This series from Greg Archer, author of Mindset for IELTS, provides bite-size support to teachers that are new to preparing students for IELTS and are not sure where to begin. Greg starts the series with the IELTS Writing Task – in particular, what to expect and what teachers can do to ensure students write the perfect answer.
What’s in Task 1 of Academic Writing and what tone should students use?
The idea behind Task 1 for the Academic Writing paper is that it present students with information visually, and asks them to write a summary of the information. In order to prepare students for this test, Greg explains that teachers need to ensure that their students know exactly what they need to do for each question type. For example, if students are presented with a line graph, then they will be expected to write about trends.
Greg also expresses the need for students to let go of the notion that their writing has to highly formal in tone. Though they are writing a report, their tone should in fact be a neutral, semi-formal tone. As this can be a hard concept, Greg suggests that teachers tell their students to imagine that they writing the reports for their teacher or boss at work, not for the examiner or a university professor!
What’s in Task 1 of General Training Writing?
A student taking the General Training Writing paper will need to write a letter. Therefore it is up to the teacher to make sure that students understand the letter writing format. This includes letter etiquette and conventions, such as which sign off is appropriate depending on the greeting used.
How can I help students to ‘describe’ information?
According to Greg, ‘describe’ is the wrong word. It’s all about seeing what is in front you and thinking ‘what is this telling me‘? Getting too descriptive isn’t going to help you and in fact, may lose you marks if you go into too much detail on the individual items you can see.
So what is Greg’s number 1 tip for teachers? Practise taking the test again and again yourself!
For more tips and explanations, make sure to watch the full video below with Greg Archer, as he also explains how you can use official materials such as practice tests and Mindset for IELTS to prepare students for Writing Task 1.
Greg Archer will be back with more help for teachers preparing students for IELTS. In the mean time, make sure to check out this article by Pauline Cullen providing help with the IELTS writing test.