IELTS writing bible by DC IELTS task 2

IELTS
Writing
Task 2

May 4

2016

Tổng hợp bài giảng IELTS Writing Task 2 của thày Dominic Cole từ Facebook page
Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS

IELTS Kungfu


Contents

Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
Hãy nghĩ trước khi viết | Stop – think – write: a checklist for IELTS essays ............................................... 2
Sử dụng bảng checklist để kiểm tra lỗi | Improve your writing by using an IELTS essays checklist ................ 6
Cách bố cục bài luận Task 2 | How to structure IELTS essays .............................................................................. 8
Hai cách để viết bài luận discussion | Two ways to write discussion essays for IELTS ................................... 13
Dạng bài balanced view | Writing balanced essays for IELTS .............................................................................. 18
Dạng bài có 2 câu hỏi | Dealing with double questions essay tasks .................................................................... 22
Quy trình viết bài luận Task 2 | The process of writing an IELTS essay ............................................................. 27
Phân tích đề | Reading and understanding IELTS essay questions .................................................................... 31
Lập dàn ý | Planning IELTS essays – the thinking stage ....................................................................................... 33
Hướng dẫn viết Mở bài | The introduction – the link between the question and the essay.............................. 36
Hướng dẫn viết Thân bài | The content paragraphs – some checklists for before you write ........................... 40
Hướng dẫn viết Kết luận | The conclusion – a summary of the essay and an answer to the question .......... 43
Hướng dẫn viết Kết luận (tiếp) | Essay conclusions ............................................................................................... 47
Kiểm tra lại bài viết | Reviewing your essay – part of the process of writing ...................................................... 50

Từ vựng cho bài luận | IELTS essay vocabulary .................................................................................................... 53
Từ vựng trang trọng cho bài luận Task 2 | Impersonal vocabulary for academic essays ................................ 55
Quy trình lập dàn ý | The process of planning an IELTS essay ............................................................................ 57
An example of the planning process ................................................................................................................. 58
Điều gì sẽ xảy ra nếu bạn không lập dàn ý | What happens if you don’t plan enough? ........................... 61
Bao nhiêu paragraphs là đủ | How many paragraphs in an IELTS essay? ........................................................ 62
Hiểu yêu cầu đề bài | Understanding the task in IELTS essays ........................................................................... 64
Ba dạng câu hỏi Task 2 | The three different types of IELTS essay question .................................................... 66
1. The discussion.................................................................................................................................................. 66
2. The proposal ..................................................................................................................................................... 66
3. The argument ................................................................................................................................................... 67
Tìm ý cho bài luận Task 2 | Ideas for IELTS essays .............................................................................................. 70
Cách để tăng điểm cho bài luận | Improve your IELTS essays – ask yourself 4 simple questions ................ 72
Hướng dẫn viết Mở bài dạng đề discussion | Writing introductions to discussion essays ............................... 74
Phát triển ý theo công thức PEE | Paragraph coherence: the PEE model ......................................................... 77
Bài mẫu: Quá tải dân số | Sample IELTS overpopulation essay .......................................................................... 80
Hướng dẫn viết CÂU ĐẦU TIÊN trong thân bài | Write better paragraphs – start with a simple sentence ... 83
Kết nối các đoạn văn | Linking paragraphs in an essay ......................................................................................... 85

1


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
Hãy nghĩ trước khi viết | Stop – think – write: a checklist for IELTS
essays
Further down this lesson you’ll find a checklist of some things to think about as you are writing an
IELTS essay. Before you get to it though, I’d like to explain how and why it may help you. The basic
ideas are:
effective writing comes from effective thinking
you need to think as you write not just before it – just “planning” is not enough

it’s better to think before you write and not after it – you really don’t have time to draft and re-draft in
IELTS
the best time to think is before every sentence and every paragraph – they are the key units of your
essay
the best thinking is directed thinking – for that it helps to have some form of checklist
Let me first explain a little below why I suggest you spend more time thinking. It may seem that it will
slow you down and most people want to write faster! It may to begin with. But you should find that with
practice you end up writing more efficiently – meaning you don’t just complete essays in time, you
write better essays too.

Clear thinking makes better writing
One – slightly simplistic – way to understand this is to see that 50% of IELTS scores come from Task
Response and Coherence and Cohesion. Those marks are less about language and more about
thought and organisation. Put another way, wonderful grammar and vocab only get you 50% of the
way. To get the other 50% you need thinking skills.

Just planning is not enough
There is a limit to what you can plan in the exam room before you start writing. Even if you are able to
produce all the structure, language and ideas in your planning time, you still need to decide how it all
fits together.
I have met very, very few students who are able to do all that in their planning time. One result of this
is that a lot of people stop planning as they think they are wasting time. That’s bad. Much better is to
accept that your plan is not the complete answer and you can refine that plan as you write.
Please note that ‘m not suggesting you don’t plan. Indeed, for this thinking to work it is crucial you
have an essay structure/ideas/language – that all comes from having a plan.

2


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />

Don’t draft and re-draft – think before you write
If you have trouble finishing essays in the 40 minutes, it’s quite likely because you make too many
mistakes and end up crossing things out. One way to avoid this is just to spend more time thinking
before you write. This is not “planning time”, but the time you spend thinking about the best way to say
something.
If you are used to writing academic essays, you need to do in this thinking time what you’d normally do
in your re-drafting time.

Think before sentences and paragraphs
When I watch students writing, I see this go wrong lots and lots. Frequently I see students pausing half
way through a sentence – not knowing how to finish it. This is very often when writing goes wrong –
sometimes just because the two parts of the sentence don’t match each other!
One way to think of a sentence is that it is a complete thought. Only start writing when that thought is
complete in your head and your writing may improve overnight. Paragraphs? Well, they’re complete
ideas (thoughts put together). It’ll also really help if you get those complete ideas together before you
start writing.

Direct your thinking
It’s all very well to suggest “thinking” helps, but what should you think about? This will depend on you,
your experience, your level and the essay. Below I make some suggestions.

My thinking checklist for IELTS essays
What you will find below are a series of questions to ask yourself – feel free to amend it to your
purposes.
There may seem to be a lot of questions –
You may (i.e. probably will) think that my grammar/vocabulary notes in particular are too simple. I just
find that the best way to get language is to think of ideas first!
It may help to remember that essays are made up of related paragraphs and a paragraph is a
collection of related sentences. So when you start a paragraph you need to think of both the essay and
the sentences. Likewise, you need grammar and vocabulary and coherence/cohesion skills to write a

sentence.

Paragraphs
ideas/language
Do I have enough language/ideas to write a complete paragraph?
3


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
What is the main idea of this paragraph? Can I put it in one sentence?
essay structure
Does that main idea fit into my essay structure?
How does this paragraph relate to the other topic paragraphs?
coherence/organisation
How is the paragraph going to be structured?
Do I have reasons and/or examples for the main idea?
How many sentences should this paragraph have?

Sentences
coherence/cohesion
What do I want to say in this sentence? Can I finish the sentence in my head?
Is this a main idea? An example? An explanation? Something else?
How does this sentence relate to the previous sentence? Do I need a linking word? How else can I
show how it links?
grammar
Am I sure about the grammar? If not, can I put it some other way?
Is the grammar too simple/too repetitious?
vocabulary
Is the language precise?
Do I want to borrow words from the previous sentence(s)?

Do I need synonyms?
Is this language the right register (essay language)?
Further down this lesson you’ll find a checklist of some things to think about as you are writing an
IELTS essay. Before you get to it though, I’d like to explain how and why it may help you. The basic
ideas are:
effective writing comes from effective thinking

4


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
you need to think as you write not just before it – just “planning” is not enough
it’s better to think before you write and not after it – you really don’t have time to draft and re-draft
inIELTS
the best time to think is before every sentence and every paragraph – they are the key units of your
essay
the best thinking is directed thinking – for that it helps to have some form of checklist

5


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
Sử dụng bảng checklist để kiểm tra lỗi | Improve your writing by using
an IELTS essays checklist
This is a very simple exercise to help you to improve the quality of your IELTS essays. It is particularly
useful if you are just starting out on IELTS or if you find you are not making progress. The idea is that
you learn how to check your essays as an examiner would by looking at the specific band score
criteria. To help you do this, there is an IELTS essays checklist to download of the most important
points an IELTS examiner looks for in your essays. Using this checklist every time you finish your
essay can help you




not to make “silly” mistakes that seriously affect your band score
learn the correct essay writing process

The IELTS essays checklist
Essay writing checklist (47504)

Be specific when you use the checklist
The main idea of the checklist is that you are very specific what you check for and when you use the
checklist you should try to underline or mark in some way something in your essay. Don’t do the lazy
thing and just tick yes. So if, for example, you are looking at the question: “Do my sentences link
together?”, you might do this:
The first point to make is that politicians have a responsibility to spend public money on projects that
bring a benefit to the general public. This has not been the case with space research as most
developments have been limited to helping astronauts in space or have been very specialised. For
example, it is not of great value to the general public that we now have pens and biros that can write
upside down. This does not merit the huge amount of money spent.
You now know that your writing is coherent. If, however, you cannot underline something in the essay,
you now know what your problem is and you should mark it in the “my mistakes” table.

How often to use the checklist
You need to use the checklist on a very regular basis to make this work best. If you fill it out every time
you write an essay, then two things happen:
1. checking your writing becomes an automatic process
2. you learn what makes a good IELTS essay
It may look boring, but you need to trust me here that this time boring is good. Two of the main
reasons why candidates do badly are failing to find the time to check and not knowing what to check
for. You should also find that after you have done this 4/5 times, you become much more efficient

when you check.

6


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
What the checklist includes
The band score criteria

You will note that the checklist is organised according to the IELTS writing band score criteria. The
main point to note here is that each of these is equally important and all need to be checked. It is not
enough just to write an essay without “grammar” mistakes.
The writing process

The section headed writing process asks you to note down how long you spent planning, writing and
checking the essay. It is a good idea to keep a note of this because:
1. if you write down the time of the planning and checking phases, you will actually plan and check your
essays – the chances are that if your essays score badly it is because you didn’t spend enough time
planning and checking
2. you learn how long you need for each stage in the exam when you are under time pressure
3. you can check your progress on how long it takes you to write an IELTS essay. I certainly don’t
suggest you start by trying to write one in 40 minutes
Your mistakes

The “your mistakes” section is vital. We all use language in our own way and we all make our own
mistakes. The idea is that you keep a record of the types of mistake you make so that you can check
for those mistakes in the checking phase. If you don’t have a teacher, you can always try typing one of
your essays into Microsoft Word and using the grammar check feature: it isn’t perfect but it can help.

The checklist is too simple?

If you think that the checklist is too simple for your needs. I would suggest that you take a look at my
sample essays and experiment by analysing them with this checklist – you should find that it works for
them!
But the smart learner is the one who adopts and adapts: so feel free to amend it to your needs.

7


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
Cách bố cục bài luận Task 2 | How to structure IELTS essays
This lesson shows you a simple way to structure IELTS essays. Below I show a very simple method
(with a downloadable resource) I use myself and also show my students in class.

Hãy đọc và hiểu câu hỏi | Read and understand the question
One key to it is understand the question and to be clear about what you want to say in your response.
Clear thinking leads to clear writing.As ever, the first step is to read and understand the question. Here
is the question today:
Despite advances in medicine there are concerns that certain diseases such as diabetes are
increasing and some people believe future generations will face greater problems with health
and die younger than we do today.
What is your opinion?

This question asks you to:
1. give your opinion – this must be clear in the introduction and the conclusion
2. about whether health will be better in future – this means that you need to talk about the future and
now – there must be some comparison
3. about whether people will live longer – this needs to be mentioned to
All these things must be included.

Think about the examiner – make your opinion and structure clear – give

your essay a backbone
IELTS essays get marked quickly. You don’t want to allow the examiner to make a mistake. So make
life easy for him/her by showing the structure of your essay as clearly as possible. There are 4 places
you do this – what I think of as being the spine of the essay. (your spine is your backbone – it’s what
keeps you upright and gives you your structure).
1. the introduction – that’s the first thing they read and where you make your first impression and first
impressions count
2. the first sentence of each paragraph (x2) – examiners are taught that each paragraph should have one
main idea – show them what it is in the first sentence
3. the conclusion – that’s the last thing they read and the first thing they remember!
The key is link these things together so that



the introduction matches the conclusion – the opinion/point of view is the same: you just need to
change the language
the two body paragraphs link to the opinion/point view in the introduction
To do this try this simple essay structure plan. It may just look like 4 boxes on a blank piece of paper ,
but it might save your life!

8


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
Download my plan to structure IELTS essays

Structure IELTS essays plan (4198)

Suy nghĩ thật rõ ràng về quan điểm và ý kiến của chính bạn | Think
clearly about your opinion/point of view

9


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
You want your point of view to be clear. My basic rule is that if you can’t say in 2 sentences, it’s too
complex. So part of the planning process may be deleting ideas that are too complex or that you can’t
express clearly in English.
See my example

I’m going to go for a balanced type essay with an argument that it health and longevity (living for a long
time) will get worse in the West but better in developing nations. Before I start writing I make sure I can
say this simply
I think health will get worse in the west but better in developing countries and this will affect how long
people live.

Xây dựng bố cục bài luận | Build the spine of your essay – see my
example
All you need to do now is build the spine of the essay: the intro, first sentences and conclusion. I really
do do this using my essay structure plan above. I ended up with this. Take a look at it. See




how simple it is – that’s good, you do want a simple structure
how things repeat – that’s good too
I crossed out my idea about stress and mental health. It’s a good idea, but would make the essay too
complex

10

Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
Tìm từ vựng | Now get the words
This lesson wouldn’t be complete if I didn’t show you the “end-product”. Your plan is only good if it
helps you write well. Take a look at my opinions (in red) and the balance between developing countries
(in green) and the industrialised nations (in blue).
11


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />Introduction

There is no question that medicine has progressed dramatically over the last century, but this does not
mean that all our medical problems have been solved. Indeed, my belief is that the average life span
in the Western world may actually fall in the 21st century. This is in contrast to the situation in
developing countries where I expect health provision to improve and longevity to increase.
Paragraph 1

The main reason why overall health may become worse in the industrialised nations of the
West relates to modern lifestyles there.
Paragraph 2

The situation in the developing world is, however, quite different and overall health is likely to improve.
Conclusion

My conclusion is therefore a mixed one. While it is true that people may face greater problems with
their health in the future, this only applies to industrialised nations and not to the developing
world where life expectancy may increase.

12

Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
Hai cách để viết bài luận discussion | Two ways to write discussion
essays for IELTS
This lesson shows you two different discussion essays for IELTS. Part of the idea is to show you that
there is always more than one way to approach an IELTS essay. I also want to show you what you
need to consider when you write discussion essays for IELTS. This means first looking at some basic
ideas about essays and then thinking about what “discuss” means.

Two basic principles
When you write discussion essays for IELTS you need to understand 2 basic principles that apply to all
IELTS essays:
your essay must answer the question fully
your essay must be coherent

To get both of these right you need to think clearly about your essay structure before you start writing.

Identify discuss questions
The question can be asked in different ways the usual format is typically:
Discuss both these points of view and give your opinion
If the question asks you to discuss, you do just that: discuss.

Discuss can mean two things
In fact, the question never ever says “write a discussion essay”. The reason for this is that different
teachers have different ideas about what a discussion essay is. The idea is not to write a model
“discussion essay”, rather it is to discuss the topic in the question – something quite different.
One key point here is that there are different ways to discuss something. Discuss includes both these
ideas:
stating what people think (perhaps saying why they believe this – this is a more objective approach)
commenting on what people think (perhaps saying what the pros and cons of their view is – this

a more subjective approach)
For me, the better type of discussion essay is one that both states and comments on the different
views – if you do this you will discuss better.

Get a logical and clear essay structure
There is absolutely no one structure for a discuss question in IELTS. You simply have to find a
structure that is logical and allows you to answer the question. You will find 3 different examples of
how to do this below in my essays. Whichever structure you choose, you need to decide first:
what is my introduction?
how am I going to write two/three clear topic paragraphs?
what is my conclusion?
13


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />do all the parts of my essay fit together?

See two different ways how to write a discussion essay
You will find below 2 different discussion essays with detailed writing notes. What you should see is
that:
both essays answer the question: they discuss the issue and give an opinion
one essay keeps the opinion to the end and discusses only objectively
the other establishes the opinion in the introduction and comments on the issues throughout the essay
Almost everyone agrees that we should be training children to recycle waste to save the
Earth’s natural resources. Some believe that it is parents who should teach their children to
recycle waste. Others argue that school is the best place to teach do this. Discuss both views
and give your own opinion
Most people would agree that young people need to be taught about the importance of recycling waste
products and packaging. There is a difference of opinion, however, whether this should happen at
home or in schools. In this essay, I will examine both points of view and then state my opinion.
The argument in favour of teaching children at school about recycling is largely based around the idea

that schools and other educational establishments are the best environment for training children. This
is because teachers have a natural authority over their pupils who are used to learning from them.
Additionally, the need for recycling could easily be included in biology and geography classess.
There are two main reasons why people think parents taking responsibility for this training could be
more effective. The first is that the majority of recycling takes place in the home and parents can
therefore more easily control the recycling habits of their children. If, for example, parents see their
child put a recyclable bottle in the wrong bin, they can explain that it needs to go in another bin. The
other very practical point is that often children spend more time at home than at school and so parents
may have more effect.
My own view is that the best solution is for children to learn about recycling both at home and at
school. In this way, they would learn about both the theory and the practice.
(277 words)

Notes
Overview

This is a much more objective discussion essay.


you separate out your opinion from what other people say. Your opinion only comes at the end.
14


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />





it looks like an easy structure/formula to learn

it may look easy to write but it is very hard to write well. The introduction uses some dangerously
formulaic language and is avery weak thesis statement
the conclusion is usually more difficult to write well as you need to refer to the main body paragraphs
to make the essay coherent. It is not really enough jus tot say “this is what I think”. Rather, you need to
link that conclusion with the main ideas of the paragraph and that means giving reasons that are found
in the body paragraphs (both of them).
be very careful about balance. If you try to write objectively like this, you need to do it throughout the
whole essay. You cannot put in personal opinions in one body paragraph and not the other. If you do,
your essay will become incoherent. Your point of view must remain consistent. This means that if
you start out neutrally, you must continue neutrally.

Structure







Introduction – 3 sentences normally
Here is the issue.
Here are the two views
Here is what I’m going to say
Main body 1
This is why people think school is the best place (i.e. main idea = one point of view)
Reasons with examples (support)



Main body 2

This is why people think home is the best place (i.e. the other main idea = the other point of view)
Reasons with examples (support)



Conclusion
Your opinion – also summarizing the main points of the essay to make it coherent.



Almost everyone agrees that we should be training children to recycle waste to save the
Earth’s natural resources. Some believe that it is parents who should teach their children to
recycle waste. Others argue that school is the best place to teach do this. Discuss both views
and give your own opinion
It is not easy to decide how to teach young people about the necessity to recycle waste products. One
school of thought is that they should be taught this in school. Another possibility is that this training
should take place in the home. While teachers may have some part to play, my view is that parents are
more likely to be effective in achieving practical results.
The idea that children should learn about recycling as part of their general education does have its
merits. One reason why people propose this is that recycling could easily fit in with other subjects on
the curriculum such as geography and biology. The general idea is that if children understand about
15


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
the effects that not recycling has on the environment, then they will naturally choose to recycle waste
and packaging themselves. The drawback is that children frequently do not apply what they learn as
theory to life itself.
The alternative suggestion of giving the primary responsibility to parents seems more likely to be
effective in practice. This is partly because the majority of recycling actually happens in the home

where parents and teachers are present. Parents can, for example, ensure that their children get into
habit of sorting waste and packaging and putting it into the correct bin. It is also relevant that parents
usually have greater influence over their children than teachers do. A child is typically going to listen to
the advice of a parent than a teacher, simply because their relationship is closer.
My conclusion is therefore that while it may seem better for children to learn about recycling at school,
in practice that training would be more effective when given by parents.
(282 words)

Notes
Overview

This is a much more subjective/comment discussion essay.







the point of view of the writer is clear throughout the essay
it follows a logical structure
the introduction avoids formula language and so requires more thought. It has a strong thesis
statement where you say exactly what you think.
You must make sure that you also cover both points of view and not just give your own
opinions in the body paragraphs
the conclusion matches the introduction almost exactly and is therefore easier to write: you simply look
back at the introduction before you write the conclusion
the point of view needs to be consistent all the way through the essay. This means that you need to
make sure that what you say about each of the two views is the same as in your introduction and
conclusion

Structure






Introduction – 3 sentences normally
Here is the issue.
Here are the two views
Here is my opinion [contrast this with the first essay where you do not give your opinion in the
introduction]
Main body 1
This is why people think school is the best place (i.e. main idea = one point of view)
16


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />


comment on whether you think it is a good idea or not
Reasons with examples (support)



Main body 2
This is why people think home is the best place (i.e. the other main idea = the other point of view)
comment on whether you think it is a good idea or not
Reasons with examples (support)



Conclusion
Your opinion – reflecting the introduction and the main points of the body paragraphs




Which is better?
I have a very strong preference for the second type of essay particularly if you are aiming for a high
score of 7.0 and above
it is typically more intelligent – by adding comments on the points of view you get more to say and you
are able to “discuss” the views both objectively and subjectively – this is likely to help you give a much
more complete answer by discussing the points of view fully and not merely stating objectively what
people think
it is typically much more coherent – your point of view is clear throughout the whole essay and not just
the conclusion
it allows you to avoid some very tired formulaic language
Some people prefer the other structure. Here is why it may help
it is perhaps quicker to learn – it often includes more formula language
it allows you to treat the two parts of the question separately: first their views and then your opinion –
this can seem simpler especially at lower levels
it does not need much thinking time before you start writing as your own opinions only come in the
conclusion – personally I don’t believe that that’s a good thing

17


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />

Dạng bài balanced view | Writing balanced essays for IELTS
This lesson talks you through an approach to writing balanced essays in IELTS. This is one form of
essay you should be prepared to write. It is certainly not the case that you have to express strong
opinions in essays, you simply have to express clear opinions. One way of doing this is to look at both
sides of the argument and consider their merits in turn – this is a balanced essay.

When to write a balanced essay
The best time to use this approach is when you yourself can see merit in both sides of the argument –
it is not the case that this approach is restricted to “Discussion” essays: it is quite possible to use it in
“Argument” essays.

Essay structure and coherence






One key to writing a balanced essay is to make sure that the structure is coherent. This means that all
the parts of the essay should fit together as a whole. The idea is to make sure that anyone reading the
essay understands that it is looking at both sides of the issue. This should be clear at all stages of the
essay. A common problem is that one part of the essay does not fit into the main structure.To do this,
you need to consider:
planning the whole essay before you start writing
linking the different parts of the essay together
writing the essay as part of a process – go back and read what have just written before you write the
next bit
concentrating on the intro/topic sentences and the conclusion

The basic approach

The basic approach is quite simple: in each topic paragraph you consider a different/opposing point of
view. You then summarise your view about which side you prefer in the conclusion. In an exam essay,
it is almost certainly the best advice not to try and discuss the two points of view at the same time in
one paragraph. If you do this it is quite likely that the “argument” becomes confused and your main
goal is clarity.
In this form of essay, it is conventional to look at the side you disagree with first. This allows you to find
a natural link between your final content paragraph and the conclusion – they should be saying almost
the same thing.

Introduction
The goal here is to state clearly that the essay is going to take a balanced position and/or look at both
sides of the issue. This means examiner/reader should understand from the introduction your position
and how essay will be structured. In practice this means that in the intro you should try to:





identify both sides of the argument
show that there is merit on both sides
identify which side you favour, (the balanced approach) and/or
say you will look at both sides (the more neutral approach)
18


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
In the two example below, you should see the difference between these two approaches.
Neutral approach
In this approach, you merely state that both sides have merit and say you will look at both sides of the
case.

While there are grounds to argue that it would benefit society and young people themselves if
teenagers were made to do unpaid work in the community, it can equally be argued that this would be
an infringement of their rights. In this essay, I shall examine the merits of both sides of the
argument and state my own opinion.
Balanced approach
This is the approach I generally prefer as you clearly identify your position on one side of the argument
or the other. I believe it is better because it is simply clearer.
There are grounds to argue that it would benefit society and young people themselves if teenagers
were made to do unpaid work in the community. While this is an interesting proposal and has some
merit, my own view is that it would infringe their rights.

Main body
In the main body, there are two ideas to focus on:
1. the paragraphs should balance each other
2. the paragraphs should link back to position in the introduction

Balancing your paragraphs

The key to making sure your paragraphs balance each other is to use your topic/first sentences reflect
each other. The examiner/reader should immediately understand how the paragraph fits into the
structure of the essay. A simple way of doing this is to use similar introductory language in each
paragraph. In the example below, it should be easy to see (even without the highlighting) how the
following paragraphs balance each other and reflect each others’ language.
One argument in favour of making teenagers do voluntary work in the community is that it would
benefit society. It is certainly true that there is a shortage of labour in many parts of the public sector
and if young people worked, then many public services would improve. For example, it would be quite
possible for teenagers to do part-time jobs in the health such as working as hospital porters. This
would have the effect of ensuring patients got better care and would allow trained professionals to
concentrate on more skilled tasks – something that would benefit society as a whole.
Despite this argument, there is an equally strong case to be made that it would be morally wrong to

force teenagers to go out to work, particularly if they did not earn a salary. This can be explained by
the fact that in recent years, there has been a global movement to stop the practice of child labour.
19


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
The main philosophy behind this movement is that childhood, including the teenage years, should be a
time for education and growth, not work. It would not just send the wrong message out if teenagers
were made to do voluntary work, there is also the real danger that young people would be exploited in
the workplace.

Linking back to the introduction

A second skill is to make sure that your topic paragraphs refer back to the position in the introduction.
This is because it is important to maintain a constant position throughout the essay -something
that can often go wrong with balanced essays. Again, a simple to achieve this is to make sure that the
language and ideas of the first\topic sentences is reflected in the introduction.
This means that you should really have a clear idea of your whole essay before you write the
introduction. A second tip is that in the process of writing the content paragraphs of your essay you
should refer back to the introduction to borrow language and ideas from there. If you look at the
examples below, you should see how the first sentence of each paragraph links clearly back to the
introduction.
While there are grounds to argue that it would benefit society and young people themselves if
teenagers were made to do unpaid work in the community, it can equally be argued that this would
be an infringement of their rights. In this essay, I shall examine the merits of both sides of the
argument
One argument in favour of making teenagers to do voluntary work in the community is that it
would benefit society.
Despite this arguments, there is an equally strong case to be made that it would be morally wrong to
force teenagers to go out to work, particularly if they did not earn a salary

The conclusion

The same ideas apply to the conclusion: the language and ideas of the intro and the first/topic
sentences should be reflected here too. You may also consider referring back to some of the details of
your argument to emphasise that you are able to support your case with reasons and examples. Do
that and the the essay should be coherent. Again, it greatly helps if you remember to go back and reread the essay before you write the conclusion.
Some people think that teenagers should do unpaid work to help society because this will help
them to be better individuals and also improve the society as a whole. To what extent do you
agree or disagree with this proposal?

20


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
While there are grounds to argue that it would benefit society and young people themselves if
teenagers were made to do unpaid work in the community, it can equally be argued that this would be
an infringement of their rights. In this essay, I shall examine the merits of both sides of the argument.
One argument in favour of making teenagers to do voluntary work in the community is that it
would benefit society. It is certainly true that there is a shortage of labour in many parts of the public
sector and if young people worked, then many public services would improve. For example, it would be
quite possible for teenagers to do part-time jobs in the health such as working as hospital porters. This
would have the effect of ensuring patients got better care and would allow trained professionals to
concentrate on more skilled tasks – something that would benefit society as a whole.
Despite these arguments, there is an equally strong case to be made that it would be morally wrong to
force teenagers to go out to work, particularly if they did not earn a salary. This can be explained by
the fact that in recent years, there has been a global movement to stop the practice of child labour.
The main philosophy behind this movement is that childhood, including the teenage years, should be a
time for education and growth, not work. It would not just send the wrong message out if teenagers
were made to do voluntary work, there is also the real danger that young people would be exploited in

the workplace.
In conclusion, I believe that while there are real merits on both sides of the argument, the moral case
againstforcing young people to work slightly outweighs any benefit to society. This is reinforced by
belief in the principle that childhood is a time for education and fear of the danger of exploitation.

Footnote on essay writing and essay structures
The ideas in this lesson are all contained in my series of lessons on the process of essay writing. Much
of the secret of writing a good essay in the exam is not to go in with a pre-prepared plan, but to make
sure that as you write you concentrate on the question in front of you and organising your language
and thoughts in answer to that question.

21


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
Dạng bài có 2 câu hỏi | Dealing with double questions essay tasks
One common but tricky task in IELTS is when you get an essay that combines two different questions.
This can cause problems with essay structure. The main idea is that you must
 answer both part of the questions
 if you don’t you may well get penalised for task achievement. To get this right you need to think
carefully about essay structure before you start.

General approach
My suggested approach is the same as for any type of essay question:
Understand the question
Decide on your point of view
Make the point of view clear in the introduction
Decide how to use your 2/3 main body paragraphs
Use the conclusion to reflect your introduction
The tricky part is probably getting the introduction and conclusion right.

Understand the question – make sure you understand both parts of the
question
The first step is to understand the question and see that the question is asking you to do two things. A
typical question looks like this:
Nowadays the way many people interact with each other has changed because of technology.
In what ways has technology affected the types of personal relationships?
Has this become a positive or negative development?
Think about structure

You should see immediately that there are 2 questions and the sensible approach is to structure your
answer so that is 100% clear to the examiner that you have answered both parts. Before you start
writing it is 100% important that you think about what the questions are asking you to do.
Think about what the questions ask you to do

Quite often with this type of question the two separate parts ask you to write in different ways and that
typically (not always) one part of the question will ask you to discuss a problem and the other part of
the question will ask you to give an opinion.
So in the example question

22


Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />In what ways has technology affected the types of personal relationships? is a discussion type

question which you can write more objectively
Has this become a positive or negative development? is an opinion question which requires
a subjective opinion answer
This means your answer has two include two separate parts – a more general discussion and an
opinion.

Suggested overall structure
My overall structure would look like this
Introduction
This is the issue. Technology has changed relationships.
Change happens in different ways
Opinion about whether change positive or negative
Main paragraph A – different types of change
A listing type paragraph showing the types of change – written as a discussion
Main paragraph B – opinion about positive or negative
A more opinion type paragraph with emphasis on why changes in paragraph A are good or bad
Conclusion
Short summary as to why positive or negative and what change is most significant.

Getting the introduction right
As I say, this may be the tough part of the essay as you need to make sure that in one paragraph you
identify both parts of the question
make sure your opinion/point of view is clear
This may mean that you will spend a little more time and energy on the the introduction than you would
for other question types as you may have more to do.
Model introduction

Here is my example:
Advances in technology have without doubt influenced the way we communicate with each other in a
number of different ways. While some of this change can have a negative influence on the we way
interact, my view is that overall modern technology typically improves communication in personal
relationships.
Notes
23

Facebook Tôi được 9 điểm Viết IELTS | 0904 98 0083 | />
You should see that I clearly identify the two parts of the question:
Advances in technology have without doubt influenced the way we communicate with each other in a
number of different ways.While some of this change can have a negative influence on the we way
interact, my view is that overall modern technology typically improves communication in personal
relationships.

Also note that I am 100% clear that I will have an opinion as the question asks me to do
Advances in technology have without doubt influenced the way we communicate with each other in a
number of different ways.While some of this change can have a negative influence on the we way
interact, my view is that overall modern technology typically improves communication in personal
relationships.

Suggested structure for main body paragraphs
The simple and clear way to do this is to use a separate main body paragraph in your essay for each
question. That way it will clear straightaway that you are on task. It may be possible to combine the
two parts of the question in different ways, but don’t bother. Do the simple thing. Simple is good in
exam circumstances. My very strong suggestion is
paragraph A – discuss how technology has changed relationships
paragraph B – discuss if this is a positive or negative
Linking your paragraphs and being consistent

If you are aiming for a higher band score you also want to find a link between your two main body
paragraphs. This will help your coherence score. My suggestion here is that you start the paragraph B
about whether this is negative or positive by referring back to the changes in paragraph A. The key
word is this or these.
Model paragraphs
Paragraph A

It is clear that technology has changed the way we communicate in several respects. Perhaps the
clearest example of this is that nowadays many people prefer to keep in touch to their friends and
relatives using applications and social networking sites like FaceTime, Skype and Facebook. Another
way this change is evident is how the email and texting have almost completely replaced the letter as
the primary form of written communication. Because these modern forms of communication are
typically much more convenient and instant, one result is that we can communicate more easily with
people who we do not see on a daily basis.
Paragraph B
24