Hi everybody,welcome back to www.engvid.com, I'm Adam.
Today's video is about the IELTS writing section,and again, as usual, I'll speak a little bit
more quickly just so you get alittle bit of listening practice as well.
More specifically, I'm going to talk to youabout how the IELTS writing is scored, and
there are four criteria that you need to understandin order to prepare yourself for this part
Now, before I get into it, I just want to letyou know also, I've written a book specifically
to help you with the IELTSwriting self-evaluation.
A lot of people don't have someone to lookat their essays and see what they're doing
wrong, so I've written a book that will showyou all the things you need to know about
the scoring section, plus a lot of sampleessays and summaries that are fully edited,
scored and assessed so that you can understandhow people are losing points and how you might
But I'll get back tothat in a moment.
So there are fourscoring criteria.
Task achievement and task response, and thereason there's a difference is this is task
There are two different things they're lookingfor for each task because different structures
Then there's cohesion and coherence, that's forboth tasks one and two, and that's basically
So for those of you taking the TOEFL exam,not the IELTS, all of this information can
It still applies to your TOEFL writingbecause writing is assessed the same way.
Lexical resource is vocabulary, and grammaticalrange and accuracy is grammar and structure.
Now, it's very, very important to understandthat there are four sections, each worth 25%
So grammar is notworth more than content.
Vocabulary is not worth more than grammaror cohesion and coherence; 25%, 25, 25, 25.
So make sure that you're not onlyfocusing on vocabulary and grammar.
Just because it's an English exam doesn'tmean that they just want to see English.
Make sure that you're communicating a veryclear, well-organized idea with good vocabulary,
But I'll get into eachcriterion separately.
Another thing that's very, very importantto understand is that the examiners who read
your writing section, and there are goingto be at least two examiners reading it, are
Okay,they're reading your essay holistically.
They're not reading it once for the task responsescore, then reading it again for the cohesion
and coherence, then reading again forvocab, then reading again for grammar.
They'll usually read it once to get asense of how everything works together.
They may read it a second time just to getthe finer points that they can then assign
But generally, they're looking at thewhole; that's what "holistically" means.
How all the parts work together.
Which means - and this is very, very important toremember - if you make a mistake with vocabulary,
you can also lose points, not just for vocabulary,but for cohesion and coherence if the sentence
doesn't make sense becauseof this one misused word.
If your grammar, if your sentences are soconfusing, if there are so many errors in
them that I can't exactly get your idea, thenyour task response or task achievement score
is also losing points becauseyour ideas are not clear.
So, everything works together.
So, don't focus just onone or two criterion, okay?
So, now, what I'm going to do is I'm going togive you the top three questions you should
always be asking for each criterion when itcomes to your particular writing sample, okay?
Okay, so let's start with the taskresponse and task achievement.
Essentially,the content of your summary and your essay.
So, TA, task achievement, task one,let me just make sure we understand that.
So, the first things you want to have in mindare did you include an overview, an overview
Now, some people prefer to put a conclusion atthe end, some people prefer to put an overview
as a second paragraph orblend it with the introduction.
Either way is okay,just make sure that you do it.
Now,what is an overview statement?
An overview is a very general look at theinfographic, at the bar graph, pie chart,
You must have anoverview statement.
If you don't, you're automaticallylosing points for the task achievement.
Did you use selective details?
Now, a very common mistake that people make isthey put all the information, as many numbers
as they can fit in, because they thinkthey need to get their word count up.
Including this willlose you points.
Remember, one of the instructions for thetask one is, you know, select or highlight
features of the taskand make comparisons.
If you're including everything, then there'sno real sense of you summarizing because you're
Make sure you carefully select your detailsand make sure that if there is anywhere to
make a comparison,that you're making that comparison.
If you don't do that,you're losing points.
And all of this comes together with,did you understand the infographic?
Did you understand that somethingis going up, something is going down?
In other words, did you have the correct informationand did you notice - again, it comes back
to the comparisons - did you notice thatsomething went up while something went down?
Do not add your own ideas or opinions, you'reonly working with what's on the page in front
of you, but show the examiners that you clearlyunderstood what's going on and what is the
most important partof the infographic.
In terms of the essay, the task two,a few things you must keep in mind.
One, did you understand thetask and did you address the task?
Basically, the paraphrase will show them thatyou understood the task, but most importantly,
The thesis is whatthis essay is about.
If the thesis statement is clear, it meansyou understood the task and you addressed
it.
If the thesis statement is not clear, thenit's not exactly sure that you understood
the task and you might bemaking mistakes as you go along.
So, I always recommend to people, put youropinion, put your thesis in the introduction.
Yes, you can put it in the last paragraph,but because this is a timed test, put it in
the first paragraph, that way you know you'veanswered the question and it'll help you stay
focused as you write your body paragraphs,because you know what it is you're supporting.
I've seen many people say, "Right, this essaywill examine the reasons and provide an opinion,
So, you used all these words to tell me thatyou're going to give me an opinion, why not
just give me the opinion andthen go on to support it, right?
Put your opinion in the beginning,make sure you address the task right away.
Now, there's a couplethings to keep in mind here.
One, did you, like,expand or elaborate on your argument?
Did you connect everything inthe body back to your thesis?
But most importantly, if your thesis is, like,I believe A is more important than B, and
then your body paragraph is A is very importantbecause of this, B is very important because
of this,that's why I believe A is more important.
If you're going to give me a balanced argument,although you took a side, a very clear side
in your thesis, then it's not clear, you didn'tsupport your thesis because you have to convince
me that A is more than B, etc.
Did you followacademic standards?
Do you have at least 250 words?
Do you have very clear paragraphs,introduction, body, body, conclusion?
You can have two or three body paragraphs,don't have four, don't have five.
And then, do you have tabs or do you skip aline between paragraphs so it's very clear
to see where the paragraphs are?
Don't skip a line and put a tab,one or the other.
For example, did you write "don't","isn't", "can't", or did you open them?
Don't use contractions informal academic writing.
So, all of these things you need to keep inmind as well to make sure that you're not
losing points for kind of a silly reason,right?
Now, there are of course other things you needto consider, but if you want more details,
go to my other YouTube channel,youtube.com/writetothetop.
I have a little mini-series explaining allof this stuff in greater detail with some
more examples that you can seeand then that'll help you as well.
Okay, so now we're going tolook at cohesion and coherence.
Cohesion is basicallymaking things stick together.
It's basically makingthings understandable.
So, basically words and ideas have to connectin such a way that the idea comes across easily
and simply to the reader, right?
So, the things you - the main things youneed to consider are, are paragraphs unified?
Now, what do I mean by unified?
Every paragraph shouldhave a central focus.
Don't include too manyunrelated ideas in one paragraph.
In one paragraph, you're making one point orpresenting one point or making one argument.
Make sure that everything in thatparagraph is relating back to that.
And basically, connected to thisidea is do you have topic sentences?
Do you have a very clear topic sentence atthe beginning of each of the body paragraphs?
And this is something that costs peoplea lot of points, and this is something that
examiners are very,very specifically looking for.
So, make sure that you start your paragraphsmaking it very clear what you're going to
discuss here,and then stick to that.
I see a lot of people startright away with an example.
Never begin a body paragraph with an examplebecause you don't have anything to give an
You haven'tpresented an argument.
So, first, my - I think this is - well, youalready gave your opinion in the introduction.
First, this is because A orB. A or B is like this and that.
An example is this and that, and that'swhy, and then connect back to your thesis.
That is a topic sentence that presents theidea, and then a unified paragraph that builds
it and connects it back to the thesis statement,and then you have your coherence and cohesion.
Another thing you have to be very carefulwith is do you make good use of transitions,
links, conjunctions, pronouns,all of these cohesion devices, okay?
When you begin a new paragraph, make sureyou're not suddenly starting an argument without
any connection towhat came before.
This is especially true in the secondand if you have a third body paragraph.
If you're shifting focus to a new point,make that clear.
If you're providing a contrasting argumentto what you did before, make sure that's very
If you're adding, if you're continuing, anythingyou do, make it very clear to the reader where
they are going as they follow you into the secondbody paragraph and the third body paragraph.
Don't have an idea in one sentence and thensomething completely unrelated in the next
sentence because then the reader is, youknow, wait, what did I miss here, right?
Then they have to go back and try to figureout the connection for you, and you're losing
The main thing to remember, every time that areader must stop to try to figure out what's
going on,you're losing points, right?
So make everything flow smoothly from oneidea to the next, one sentence to the next,
one paragraph to the next, and then this willcreate a whole unified essay that is easy
to understand and follow, okay?
So that's cohesionand coherence.
And this applies to bothtask one and task two.
Don't use formal academictransitions in task one.
On the other hand, because you're not reallymaking that kind of comparison, paragraph
one has this focus, paragraph two has thisfocus, you can just say, "Now, in terms of
And all you have to do is tell me whatyou're focusing on and then get to it.
Don't use too many words is anotherbig issue with cohesion and coherence.
Having said that, let's look at lexicalresource because that's also an issue there.
Okay, so now we're going tolook at lexical resource, vocabulary.
First thing, like, I'm going to focus mostlyon the essay, but I'll give you a couple of
So, for the essay,this is super, super important.
If you're using a lot of words from the task,like words that were given to you, you're
Make sure to change or rewrite thetask as much as possible to avoid this.
Now, the reason is, one, because they're givingit to you; two, it shows that you understand
the task, that's also part of task response;but mostly, it's just to show that you have
enough vocabulary that you can say onething a different way, and that's the key.
Lexical resource, do you have the resources toexpress yourself in different ways in different
Now, in the task one, they're not giving youthat much information, and there's only so
You're not going to change certain thingsthat can't be changed, especially if they're
part of the infographic, but again,change as much as you can.
If they're using "average",say "mean".
If they're using "the most", say "the highest",or again, depending on the context and what
Every word you can change,change.
Also, did you or do you repeatwords that have clear alternatives?
Now, clear alternativesdoesn't only mean synonyms.
Of course, use synonyms, but I've seen peoplewrite an essay and they had, like, one word,
and throughout the essay, they've used everysynonym in the thesaurus for this one word.
That's showing the examiners that you memorizeda bunch of words in their synonyms and you're
So,don't necessarily use all the synonyms.
You can also use pronouns, or you can rearrangesentences so you don't actually even need
Combine sentences, make this word use - like,help you produce two ideas instead of one
word with one idea,the same word with another idea.
Combine those two sentencesand make them work together.
Minimize your needto use that one word.
Lots of different alternatives, part of yourresources, show them you have those resources.
And of course,did you use words naturally?
So,I've seen this a lot of times.
People write a very, you know, relativelysimple style of writing, not crazy big words
But then suddenly, this one word that is obviouslyvery academic, very high-end, not commonly
used in everyday situations, and it's veryclear to the examiners that you forced this
word in thinking it willget you more points.
So, that's not natural,that's forced.
So, for example, if you're going to use theword "plethora", but in all the other situations
you just write "a lot", which is what "plethora"means, then that word "plethora" means you've
memorized it somewhere and you're losingpoints for that word, not gaining points.
Better to use "a lot" than use "plethora" asthe only academic word and then all simple
So, if you have "plethora", make sure youhave "myriad", make sure you have all kinds
of like "mitigated"instead of "reduced".
Make sure you are on a consistentlevel of vocabulary, not forcing it in.
And also, and this I see all the time, it'svery obvious you memorized words if you're
Just because you know the word, it meansnothing if you don't know how to use this word.
If you use simple words, you'll actually get ahigher score than using big words incorrectly.
Now, for task one, the lexical resource isnot about big words, because this is not an
This is a summary of details,right?
What they're looking for intask one are your function words.
Are you using "increase", "increase", "increase","increase", or are you using other words like
"rise" or "blow up" or whateverother expressions you have?
And so, function words for "increase", "decrease",but especially words like "plateau", "fluctuate"
They know all these words are coming, they wantto make sure that you're using them correctly.
So, don't try to write anessay style in your task one.
Write very simple and worry about thefunction words more than anything else, okay?
So, that's lexical resource,now we still have grammar to look at.
Okay, so now, finally, our last criterionis grammatical range and accuracy.
And again, basically it's grammar, and toomany people focus too much on this and the
So,a few things you have to keep in mind.
Do your structures show variety?
So, yes, you do need to try to have differenttypes of sentences and different types of
clauses,but don't overstress about this.
If you have two or three good, complex sentences,that's usually - you know, it's pretty much
enough to showthat you can do it.
But I've seen a lot of people, they try tomake every sentence a little bit complicated
or complex with all kinds of different structures,and inversion, and subjunctive, and this clause
At some point, you're just giving yourselfmore opportunities to make mistakes.
Get your message across first, that's yourfirst priority, make it clear, and then add
a little bit of variety and style to it,just to show them that you can.
If all of your sentences are simple,also not good.
But better to be simple and easy to read thanoverly complex and not make any sense or not
make any argument to the examiners,to the readers.
This one, I shouldn't have to ask this,but it's a real thing.
Are you aware ofbasic language rules?
Are you aware that subjectand verb must agree?
Are you aware that he or she must take an"s" in the verb, like in a simple present?
Are you aware of how to use basicprepositions, basic punctuation?
All of these things, how to capitalize, how toavoid a run-on sentence or a sentence fragment.
These are all basics of the language, basicsof grammar that a lot of people are still
And again, remember the wholeidea about being the holistic scoring?
If you're making basic mistakes, and I'm notexactly sure what's going on, you're also
losing points for task response,maybe for cohesion and coherence as well.
Everything affects everything else,which leads to the last question.
Do your mistakes,do your errors distract from the reading?
And the same as cohesion and coherence, ifI'm reading your essay and I have to stop
and try to figure out what is going on, tryto make the connections for you, try to make
sense of your syntax for you,then you're losing points.
If your grammar is not at a high enough levelright now, work on your grammar and build
your vocabulary first,then think about the IELTS exam.
If you're desperate to get yourIELTS score, it's not going to help you.
Desperation should onlypush you to study harder.
But there are no tricksto the IELTS writing, right?
You have to know how to express an idea, howto get an idea across to a reader, that's
Anyway, if you want to know more about allthis stuff, like I mentioned, right to the
top on YouTube, I have more things you needto consider and I have a lot more examples
that you can actually seehow all of these things apply.
And if you want even more examples,like I mentioned, my book is available.
It has ten summaries written by students orwritten by people preparing for the exam.
I edit these summaries and I have 40 essays,fully edited, scored, assessed with notes
of where the problems are,and all of them have been rewritten.
So, every essay submitted by a student wasnot only fixed, but was rewritten to a band
nine level so thatyou can compare.
So, you can see why this person got a 5.5and why - what this essay could look like
And I try to keep as manyof the original ideas as I can.
You can buy the print book through Amazon,you can buy the PDF e-book through my website,
And, again, it's only there to help you improvefor the writing section because I know that
the writing section is the hardest sectionof the IELTS exam and the TOEFL exam as well.
So,make sure you're prepared for it.
Don't focus on one area,focus on all four areas.
Now, if you have any questions, feelfree to ask me at the www.engvid.com page.
There's also a quiz,you can take it there.
And come back for more useful tips on testprep, English, grammar, all kinds of useful