IELTS Writing Task 2 | TWO ESSENTIAL PARAGRAPH STRUCTURES with Jay!

hi guys my name is J I'm one of the expert IELTS teachers here at e to language which by the way is an online platform for IELTS preparation anything you need help with whether it be writing or speaking or listening or reading we can help you out through tutorials through our practice materials through our daily live group classes etc what we're going to do in this live class is important one of the things that you need to be able to do on test day and one of the things you need to be able to do quickly is to conjure up a paragraph structure for your essay okay so imagine you sit down you look at that essay prompt the question prompt how are you going to structure it there are two main paragraph structures you need to know before test day okay because there are seven different question types and of the seven different question types five of them require one paragraph structure two of them require another type of paragraph structure so you need to know this before test day so let's have a look this is for IELTS academic no no no no no it's not even for academic sorry shouldn't say academics for IELTS general and academics for both okay it's for the birth my mistake there but for IELTS writing task 2 this is called essential paragraph structures hold on to your hat so in today's class I'm going to quickly go through the 7 essay types that you might see on test day of course you will only get one but there are seven of them we're going to look number two at the single idea paragraph structure we're going to look at the double idea paragraph structure as well I'm also going to give you a quiz and you'll also be doing some writing in this so please get out a pen and a piece of paper because I'm going to teach you it's for writing you can't just watch videos you need to get out your pen and if you do it once that might even be enough that might boost your score up to the score that you need so get out a pen a piece of paper we'll do it together I'll talk you through it okay cool let's get started so there are seven essay types ion's that you might see with your academic or general okay these are the seven so the first ones called double question second one agree disagree or to what extent third one discussed both views fourth one is discussed both views and give your opinion the fifth one is discuss the problems and the solutions number six is discuss the advantages and disadvantages and number seven is discussed the advantages and disadvantages and give your opinion about which one you think is best first of all this is hard because I think you actually need to practice writing all seven types because they're different if you want to score highly on task achievement in the criteria and to get up to the six point five seven seven point five or eight you need to understand the question types that's the first step okay let's keep looking at them I'll give you an example of each so the double question will look like this so the question prompt will say something like blah blah blah blah don't worry too much about this we'll get to it but the double question says why they are students choosing to study online what can universities do to restricts attract students back on campus so you can see two questions there agree disagree although to what extent question type says in this little second part to what extent do you agree or to what extent do you disagree or do you agree okay one second my computer is about to crash no I didn't crash yes it did thanks computer here we go we're back discuss both views this is the third type it just simply says discuss both views number four says discuss both views and give your opinion about which one you think is most effective fifth one is that's fourth this is fifth problems and solutions what do you think are the causes of this what solutions can you suggest sixth one discuss the advantages and disadvantages advantages of online learning for example and thus the seventh one they should say seven do the advantages outweigh the disadvantages I don't want you to worry too much about those question types because we have another video up here which you can watch in your own time which looks at them in more depth okay I just wanted to refresh your understanding and memory of those seven different types this leads to something more important well maybe not more important as important that is there are two types of paragraph structures you need for each type of essay mmm that didn't sound right 1 2 3 & 4 the purple ones that's where you will write to single idea paragraphs I'm going to show you how to write those single idea paragraphs in a second okay now the green ones discuss the problems and solutions discuss the advantages and disadvantages this requires to double idea paragraphs the main reason being is that it says discuss the problems and the solutions you can't just discuss a problem and a solution so that would be a single idea paragraph because it requires problems and solutions advantages and disadvantages we need to put two ideas into the one paragraph okay let's firstly think about single idea paragraphs so this will be for the double question for example let's let's look at this one every year more and more students choose to study online rather than attend classes on campus why are students choosing to study online what can universities do to attract students back on campus okay so you could have one paragraph here this would be your paragraph one and you'll have a single idea about why maybe if effectiveness or maybe they're choosing to study online because of convenience you'll describe one idea in depth and number two what can universities do to attract students back on campus they can decrease the cost or they can subsidize transport something like that okay agree disagree to what extent studying online is more effective than studying on campus to what extent do you agree well you would have single idea paragraphs let me skip through this this is boring let me just get to the structure here the single idea paragraph structure okay this is important so one sentence one you want to introduce the first idea okay you want to introduce that first idea the single idea a single idea that it that's your opening sentence sentences two and three you will explain that first idea by giving reasons sentences four and five you will give examples or an example or examples of that first idea that's your evidence and then sentence number six you refer back to the first idea let me take you through an example one here okay I'm gonna do it sentence by sentence I'll read it to you so we need an opening sentence which is a single idea introduces a single idea studying online is much more effective than attending campus that is wrong I'm so sorry that should say convenient this is the problem of when you create these slides just imagine that that says convenient okay because this paragraph in fact is about convenience I would lose points if I made that mistake convenience ok convenience studying online is much more convenient than attending campus that's my opening sentence now I need to explain it students do not have to leave their homes to listen to lectures or participate in tutorials there's a grammar mistake they can even interact with fellow peers just by using their laptops that's another reason now I moved into my example for example while online causes courses used to target working professionals who couldn't attend class they now target anyone because universities have realized that people are time poor again related to convenience and then I need a closing sentence that refers back to my opening sentence about convenience in short because of the enormous time savings that online courses allow people prefer it rather than attending face-to-face classes so let's just get this right so if that said convenience which it should have that was my mistake I'm sorry convenience much more convenient okay so that the idea the single idea is convenience okay so let's look at this second one they do not have to leave their homes okay they now target anyone because universities have realized that people are time poor in short because of the enormous time savings okay and my reasons also linked back to convenience there so this is a single idea paragraph about convenience your turn hopefully you can write a better paragraph than mine I'm gonna give you five minutes I probably did mine in two I want you to write now a single idea paragraph okay I'll talk you through it I'll talk you through it so get out your pen and paper here we go so this is going to relate to the discuss both views question imagine you get this on test day it says some people believe that studying online is more effective than studying on campus while others disagree okay so your first paragraph I want you to discuss the first view which is that studying online is more effective okay studying online is more effective than studying on campus so I want you to write a single idea paragraph you introduce the first idea you explain the first idea why is it more effective give examples of why it's more effective and refer back to that first idea of why it's more effective okay see how you go I don't want you to write four sentences I want you to write this ones one Center try and write two here for the reasons you can write one or two here for the example of evidence and one here so I want you to write one two three four five or six sentences your time starts now you you you you you you you you you you you you you cool all right I'm gonna look at the chat and I'm gonna read some out now I hope that I'm just seeing single ideas such as convenience or effectiveness or whatever it is extrapolated which means you take that one idea and you just build on it that single idea and you flesh out the one idea don't put other ideas in don't want multiple ideas we'll talk about the double idea paragraph next let's have a look so I'm just gonna read the opening sentence of each of your paragraphs and hopefully we can get the the main idea from it what do you what's this paragraph going to be about many people nowadays believe that taking courses online is more beneficial than attending classes in person okay it was not nice but I want to know why discuss both views some people believe that studying online is more effective than studying on campus okay that one's about convenience i from the second sentence convenience is another one here okay I'm gonna read one that is not good okay and I'll tell you why so studying online is very effective rather than studying on campus it saves time and also it saves money how many ideas we got here we've got effectiveness we've got convenience and we've got cost saving so in fact we've got three ideas into this one paragraph No choose one let's say you choose cost saving okay let's say you're discussing both views so you say online studying is far less expensive than attending campus that's your single idea now you will flesh it out now you will say okay it's far less expensive than studying on campus I need some reasons why the reasons why I because you can study on your computer rather than going to rather than going to campus campus canvases cost a fortune to maintain for example the University of Melbourne campuses cost 1 billion dollars per year to maintain including the technology in the classrooms studying online you just need your laptop therefore it is far less expensive and possibly preferable to online study right you flesh out that one idea that's the idea of this paragraph here good though you have to make mistakes to learn sometimes let's now talk about these double idea paragraphs because you may need to write one depending on these prompts here the first prompt if you get problems and solutions you must write a double paragraph structure let me tell you why by reading the prompt ready every year more and more students choose to study online rather than attend classes on campus what do you think of the causes of this what solutions can you suggest why do I need to write a double paragraph double idea paragraph structure here well let's have a look first of all this will become my paragraph 1 what do you think of the causes and this will become my paragraph 2 what solutions can you suggest now it says here what are the causes and it says here what solutions if you give one solution and one course you will be marked down you need to talk about causes and solutions but you need to talk about solutions in the one paragraph and you need to talk about causes in the one paragraph therefore we're gonna need a double idea paragraph right have you got me this is what the IELTS examiner's do and this is how they trick you this is how they mark you down you need to be more intelligent you need to outsmart them also look at this one advantages and disadvantages some people believe that studying online is more effective than studying on campus while others disagree discuss the advantages and disadvantages of online learning it does not say discuss the advantage and disadvantage it says discuss the advantages plural more than one we need a double idea paragraph for this as well the last one of course is advantages and disadvantages plus your opinion it's the same as the one before okay let's look at the double idea paragraph structure this is the kind of paragraph you want to write first sentence you'll introduce the set of ideas for example the advantages you're going then in your second sentence explain the first advantage third sentence you'll give example of the first idea or the evidence then you'll explain a second idea or the second advantage give an example and then refer back to the first two ideas so basically if you look at this structure it looks complex but just forget the introduction and the closing because they're basically the same what you do is you explain give an example explain give an example ok and these two sentences almost are the same so it looks confusing but let's go through one sentence by sentence so have a look at this first sentence there are two primary reasons why studying online is more advantageous than attending classes on campus so this paragraph will contain two ideas there are two reasons or two advantages okay firstly it is far more convenient students do not have to travel in order to attend a lecture or tutorial give me some example and evidence some evidence for example students can simply log into the university's websites to study my grammar here needs a shake-up I'm sorry about this I wrote it too quickly second idea secondly online learning is much more effective okay let's go back the first idea was about convenience secondly online learning is more effective the second idea is effectiveness indeed online learning has been increasing in effectiveness since the late 1990s evidence what's your evidence Jai well one research article suggests that it's now so it now supersedes face-to-face learning by 16% okay wrap it up Jay this should mirror your opening sentence overall online learning is better than on-campus learning because of its convenience and effectiveness right cool I hope that's clear so I've got the two ideas I've got one about convenience and one about effectiveness my opening sentence said that I would say that my closing sentence reminded my reader of what those two ideas were your turn I want you to write a double idea paragraph so I'm sorry I've made too many mistakes I'm gonna fix this one I'm gonna fix this one give me please give me just give me a second advantages this advantageous that'll make sense now good okay advantages and disadvantages so it's test day and you receive this question prompt which says some people believe that studying online is more effective than studying on campus while others disagree what are the advantages and disadvantages of online learning okay well you can talk about either the advantages or disadvantages but I want you to put two ideas into your paragraph using this structure okay your time starts now you have five minutes to do so you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you okay yogi um a few things first of all on test day you're going to have extreme pressure on you right that clock's ticking out the front you've got a pencil a piece of paper you probably need to go to the bathroom you haven't eaten for hours you feel terrible you need to make decisions in this exam probably one of the most critical decisions you can make is which paragraph structure will I use because if you get the advantages/disadvantages essay prompt and you write a single idea paragraph you will automatically be marked down because you have not answered the question properly so anyway it's just important it's just important to make sure you you just before you start writing just just stop before you start writing really the question prompt thoroughly make a little plan you can't change your plan as you go along don't freak out if you can't change your plan but just keep in mind how important it is to get the right paragraph structure for that for the for the particular question prompt that's all that's all alright I'm just gonna have a quick look at your paragraphs and I just want to see what the two ideas are okay here we go there are two main meinen where's my pens image okay here we go there are two main advantages of why studying online is the fairest way than on campus okay it wasn't about fairness it was about effectiveness so you would have automatically lost marks first of all it's more convenient blah-blah-blah-blah good if you had one I can't see the rest of it okay somebody's written it's more cost-effective and more effective excellent like it's cheaper and more effective great okay good somebody's written the same thing it's cheaper and more convenient or similar thing excellent okay somebody's written it's cheaper I can't see your second idea there imagine I'm the IELTS examiner this is what I'm going to be doing I'm going to quickly scan your paragraph I'm gonna sort of pay attention to grammar but I'm gonna say okay okay one advantage to do know second advantage score down okay this is really the IELTS examiner's spend is it is it three minutes per task or something I think they get paid $3 per writing to mark they spend very little time looking at it they just scan their eyes over grammars good okay let's have a look at these paragraphs how many advantages do to excellent okay good and what about disadvantages what only one poor mark down just that's that's that's how it works that's how it works cool let's do a quiz so let's say it's test day I'm going to show you a question prompt I want you to type into the chat which paragraph structure you should use ready single idea or double idea you let's have a look let's have a look good nice nice nice nice why why are you going to use the double idea paragraph here because it says advantages and disadvantages and you have to discuss both okay that's why good well then excellent quiz - ready hmm actually let me make this a little bit more difficult I'm gonna delete the title off the top of the slides and you don't know what it is evil teacher well I'm gonna prepare you for the real world I think all right all right all right ready in which paragraph structure single or double alright you should be I don't get that in a set in a second by looking at it yes good nice nice nice double correct why let's have a look at it you need to use the double idea paragraph because your first paragraph is going to be about causes B there's more than one your second paragraph will be about solutions but there's more than one okay so we use the double idea paragraph great next question quiz time and you get this one on test day okay what have you got go ahead single let's have a look at this this is a confusing one I purposely put this in because I wanted to trick you but you're too smart but let's have a look okay some people believe that studying online is more effective than studying on campus while others disagree so this one is about effectiveness about whether it works or not until what degree does it work studying online in terms of teaching you now discuss both views and give your opinion about which one you think is most effective okay so your paragraph one is going to be about online learning and its effectiveness okay you can't talk about convenience here because it's not about convenience is asking about effectiveness paragraph two will be about on campus on campus studying and the effectiveness of on campus studying I guess you could write well no no it's better to write a single idea paragraph about effectiveness of online learning and then a second paragraph a single idea paragraph about the effectiveness of on campus learning okay that would be a much better way to do this and the idea of writing that single idea paragraph and really pulling out the reasons and the examples focused on that single idea of effectiveness of online learning for example let me give you an example let's say my opening my first paragraph says because I have to discuss both views and it says online learning is incredibly effective okay now I need reasons why reasons why you know many cognitive scientists have worked for decades on improving the effectiveness of online learning in addition the technology is good enough to enable people to learn more effectively okay all about effectiveness now I need some evidence evidence I'll make it up one research paper from Harvard University suggests that online learning is 86 percent more effective than actually studying on campus now I need a closing sentence about effectiveness overall online learning is an extremely effective way to learn in the modern world something like that ok fine that's paragraph one paragraph two I need to talk about the effectiveness of on-campus study so oh now I'll say something like studying on campus is also an effective way to learn ok I'm not saying which one's better yet I'll do that in the conclusion so now I need reasons by studying on campus is effective not only can you meet face-to-face with the lecturer and the professor but you can also interact with your peers who will help you to learn okay great great great now I need some evidence according to a recent poll 22% of students said that they preferred online uhsorry on-campus learning because of it was more effective than studying on the computer overall studying on campus is an effective way to learn whatever okay you can see I put my to now if we look closely at this one again it also asked me from my opinion I will put that into the conclusion I might even put it into the into the introduction but I'll say you know despite on-campus learning the very effective online learning is more effective where is the most effective blah blah blah cool one more quiz which type of paragraph would you use here a single idea or a double idea you single the answer single death the answer single good good good let me just quickly clarify why okay again studying online is more effective than studying on campus okay so I'm gonna write one paragraph about studying on lines effectiveness okay and I'm gonna write one paragraph about studying on campuses effectiveness now I can't talk about convenience or cost saving because that's not what it's asking me about it's about asking with which one is more effective and and then I also have to say to what extent do I agree or disagree so in my conclusion I will also put my opinion sure right that was pretty tricky stuff don't worry if you're feeling confused if you are feeling confused and you feel like you need to clarify you feel like you need help check out this website make yourself a free account think about upgrading your account for some tutorials tutorials we also give feedback on your writing so if you want to write an essay and submit it to us you do that through the platform you can also come along and join our live classes which happen every Monday Tuesday Wednesday and Thursday nights a whole lot of practice material on there as well as well as methods lessons and more okay does that make you feel better or worse just type into the chat better or worse after that little lecture better or worse better good good very useful all right yeah well it's interesting isn't it you know it's actually it's taken I've been looking at this ions test for like literally a year and thinking this if you think you're just gonna go and take the IELTS and get an 8 I think you're kidding yourself even if you're a native English speaker you need to understand all the different question types you need to think about okay what structures will I use on test day I really think you ought to put yourself under test conditions and practice as well because it's one thing to stay and to be at home and to be relaxed and have a cup of tea and think oh I'm gonna write an essay on the computer and practice for my IELTS and you type an essay it's very different on test day when you have a pencil you have a piece of paper you have time pressure you may need you know you're tired you're not feeling a hundred percent and you have to use not only that you start at nine o'clock in the morning you have to switch your brain on straightaway make sure you drink lots of coffee but not too much coffee because then you need to go to the bathroom it's problematic Erica Jay what we are IELTS second test scores okay what am I gonna say to you what am I gonna say is your teacher and I've taken the IELTS why first time I get sick and time I got can I please wait to tell you I want to wait because I don't want you to lose faith in me as a teacher I don't know I mean I do know I've taken his test for the third time I took it last week for the third time and the third time hopefully third time lucky I the third time I felt very good about what I'd written I really I really sat there I finished and I thought oh great did it really nice really nice pass one task to don't think I could have written it any better the second one I to be honest with you I felt terrible on test day not sick I just I don't know I I slipped for about two hours I I was nervous I felt really nervous in there which was really strange because maybe I do have a lot riding on this being there you know the IELTS teacher look I will tell you but I want to wait until I get my third test result because then I feel like I'll get a really high one and I can say don't worry about my second one you can still trust me don't get scared I look and also I think there is an element of is a beautiful word arbitrariness to this I really do think that sometimes you just get an examiner who for whatever reason doesn't like your handwriting they need to go to the bathroom they are quick I'll quickly do this to do or maybe they don't understand how profound you really are and your essay was far too philosophical I don't know look I think with language testing then if how accurate language testing is so you can use computer-based testing which I think there's a lot of promise in computer-based testing anyway I don't want to go into it I'm sorry I'll wait till I get my third score and then I'll tell you I promise I promise I'll tell you then but I can't tell you now because you hate me okay any questions you Christiane's Tintin tan says I failed my PT e twice well the PT who's got a similar thing with speaking where it's incredibly strict for speaking any questions and on tomorrow is my exam give me some tips just watch all the videos on YouTube there are none unless you're a paid member and you shouldn't practice my man okay okay alright here's a question sorry here's a question about the agree/disagree question type to what extent do you agree or disagree good question it says it just asked to what extent do you agree can if it says to what extent do you agree can you also talk about disagree yes you can because as long as it's just in your conclusion and maybe your introduction as well that you put your opinion in your say I completely agree with the prompt now you might for example write a paragraph that says you know let's let's take a question pumpkin says studying online is more effective than studying at university okay fine so there's an opinion to what extent do you agree or disagree and I'd say I completely agree that studying online is now more effective than studying at university okay so that might be my first paragraph second paragraph I can say despite this there are reasons why some people think that studying on campus is more effective for example blah blah blah and then in my conclusion I can go back and say you know despite the arguments of why studying on camera this could be more effective studying online is more effective anyway yes you can you can do for for against against for against against for just like that okay here's a good question for the evidence can you just make up statistics yes you can of course you don't have access to a library so you can just use your imagination you can say a recent study from Harvard University suggests that 96% of people prefer online learning because of its convenience okay so you can make that up or you can just make up a statistic and just say it's better if you reference a university or research body to say Harvard University to Harvard University blah blah blah J do I have to pay for the evaluation of writing yes we don't do it for free unfortunately whereas we couldn't do this at all cool all right I'm gonna try something with you guys if you don't mind I'm gonna send you a link where you can donate a little bit of money whatever you feel is okay by you whether it's $1 or $2 or $10 whatever okay I just want to do this as an experiment I'm gonna send you an email everyone who attended this live class and I'll put it on YouTube too if you want to contribute a little bit of money to eat you language to keep us going to keep us producing great materials so you don't have to suffer through your exams then click on that link and I'll be surprised if if you do contribute something okay cool thanks guys I'll see you soon and good luck in your exams you

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Id: indZ5C4O5C0

Length: 49min 23sec (2963 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 07 2017