6 things to remember when writing IELTS tasks
1. The purpose of the IELTS writing is to demonstrate YOUR
ability to write coherently in ENGLISH on a given topic
It is very important to bear this in mind when preparing for
the exam. This is one of your chances in the IELTS exam to take control (the
other being in the speaking) and demonstrate your great ability in
English and to write good English so don’t waste it!
Make sure that you give a lot of preparation time to this
and , if possible, get a teacher to help you especially if you are looking at
bands 7 and 8. The teacher will not only mark your essays but will also
help you to improve it by showing you how to develop your writing to ensure
that you get the band you want.
2. The key to IELTS writing is effective preparation
and practice.
I know that many IELTS students work VERY hard on their
IELTS but I have also met many who, despite this hard work, have not been able
to achieve their goal. Your practice has to be effective to work for YOU.
If you need to get band 7 you HAVE to understand what a band 7 essay looks like, what it contains and how
it feels to write one. You need to know this in your muscle! To do this
you need to produce one and this may take 2 or 3 hours but it doesn’t matter,
once you have it then you will not go back to your old way of
writing again.
Less is more with
writing – quantity does NOT necessarily produce quality. It is better to work for a long time on ONE
essay than produce 4 at once. You have an IELTS teacher or coach then I
will tell you when you have managed to get your band 7 essay down. If not then
you will have to rely on models. Model
essays are YOUR key to great writing and don’t rely simply on the good essays
of your friends, they will have mistakes.
Don’t try to second-guess what the examiner is looking for.
Your job in the writing is to say “Look at my great
writing ability at band 7. See how I have managed to express this topic really
well and given you lots of good language to assess” it isn’t to think “I
wonder what the examiner would like to see in this paragraph”.
The exam is not about the examiner,
it’s about you. I can tell you that all examiners
want you to do well. I know this because I have been an examiner myself and I
really wanted every essay to be good and to get whatever band the candidate
required. It’s sad when you see essays that have lots of silly mistakes, or weren’t planned properly or are too
short or aren’t finished. Sometimes you can see that the person really has
ability but they haven’t demonstrated it.
See the exam as an opportunity to
demonstrate your great English
rather than a ‘test’ and you’ll be much more confident.
3. Please Plan, don’t just dive in!
“There isn’t enough time to plan” I hear this all the time,
yet planning well actually ‘saves’ you time! With a good plan the essay
almost writes itself leaving you to concentrate on the language you are using. Without
a plan you are trying not only to make sure you use good English, the right
vocabulary, great structure and not too many mistakes, but also the
ideas you want to express as well, all as you go along and all in about 20 or
30 minutes – that’s a lot to ask!!
A good plan will give direction to
your essay and state the points you want to
make leaving you to concentrate on the language you are using to express these
ideas on paper.
When I was learning English at school
a teacher told me “If you don’t know it, don’t use it!” This is very good
advice – translating from your own language most often fails and you will end
up with English which can at best sound ‘odd’ and at worst be gibberish thus
losing you many marks in the process.
If the idea in your head is only
in your own language and you don’t know the word or expression in English then
either come up with another idea or think of words you DO know that you can use
to express this. I understand that you can express things in a very erudite and
confident way in your own language and that you want to come across in your
writing as an educated and knowledgable person BUT look at point 1 here – it’s your ability in English that is the most important thing in
this exam NOT your knowledge!
In fact, if you can train yourself to
think in English then your chances of producing great writing are better.
The way to do this is to immerse
yourself as much as possible in English as you prepare for the exam. Read
newspapers, journals, books. Listen to radio programmes, watch films and
documentaries. Develop a deep and
meaningful relationship with English and great things will start to happen.
Firstly you will learn a lot of things using English as a vehicle and secondly
you will begin to absorb the language naturally as your exposure to it
increases and soon you will be thinking about ideas and topics straight into
English and NOT via your own language.
Wow, this sounds like a lot of work
and IELTS preparation on top too! Well, yes it is a lot of work but isn’t it
worth it to get what you need? Why are you taking the IELTS anyway? Isn’t it to
get you somewhere where you will be working or studying in ENGLISH every
day? IELTS is simply your gateway, once you arrive at your destination you are
going to need FAR MORE English than the IELTS needs so get started in this way
and ‘kill two birds with one stone’.
5. Try things out during your
preparation period
In order to produce a wonderful piece
of writing you need to experiment a
little. All writers create several drafts of their work before they
publish. Obviously in the exam you have
only one chance but if your preparation has really prepared you for that
one chance then you’ll have no problem. On the day of your test you should know
how you are going to tackle the questions, whatever they are – there shouldn’t
be any nasty surprises!
The time for experimenting is in your
preparation time and to get a good band you really should, try and do
this. From your reading and studying of model essays and other texts you will
find a host of new vocabulary and sentence types. You should choose the
ones that you like or the ones that impress you and use them in your own
writing. Be creative, test things see how they fit, see what the result is and
then ask someone to check and see if they have worked.
Questions I always ask my students
when they give me writing to check is ‘Are
you writing in the same way as you did before?’ and ‘Has the way you approach
your writing changed?’ I always expect the answer ‘yes’. There wouldn’t be
any point in working with me and then doing the same old things. I am always pleased with the ‘yes’ answer
because it shows me that their work is growing and developing and getting
better and that’s what should happen. I also love it when students try
things new, even if they don’t work – you
have to fail to grow and when better to do this than with a supportive
and experienced person to help you to use these words and phrases in the
correct way.
6. Timing comes towards the exam date
Many IELTS students I meet are worried
about getting their writing tasks done in the time allowed (1 hour) and spend
much of their preparation time racing against the clock, doing essay after
essay as fast as possible. This is putting the cart before the horse! When you
learn the Piano, the teacher would keeps telling you to get it right first and
then speed up. This is my advice for you
also. Once you know exactly what you are doing you can easily get this done in
the time and even faster leaving you extra time to check. This is what you
are aiming for. So make sure you start with the content and quality of your
writing and don’t worry about the time – that will come when you are ready
with your perfect band 7 essay every time!
Writing is the part of the exam that
most people struggle with but with some disciplined and effective practice it
will soon become a joy to you to write these tasks and when you are looking
forward to it then you have achieved what you need.
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