How to write Ielts writing task 1 for 9 bands | the invigilator

                    The Academic Task 1 Essay

Task 1 essays require students to describe data, diagrams or processes using English. Most students find Task 1 essays much easier to write than Task 2 essays. Nevertheless, there are a number of choices that students can make to ensure they write an effective essay.

The first is that writers should have a clear idea of the aim of the essay. The goal of the writer should be to allow a reader who has never seen the information presented in the question to reproduce the information presented in the question accurately.

Step 1 – Organising the information – thinking time

The Task 1 response will almost always have an introduction and two body paragraphs. The first step is to analyse the data and determine how to split the data into two logical parts. Very occasionally data is best split into three parts, but this is unusual. This decision is often very simple to make, for example when there are two diagrams or two graphs. On other occasions it is more difficult and sometimes it is appropriate to combine two small logical pieces that are related into one paragraph. The way in which data is split is a critical decision in writing an essay as this defines the high level structure of the essay and have a significant impact on the essay’s readability.

Step 2 – Writing the Introduction

The introduction in a Task 1 essay is usually one sentence, or very rarely two short sentences. After reading the introduction the reader should be able to describe the form of the data (i.e. diagram, graph, table etc.), provide a title for the data and draw and label axis correctly. For example

The bar chart shows the percentage of males and females that completed various educational qualifications in 1999.

Step 3 – Writing the Body

From Step 1 students should have already decided what is going to be described in each body paragraph. The opening sentence must describe the data that will be covered by the paragraph. When describing data it is best to describe trends rather than individual pieces of data. The most accurate picture of data can be provided when the start and end points as well as the nature of the trend is described.

In 1940 both countries had 7-9% of their population aged 65 or above and this increased steadily until 2040 when both countries are expected to have around 25% of their population aged 65 or above.
In this case the reader will know that both graphs start at around 8% in 1940 and are a straight line and reach 25% in 2040. The reader can draw this graph accurately.
Another useful item that can be added (this is good to have rather than essential) is an analysis of the data. Adding a reason why data is like it is makes the piece feel like a more authentic piece of writing.
The data suggests that people prefer fish and chips because they are inexpensive.
All body paragraphs have the same structure. No conclusion is required for Task 1 essays.