself is to try and identify the main reasons why you might be getting that six or six point five so that we can bring you up to the seven so turn your weaknesses into strengths so what we're going to do is we're going to go through step by step this question so some people say that in all levels of education too much time is spent on learning facts and not enough on learning practical skills do you agree or disagree what's the first thing that we should do with this question establish what type of essay is it yep so what is opinion essay it's an opinion okay good that's the next thing that we should do big aside oh well like but before the topic I think as well for what's the very first thing that we should do maybe just make up the key words and I think you understand the question yeah because that's something that um there's a lot of things in IELTS that are very obvious and very straightforward and people overlook them so I think what a lot of people would do sometimes is immediately go in and start underlining key words before they even read the full question and really understand what it is what problem do you think could happen if you don't understand the question first we won't get the achievement properly yeah yes because you could go off in many different directions that are totally unrelated to ask you the actual question so imagine working really hard to improve your grammar your vocabulary and then on to and then on test day and achievement exactly so some people say that in all levels of education too much time is spent on learning facts and not enough on learning practical skills what do you think is that the two things that we really need to understand in this this question they are saying that in schools we are learning more about facts and not learning enough skills that will it will help us to be prepared for our actual jobs in the future so I think that the main thing that we need to understand is the difference between learning facts and practical skills so what are practical skills because that you can apply in day-to-day life when you're working when you're starting your new career yeah in real life area yeah and what's the opposite of a practical skill theoretical exactly exactly exactly so can you think of a subject that is very theoretical and but not very practical like what I did in in my college we learned a lot of chemistry and stuff like that science but was not 100% related with what I'm doing now like it's alright I understand that we have to learn the part with the formulas and the side effects and treatment and so on but when I got first in the in a pharmacy I was just like I never been to a college it was totally different yeah so a guy I studied law at university and then became a lawyer and nothing I learned in law school was I applicable to what what I was doing and we had to actually go into a whole course for a year that just focused on the practical side of being a lawyer as well yeah I think most professions that's what they do Justin you know a theoretical physicist don't you so that's another good you know some people who study especially the hard sciences and then they get a job at Google or Facebook or something like that yeah and I have to learn a completely different and set of skills the reason why I bring that up is learning facts is that theory or is that the opposite of practical still in the same time like learning facts could be only theory but also just learning about something practical but never applied yeah never learn how to apply it yeah I think that's about yeah I suppose like geography or something act out like learning the names of the capital cities of all the countries in the world that's useless you know for most jobs and maybe if you're a pilot be good to know where where your planes going or something like that but for most of the time when you're learning facts whether it could be theoretical or otherwise so I think it's it's if we don't think about the question we're going to go off on different things but now we know what's really about the tension between this and this and it's that and all levels of education okay so it's not talking about primary school or university or high school or adult education sick everything okay and so now that we've understood the question and I've made made the board all dirty what do we need to do next okay so establish the topic topic it's educational why do we need to establish the topic oh we would have an idea about what the calorie we we would use or what the main subject is where we should situate ourselves and the topic it's also because a very common mistake that a lot of students make is they just write everything they know related to this general topic so well kind of like it's like a shotgun approach that they're like just shoot as many different bullets at the wall and hope that something sticks and something they hit something but that's not what we're doing we're understanding what the general topic is so then we can go deeper into the specific topic so what's the next thing we need to do underline the key words yeah what do you think those are so all levels of education learning facts and learning practical skills so it's not just an education it is the specific things that we want to talk about okay good now what's the next thing we should do agree or disagree with the statement well I agree with it so and should you always think about what you personally not agree or not oh we should agree about what most people think about it because it's about general opinion I am agreeing with the statement and I would plan to to talk about agreement because I think if we would ask most people about this this question they would say the same because there are a lot of lessons tarek theoretical lessons in schools so how people are learning facts and when they get a job they don't know what to do yeah I mean a mistake that a lot of people make is think that the examiner or the test is asking them about their personal opinion so your personal opinion could be you completely disagree but you you can't think of any ideas that you can support and explain a nun exemplify but if you pick the side that most people would believe that that's normally the area where you can think of lots of good ideas and to explain things get to develop your answers because that that's what we need to do not every time but I think that's a useful way of day of thinking about it okay so know that we have got this one and we're gonna pick agree what's the next thing we want to do Higgy a generation to generation okay what so when we're thinking this is an area that that you said that you really struggle with and you're really worried about it what advice that I gave you today that helped you with your idea generation I should think about what others would think and not just myself yeah yeah this is um instead of just thinking why do I believe this why do I agree why would someone of the opposite gender or from a different country or a different career or a different socio-economic background or something like that that makes it much much much easier I think it's good to begin with you don't ignore what do you think about this but if you start to struggle you're like okay why would a man think this or your pharmacist why would a doctor think this or why would a nurse think this oh you're from Romania why would someone from Ireland or Vietnam or or someone from a working-class background or an upper-class background there's many different ways that you can attack it and that'll help you with that what was the other thing that I said that was useful when you're thinking of ideas just try to write them down and it's like that the obvious this part like the first thing that comes into your head ninety-nine percent of the time that's that's the thing that you should use and then what would most people so if you went into the coffee shop across the road that we went to earlier and you asked the 25 people in there what would 20 of them say what would most people say and then using critical thinking critical thinking for idea generation is what would someone completely different from me an opposite job or opposite gender and opposite whatever think instead of just me as I think this is this is really useful because a lot of people just are like oh I'm a female from this country from this thing on this job or I'm a male from this country and this thing and I have no experience of this why are they why are they being so mean Frank well you have to think outside of yourself a little bit alright so what's the most obvious one well here we would learn more about practical skills we would be more prepared for the jobs yeah what would what would most people say maybe just that it would be easier to get a job okay that's a better critical thinking so or maybe your own your own experience first sorry as a pharmacist and is it better to learn every element of the periodic table and exactly what everything looks like or so it's more important to learn how to communicate and I know learn how to speak with a customer explain him enough what would why would we group all of those together at communication speaking to people communication skills yeah our soft skill Oscar yeah soft skills are thinking you could add in how to negotiate with people how to empathize with people how to understand people or things like uh um what would someone in a different field to you so an Irish doctor for example what would he do he or she say about that I think it would make his job easier okay okay so that that's much more effective than what most people do which is put a bubble in the middle and then just start brainstorming because you're going to end up with a bunch of ideas that are not really relevant and you've just wasted your time and now you have to sort through all of them and know all you have to do is this is an opinion essay so we just need two ideas so how do we pick the ideas that are best for us well I would choose the ones that I know more about or I am able to talk more about so it could be the first which is the most obvious one probably the third yes okay and they because number four and number one a little bit similar yeah yeah soft skills some people might argue that soft skills are not practical skills but that would be a very narrow definition of the word practical practical in this context is can you use it in the real world so as a pharmacist I need soft skills you definitely know it's nice to talk to and such so that would be a practical skill and you know communicate communication negotiation telling people that you admit you don't need 80 milligrams of oxycontin just right now okay so now we've got two ideas okay let's plan X plan okay how are we going to plan so let's let's not focus on the introduction and the conclusion because we know what we're gonna put in there let's put our two main body paragraphs main body paragraph 1 main body paragraph 2 what are the three elements topic explanation and example okay so what's the first topic more prepared for the jobs in fact all right and then the second one Oh soft skills skills okay so we talked about this earlier today imagine a five-year-old child saying why why or hi hi does learning practical skills prepare you better for a job you know how to apply the theoretical things that you already learned also you already are familiar with the job that you need to do or take your time think you know don't rush in just cuz they're on video so again think about what will why why is applying very important for the job why is it going to help you prepare for the job getting the task done better okay in more in a more efficient way the task completion okay and for example out saying IT guys that studied a lot of programming like my sister has yeah so as we talked about earlier instead of thinking about studies and research and thinking like 82% of computer science just think of something from your your own life so that could be your country the country are currently living in your job your sister's job so for this one you know for example lots of computer science students struggle when they first get get their first job as a computer programmer because they are need to retrain again yeah they're more comfortable with theory than practical so good one thing that you said to me today was that you often go into the writing part and you change your mind one reason why a lot of students change their mind is there's part of this plan that doesn't make sense that is not absolutely crystal clear before so are you a hundred percent sure what you're going to write about 90 percent sure yeah I think definitely this one and this one this is a little bit vague so I would maybe simplify this a bit and remove that and just say okay because this means that you will be able to complete the tasks you'll be able to do your job more effectively and you could maybe talk about the negatives of theory a little bit so why does you know why does theory not prepare you for your job you know do you see what I mean so you could start off by saying and your learning theory in university is is great but it doesn't actually help help you do your job because in order to complete tasks and do your job effectively you need harder skills more practical skills and things like that and then it goes nicely into into that one but that all because you do change your mind a lot I'd make I'd spend an extra two minutes just thinking about that you know just soft skills okay because more most people will work with colleagues and with other people they will need to know how to communicate properly communicators last just general work with other people you know so you could and negotiation empathy clear communication all those things talking on the phone you know sending emails all all of these things and would come under like you know working with other people not just communication and an example mmm my work is a pharmacist yes pharmacy and I'm sure you have lots and lots and lots of examples about why it UK you can't go in and just say well I know which drugs to give people and I know how much to give them if someone comes in and asks you for a lot more than then they should get or they ask you for the wrong drugs or they're not happy with you for some reason or they want it for free and they can't get it for free as you told me earlier okay so would you feel confident and I yeah I would say so yeah okay good so what is the next step starting with the par phrase part mm-hmm so do you want to try the par phrase and then yeah I would do that so some would argue that people should be taught more practical skills don't your reticle facts this essay agrees with this statement let's focus just on there okay so what what are the things that we need to think about when we're paraphrasing what's the first make sure that it has same meaning with the exactly so does this have the same meaning oh yeah that's exactly the same meaning some would argue that people should be taught more practical skills than theoretical facts so we'll look here some people say that in all levels of education too much time is spent on learning facts and not enough so why did you miss at the all levels of education I didn't miss it on porpoise I saw that after I finished my introduction but I think it's still getting the point maybe I could insert it somewhere yeah I think if you look at the context of this where do you learn practical skills and theoretical facts in education okay so sometimes you you don't have to copy every single word or chain you know duplicate everything because the context provides enough context so for someone to look at this and so know if someone looked at this they would understand exactly what you meant you're not talking about anything other than education but how could we make a hundred percent sure because we wouldn't want any examiner to look at this and don't give the examiner any chance to mark you down all right so how could we change this a little bit there's one very very very simple way I can see insulation works so what we could do is change people to students yeah okay I thought about writing with students but then I thought students only are in college and got the connections another way that we could do it would be some would argue that in school students should should be and general it's Gerald's school can be primary school and can be secondary school but people would also refer to university as school I'm at school with a minute or I'm going to school so you know it's it's a it's fine to do that don't you know spend 10 minutes debating that in your head you know I got to school mean this you know it some and some people watching will look at that and be like oh my god you said that instead of that it's like you're gonna waste a lot of time and in a test if you do that and that's one thing that we need to help you with because you second-guess yourself and you change your mind a lot so you know have the confidence just to to not have those debates in your head you know so some would argue that students should be taught more practical skills than three or radical facts you could add in school you could add that as well go so what was the next part okay this essay agrees with this statement because people will be better prepared for their next jobs [Music] and also it would help them develop their soft skills also it will and also it will or it will also and also it would it will develop their soft skills or will okay so you paraphrased effectively and you've also done something very very important which is make it very very clear what your position is this essay agrees with this and you've outlined your two main ideas so that's everything that we need to see you in here is there anything you'd like to change grammatically disagrees I understand we first people [Music] maybe and also they will be I would just it just signs a little bit clunky to me I would put it well also so we've completed my our introduction by adding in our position our position is extremely clear and our two main ideas are also extremely clear are you happy with that you can move on how are we going to use this introduction to help us write the rest of the essay what do you mean by this does it so what is the purpose of this well we have our main ideas in the introduction yeah okay so this is main idea one and this is main idea too alright so when you are writing your first main idea you're going to make sure that this links up its you're not writing about multiple different things that don't so that's going to help you with everything alright so next it's time to write our main body part [Music] [Applause] [Music] all right so first before we look at the grammar and the vocabulary and everything we're going to look at the task achievement the coherence and cohesion does it do what what we're trying to do and people that are taught practical skills in school will know how to apply them in their real jobs so does the topic sentence tell the examiner what's in what the paragraph is about I say so yeah it does so well done if a person is confident with their work abilities they will manage to complete their tasks faster tasks tasks tasks or I wouldn't want a job where you just did one thing over and over no we don't work again thank you editing therefore they will be more effective in their workplace and accomplish more results before they will be more effective in their workplace and accomplish more results so in terms of answering the question are you happy with that does it explain so does from there to there does that explain how learning practical skills help someone do their job probably yeah yeah I'm happy with that so for example when my sister got her jobs she had to do a full training about programming because what she had learned in college wasn't applicable to the actual job maybe here I should have said that she studied computer science or something - mm-hmm well a better way would be some examiner's would maybe look at this and say well that's applicable to your sister and that's for everybody but not for everybody so is there any way that we could combine those two things so mentioning computer science and removing your sister and prior general example yeah so what we could do is say for example computer science graduates have to do a full-time training about programming why could we add to the end so this is fine for example computer science graduates have to do a full training avoid programming because in university doesn't apply to their jobs for their actual jobs and for anyone watching I'm just putting CS and grads and uni here because it's quicker for the video in the real test you would put computer science graduates and university and because it is a task 2 essay and you would avoid shortening things up like up ok so from a task achievement coherence and cohesion point of view are we happy yeah yeah I think we're happy with that have grammar is there anything you want to change or anything that you think what I really liked was you learned to put a full-stop here so what you were doing this morning was you were putting in a comma and then just continuing on and continuing on and continuing on which is which caused a lot of problems for grammar but also for coherence as well and so that's so well done with that so let's go through it and let's just remove those things people are taught practical skills and scoop people people that are taught practical skills in school will know how to apply them in the real jobs you know to get about 7 we wouldn't really need to worry about this but some people would say people who are taught or not instead people that are taught but that M I don't think we need to worry about things that that are not like that if a person is confident so again this is being extra fussy in in their work abilities and they will manage to complete their tasks faster therefore they will be more effective in their workplace and accomplish more results would again collocation will to accomplish more results accomplish more because it doesn't call a Kate we don't write you don't accomplish results and we would just accomplish something but we wouldn't say you would achieve results maybe and but not accomplish more results therefore they will be more effective in the workplace and accomplish more yeah good for example computers have to do a full training have to do a full training what do you mean by full training full training means they do it for eight hours or 12 hours or something like that again collocations would we say full training I don't think more than a day yeah so there's signs like they have to do it for a long time which is not the mean that's not what you mean you mean something else apart from full um so what so whenever you went to pharmacy practical school was I've just given you practical have to do practical training or it could be on-the-job training you could change it to that on-the-job training practical training and because what they have learned in university doesn't apply to their actual job okay um again we're noticing the same things we did but we've reduced the number of grammatical errors just dramatically and which is good a few little grammatical errors and but but we're improving all the time and then we're seeing the collocation thing again and what we're improving that as well and that the advice I gave you earlier about reading and paying attention to call occasions while you're reading that will help you as well so we've run at a time unfortunately so what I would like you to do is this week and finish the essay send it to us and then we'll show it on the video okay so Simona sent me her second main body paragraph so let's give her some feedback on that learning social skills in school can also help future employees so we know what this main point is we know what this main body paragraph is going to be about it's all about high social skills soft skills help people in their future life all right we should learn things in school that help us in the future of course so now what we want to do is to see whether she explained this main point and to really give a good explanation or not the vast majority of people are working with other people and they need to know how to properly communicate so what she's done here in this second sentence is she's explained why social skills are important so one of the things that students often do is they assume that the person reading it the examiner knows exactly what they mean and you can't assume that you have to leave everything on the page so she's done a very good job of explaining how social skills will help people in the future and then she goes on to explain further she doesn't stop there she goes on and gives a further explanation on the same point is really good negotiation or extended explanation might be just some possible situations encountered by individuals at the workplace and they will have to know how to handle them so she has linked this back to the question by talking about the benefit for people when they are working in the future which is very very good know what we need to do is see whether her explanation and links up with her examples so the example should link up with the explanation and the explanation should link up with the main idea they should all link up together in one coherent cohesive paragraph you'll notice that there is just one idea and then the explanation it explains that idea and hopefully the example exemplifies supports provides evidence for this main idea so she doesn't have multiple different ideas multiple different explanations multiple different unrelated examples hopefully let's read her example pharmacists are not taught in college how to talk with their customers or what possible situations might occur on the job and therefore their first months on the job can be really difficult so the thing I like about this example apart from the fact that it does link up with the rest of the paragraph and it does support that main idea is that Simona is actually a pharmacist and what she find difficult was she was using sometimes very very personal examples like she would say my sister did this or my cousin did this or she was making up fake research statistics and things I got that didn't really sign right so what we were teaching her the other day when she was in the office was use something from your own experience from your own life so she is a pharmacist and then make it a bit more general so she doesn't say for instance I'm a pharmacist on my first year on the job was really really difficult because that's too personal that's just about her her job might be deaf but that might be just her it doesn't really talk about people in general but what she's done is she has opened it up from me personally as a pharmacist to pharmacists in general okay pharmacists are not taught in college how to talk with their customers so she did a very very good job of just simplifying the process of thinking of an example so you can do that yourself by thinking about your job or maybe someone your nose job or the country that you're from the country that you're currently living in the city that you are living in a company that you're working for think about your own experience and then use that to help you write a good example so she did a very very good job on this and the grammar and vocabulary are also at a very high level and to the level that she needs to be so well done sooner for that I know that you went away and did that's whomever you check some of the grammar and vocabulary but you did a good job one other thing that I would like to mention is people people she has repeated some vocabulary and this being a video on the internet below in the comments people are probably freaking out right now I'm going home she said people twice in one sentence you're not allowed to do that this is really comes from people misunderstanding the marking criteria the marking criteria does not say you cannot repeat a word what the marking criteria really says let me interpret it for you is you should try and vary your vocabulary as much as possible but there will be times when you either simply cannot change a word because there's not another way to do it some words that's the only way that you can do it and if you try and change it the word will be wrong or the other situation is she might have got here in the sentence and she couldn't think of another way to do this so she had two choices what she could do is just repeat the word or choice number two she could try and change it to something that she wasn't a hundred percent sure about and probably would have been a mistake or choice number three she could have spent 10 minutes going people people people people how do I change this how do I change this and then you're just running out of time which means the rest of the paragraph isn't going to be that good no is she going to get a bond 9 for vocabulary if she repeats people people people people people all the way throughout her essay probably not but she needs about seven and in order to get about seven they will look at all of her vocabulary in her essay they won't as most of you think just look at one word and say oh my god she repeated that one word let's give her about five or something like that that's not how the marking criteria works let's have a look at her conclusion so what is the examiner thinking about when they are looking at the conclusion they're thinking about is her position clear so what does she think about the question this is an opinion question so her position is going to be what she thinks about agree or disagree is so is that clear and the other thing has she summarized her main ideas so let's have a look at this in conclusion I believe that people should study more practical skills this here is her position it is extremely clear extremely easy to understand so well done Simona in school because okay so this indicates that she's going to give us her main ideas now in school because that will make them better prepared for work that will make them better prepared for work okay that's our first main idea and it won't prove their soft skills so idea number one idea number two and we have our position here so the three elements of a satisfactory conclusion are there they'll also be looking at the grammar and the vocabulary they'll also be looking at did she maintain the same position so if she had a said I don't believe in the introduction or I don't believe in the main body and I she says I do believe so it's inconsistent that would not be a good idea or if she two or three different ideas in the main body and then she has new ideas here that wouldn't really link up so she wouldn't get a higher enough score to get about seven probably if she was adding in completely new things in her conclusion and there was a completely different idea and her introduction everything should be nice and coherent and cohesive her position should be clear and consistent throughout the entire essay so she did an excellent job with this conclusion so let's just have another read of it to make sure that she hasn't got any little mistakes in conclusion I believe that people should study more practical skills in school because that will make them better prepared for work and it will improve their soft skills excellent jobs and well done so now I here is your challenge so you watch the video where I took some on a step by step through how to write an opinion essay and agree or disagree essay I'm gonna give you the same question use different ideas you can have different position if you want but what I would like you to do is go through the video again and try and identify the different steps that we went through and then try and use that information to complete your own essay put it in the comments below and what I'll do is I will pick one of them randomly and I will do a full feedback session with that student I will put their essay up on the screen I will record my screen and I will give them detailed feedback on their work just for one student but what you need to do first is do that go through the lesson again look at that question some people say that in all levels of education too much time is spent on learning facts and not enough on learning practical skills take your time there's no rush write out the essay put it in the comments below and I will pick one of them or maybe more than one depending on how much time I have and I will give you feedback on your essay for free normally I charge a lot of money for that service so one of you are going to get it for free and even if you don't get picked doing this is really really gonna help you improve your essay writing skills and if you get one of these questions and you're going to hopefully get the score the you need on test day and that is going to help you overall thank you very much guys I hope you enjoyed this lesson if you have enjoyed it these are all free lessons all that we ask for is that you hit the like button or say thank you in the comments if you or if you have any questions just let us know in the comments and don't forget to subscribe to get future lessons as well if you need our help or you have any questions related to IELTS feel free to send me an email chris at il2 advantage comm is my email address we answer a hundred percent of the emails that we receive so looking forward to hearing from you and hope you enjoyed the video [Music]

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Keywords: IELTS, IELTS Writing Task 2, Writing Task 2, IELTS Writing, WT2, IELTS test, IELTS Exam, IELTS Writing Test, Writing Task 2 | Band 6.5 Student Gets 1-1 Help, IELTS Student, 1-1 Lesson, IELTS Lesson, IELTS Preparation, IELTS Teacher, IELTS Advantage, www.ieltsadvantage.com, Chris Pell, Writing, English, IELTS Writing Task 2 Sample Answer, IELTS Band 7, Band 6.5, IELTS Essay, IELTS Essay writing, Essay writing, face to face

Id: lNYoSpKpu44

Length: 50min 24sec (3024 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 04 2020