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We were asked by a member of our private Facebook group about how to improve their Task 2 writing, so we asked one fo the IELTS examiners here.  Here is what they said.

There are a few things you can do by yourself, and some things that you can’t.

So, things you can do by yourself.

1 Understand the question. When the question says “Discuss both sides….” you need to do so. If it doesn’t say this, then just focus on presenting your opinion.

2 Write 4 paragraphs; a short introduction and conclusion, and two body paragraphs.

3 Don’t waste time on the introduction. I see lots of candidates write introductions that are as long as their body paragraphs. If you are doing this then you are doing something wrong.

4 Support your two (only two) ideas with clear examples. In each body paragraph, introduce your idea, add more details to explain it in the next sentence, then add a real-life (or invented) example in detail to support it. This is all you have to do to get into Band 7+ for Task Achievement. Higher marks will have more details in the example.

5 Reread and proofread your essay after you’ve finished. So many candidates don’t do this; it’s crazy!

Right then, things you can’t/shouldn’t do by yourself.

1 Check your work for errors. Now, this depends on what language you speak but by far, and I mean 70/80% of IELTS tasks I see, the biggest problem is articles (a/an/the). The vast majority of IELTS-takers are Chinese and Indians, and in both languages, articles don’t exist. It doesn’t matter if you have studied English for 10+ years, you will be making mistakes with them, and you won’t be able to see the mistakes until someone points them out to you. Your grammar mark will be affected and you will need a teacher.

2 Give yourself a mark. How will you know how your writing comes across to another person. In your head it may all make sense, but to another person it make just be ‘crazy talk’! Again, you will need a teacher.

3 Book a test thinking you are ready without someone checking. How do you know? Are you that confident? People do IELTS multiple times mostly because of the writing and this just makes IELTS richer. It’s also not fair. There are changes coming to IELTS to make things fairer but they aren’t global yet.

Put your quesitons in the comments or conact us here 

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