IELTS - How to get a high score on Task 1 of the IELTS

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Hi, I'm emma and today. We are going to be talking about

Task one of the writing module for the ielts

So again this is task one for the writing module of the ielts

It's in two parts

The first part is going to be something about maybe a graph

[a] diagram something something to do with having to write a report

to describe

What you see visually the second part is an essay

So we're going to be talking about the first part today

Okay, so the first thing to know is [that] you're going to have about 20 minutes to do task one

so this is [not] a lot of time and

It's going to be very important for you to practice this before you actually go [into] the ielts

For task 1 you have to write about 150 words

describing either a graph a chart [a] table a diagram or a

flow chart

You will be marked on four different things in this task

So this is something to keep in mind

You're going to be marked on your usage of vocabulary if you use vocabulary

Correctly and if you use a lot of different vocabulary you're going to be marked on grammar

You're going to be marked on your ability to do what they asked so for example

You need to write a hundred and fifty words for this

task [if] you write 120 words for this task, then you didn't really meet the task requirements and

Finally you're going to be marked on

Coherence, so

[do] you have in your answer and introduction and

a conclusion

Do you use words like?

first of all

secondly in

conclusion

So again there are four different things are going to be marked on vocabulary grammar

Coherence and

Your ability to do what is asked of you, so your ability [to] meet the task requirements?

Okay, so let's get started, so this specific lesson is going to focus a lot on vocabulary

What sorts of words can you use in this task that will help you to get the the top mark you can?

Alright, so let's get started

so like I said before

In this task you're going to have to describe what you see

this may be a

Bar chart or a bar graph, so this is what is known as a bar graph?

You might have to describe something like that. You may have to describe a line graph

see the line this one is a

line graph

This one that looks like a pizza

This is called a pie chart. So another [thing] [that] you might see on task one is a pie chart

[so] we have a bar graph line graph pie chart

Sometimes you may see two of these

You may have to describe a pie chart and a line graph or a bar graph and a pie chart

You may also have [two]?

If you don't get one of these you may get what is called a flow chart?

So a flow chart

shows how something is organized so

Usually it shows different steps so this might be step one this might be step two

Step three so it's a way to show a process [into] organized information, so you might get something like this, which is a flow chart

Or you may get a table, so this is just an example of a table

and

Depending on which one you get you're going to be using a different type of vocabulary

So there's specific words to use when you're talking about a bar graph there are different words to use with flowcharts with tables

Today, we're really going to focus on bar graphs and line graphs

All right, so let's get started

[okay], so now what we are going to do is talk [about] how to write your introduction and

Vocabulary you can use in your introduction for this part of the ielts

so when you present a graph

Like I said [before] you should have an introduction

The body of what you're going to say and a conclusion

This is going to affect your coherence marks. So you want to have an introduction body and conclusion

It's very important so a lot of students when they first see

ielts task 1 in the academic version of the ielts

They get really nervous. They don't know how to start off what they're going to say, how do you start off describing a graph?

So what I'm going to talk about now [is] an easy introductory sentence. You can use in order to explain your graph

So I

Have the sentence this line graph, so here's an example again of a line graph

shows the changes in sales between 1990 and 1996

So this is just an [example] now if I got a bar graph

Just change this word this

[Far] graph [I]

Could also say this pie chart

this table

This flow chart, [so] whatever

image you get

You can use this plus

the type of chart it is

Or the type of figure it is if it's a table if it's a flow chart if it's a diagram

So this diagram this pie chart this bar graph

This is almost like a mathematical formula. Just imagine this plus this plus this plus this

equals your introduction

your first sentence in your introduction

so this bar graph and

now we have a verb so

[shows] is good. What else could you use?

Well, you could use

represents

this pie chart represents

You could use this pie chart demonstrates

[this] bar Graph illustrates

If you're doing a table, you could say this table lists so like

This so what you want is you want a verb similar to these shows demonstrates represents?

Illustrates these are all really good verbs to use for your introduction

for the first sentence of your introduction, so this bar graph Demonstrates

Here we have a specific example

The changes in sales often [times] you'll be looking at changes in sales, so for example here in this graph

We have on this is known as the x-Axis

so x-Axis

This is just some more terminology about graphs so on our x axis we see years

1990

1994

1996 so we're talking about time

You may not see something like this, but there's a good chance you might get a graph [that] shows time on your [x-Axis]

This [is] known as the y-Axis

So why?

Yes

and

in this example on the y-Axis is sales in millions of dollars so if 300 million 200 million

100 million

you may get something completely different than this this is just an example, so

in here

So this and again, this is a line graph demonstrates the changes in sales

so if you get a different [type] of graph

In this section you just write what it is. So you write the topic you're talking about this pie graph Demonstrates

the differences between men and women in [terms] of

further education

Just an example

So whatever your Topic is

Or incidence of disease in [some] land. That's another example

So it might be an incidence

prevalence

So whatever your topic is you write here?

So this graph Demonstrates blank and in the last section you should write

Sort of the date, whatever, they're showing so if you're looking at years which is a good chance you will be

Here you would you could say between 1990 and 1996

This was different. Maybe if we were looking at

2000

to 2010

you could say

this bar Graph Demonstrates incidence of Whatever over a 10-year period

so again you can have between

the State and the [State]

from

Have a year from 1992

So these are just different ways to show time which will be located on the excess excess. Sorry

Okay, so again what you want to include in [your] introduction is

First the type of graph it is is it a pie chart a bar graph?

you want a verb such as demonstrate shows you want to say what the topic you're looking at is and

You want to talk [about] the dates?

Wow, what are you looking at exactly 2002 2010?

So the this is how you should start off your introductory sentence

Okay, so we've talked a little bit about what your first sentence for this

Task can be there are other ways to do it, but the way I showed you is a great formula

that's easy to remember and that will really help you with vocabulary marks and Coherence, so

Right now what we're going to focus on is some key terms key [vocabulary] you can use when describing

movement of a graph or a

Line a bar graph or a line line graph

okay, so let's get started, so

[usually] when we look at graphs there are three different patterns we might see

three different trends we may see

An upward Trend where it goes up?

we may see a downward Trend or

we may see

It remaining stable

So you may see multiple trends on a graph so for example a graph might?

Have an upward Trend reach a peak

then downward Trend

Or maybe it's a downward trend first it goes up a bit, and then it becomes stable

So how do we talk about?

Describing movement. What are some key words we can use

so when we're talking about a

upward Trend

Some of the words we can use I'll talk about Verbs first we can use increase

so

So we could call this an increase

We can say it went up

You can say it climbed

It jumped

It Rose

So notice when we're talking about

Describing movement on the ielts the verbs we use these are all verbs. What tends [are] [they] in

If you said a simple [pasteur] correct you want to be using the simple past when you're describing movement for ielts Task 1

so we can say

If this was talking about sales for example, so we looked at that example before

Sales and this is years, so we have maybe 2000

to 2010

We could say sales Rose

sales increased sales went up sales climbed sales jumped and then

We would usually say between 2000 and 2010

So this is talking about the the verbs

[but] we can also turn this into noun, so

Rise the noun form of sorry Rose is a rise

so for example there was a

rise in

2000

We could say there was a and increase

So this is one way to do it

so

If we have the noun here if we decided to use it in a verbal form we could say sales

Rose

between

2000 and

2010

Okay

So we've looked at when it goes up when trends go upward what about downward trends?

But are some of the words we use with that

So we'll start off with verbs

we can talk about a

decline

Sales declined you can say decreased

And again simple past we can say went down

We could say dropped

We could say plummeted if it's a very steep drop

Okay, so we can say sales plummeted, and we can also say so we have declined decreased went down dropped plummeted finally

slumped

So these are all ways to say it went notice the arrow down

[so] again these are all verbs so we could write [it] here sales decreased

between 2000 and 2010 sales went down

between 2000 and 2010 if we decide to use [a] noun

decline

We can say a decline

we can say a decrease a drop a

slump

so many of these also have a noun form

so there was a a

decline

say a

Decrease a slump and

so when it's important to note that

So here is when we're using the noun

here is when we're using the verb when we use the noun remember [its] there was a

Decrease Arise whatever in

Here we can actually write the topic in sales or whatever your topic is between and then we have the date

Or if we use the verbal form you have the topic

sales

verb and the date again

okay, so

[finally] the third Trend

Is when nothing happens we can say it remains steady?

You can also say it remains stable

Remains stable it remains steady, we can also call this a plateau

Plateau

okay, so there was

or sorry sales

remained

steady

between 2000 and 2010 sales

remained stable

there was a

Plateau in

sales between 2000 and 2010

Okay, so again when you do this part of the task you don't want to reuse the same words [again] and again and again

If for the whole time you're describing the movement [you] use [went] up

multiple [times] the

Sales went up, and then they went down and then they went up again, and then they went down again

The examiner is going to give you low marks on your usage of vocabulary they want to see variety

So try to memorize you don't have to memorize all of these choose a couple maybe use increased

Maybe use [Rows]

decreased dropped

remain steady

one thing I wanted to say as well with

Plummeted, [I] think I said this before, but it's a really

steep

Drop, so if the decline is like this that's not plummeting plummeting is a very steep drop

Now another thing we can do is we can add adverbs and adjectives

To our nouns and our verbs in order to explain the degree of change

So we just describe movement. Well, what else can we add here?

so races

So we can add words like significant

There was a significant increase meaning an important increase

It's a quite a big increase

we could say there was a

A

steady increase

We could say there was a dramatic

so for example if

We had to draw these a dramatic increase

Would be a very sudden increase that's another word

Sudden

We could say a steady increase it's not so dramatic

We could say a significant which is more than steady less than dramatic. Maybe something like this

So significant steady Sudden dramatic [these] are all adjectives

so where would I put it here there was a

We use the word increase which can be a noun

There was a sudden increase

There was a dramatic increase there was a significant increase we could also use these with the words decrease there was a sudden decrease

There was a steady decline

There was a dramatic drop

Although that one a drop usually is dramatic so it's better to use with decline decrease

so increase

So something like this will help your mark if you're using both adjectives to describe what type of increase along with nouns

[similarly] we can turn all of these into adverbs

Significant is an adjective if we want to describe it as a verb we say [sidon]

significantly

steadily dramatically suddenly sales

Talking about an increase sales increased

Or went up any of those verbs we learned earlier increased dramatically?

between 2000 and 2010

sales

increased steadily

sales increased significantly

[sales] increased rapidly these are all different words. We can use to help us in terms of our ielts score

So again this lesson has focused mainly on vocabulary

so we haven't really talked so much about

how to get good Coherence marks meaning your organization

So that will come in at a later lesson where we'll talk about how to write a proper introduction body and conclusion

For now this is focusing on vocabulary and how to get your vocabulary marks

The highest you [can] get them so again the main thing to remember is you want your vocabulary to be varied?

meaning you don't want to use the same where to get [and] again you want to have an introduction a body a conclusion and

also

you want to have variety so

There was a sudden increase you want to use now sometimes

maybe you want to also show you can use these words in the verb form

Again when you do use it in the verb form remember simple simple past

So for more information on this I highly recommend visiting us at

Wwe TV Com

Another great resource if you're planning on doing the ielts is good luck ielts

comm

It's an excellent website that will give you more information on the different types of tasks you [will] be required to do

So until next time take care

you