In this video, I go through the 3 key things you need to understand when you read your IELTS Writing Task 2 question. Once you understand these 3 things, you will understand every type of question there is, and you won't need to worry about preparing different essay plans for several IELTS question types.
Does the question:
ask for your opinion?
ask you to discuss both sides/ views?
have 2 parts?
After watching the video, you should be able to recognise the language used to ask these three things, and therefore prepared to answer any IELTS Writing Task 2 question!
If you'd like to read more about IELTS question types and do some practice exercises go to the IELTS Writing Exercises on this topic here.
Video Transcript
Hi, today we're going to look at the different kinds of IELTS Writing Task 2 questions that you might see, and discuss how you approach dealing with different kinds of IELTS questions.
Now, if you've been researching IELTS for some time already you've probably come across several different question types that different teachers talk about. You might have heard about agree or disagree questions, discussion questions, advantage and disadvantage questions, advantage and disadvantage with opinion, problem cause and solution questions, two part questions and sometimes direct questions as well. Different teachers classify or group these questions in different ways, but you generally have several different groups.
Now this can be quite intimidating, quite scary, when you first approach IELTS, because you think, well maybe I need to have a different essay for each of these different types of questions. But, fortunately, that's not really the case. You don't need to write a different style of essay for each of these question types really, you only need to pay attention to 3 key things as you read the question. And, if you understand the question correctly, if you pay attention to these 3 key things, you will be able to write the answer perfectly. And, it can be the same style of essay for every kind of question you could possibly get in the IELTS Writing Task 2 test.
So what are the three things that you need to pay attention to?
Number 1, does the question ask for your opinion?
If the question asks for your opinion then you need to make sure you give the opinion in the introduction and in the conclusion.
Number 2, does the question ask you to discuss both sides?
If the question asks you to discuss both sides, you need to make sure that you include the discussion of one side in the first body paragraph and you discuss the other side in the other body paragraph.
And finally, does the question have two parts?
So, essentially, are there two questions within the writing task 2 rubric? If there are two questions you answer the first question in body paragraph 1, and you answer the second question in body paragraph two.
So, as long as you look at these three things and you read the question and make sure you understand, does it ask for your opinion, does it ask you to discuss both sides and does it have two parts, as long as you understand that, you are ready to answer the question and your approach, your style, can be exactly the same for any question you receive.
Let's have a quick look at the kind of language that the question might use to ask you for your opinion.
So, the question might ask you, do you agree or disagree? It will give you a point of view and ask you, do you agree or disagree? For example, some people argue that schools should not include physical education in the school curriculum, do you agree or disagree? So, that very clearly asks for your opinion. Likewise, many questions will simply ask you, what is your opinion? So, that's very clear. Slightly less obvious, some questions will ask you using “should”. They might say, should schools include physical education in the school curriculum? So, the word “should” tells you that you need to decide, you need to give your opinion.
Now, particularly in the academic test, the kind of language they use to ask you for your opinion can be a little bit more complicated and academic. The question might ask you, is this a positive or negative development? So, the keyword here is “or”, is this good or bad, positive or negative. They want you to decide which one it is, so in other words, what is your opinion? Which one is more important?
Another style of question that they sometimes use, or a style of phrase is using the word “outweigh”. So, they might ask you, do the advantages outweigh the disadvantages? The keyword here, “outweigh”, is asking you which side is more important, which side weighs more, which one is more significant? So, if you see this word “outweigh”, you know that you need to give your opinion.
Finally, they might use a superlative like “most”. They might ask you, what factors are most important or most significant? If they use this “most”, again they're asking you to choose the biggest, the most important, the most significant. Again, any question that uses this word “most” is probably asking you for your opinion.
So, the first three examples, they're very obvious I think. You will have no problem identifying those three as opinion questions, or I should say, questions which ask for your opinion. And then the final 3 are slightly less obvious, but you know, if you look at enough IELTS questions, you will quickly become familiar with these kinds of phrases. So, again, you know that that is asking you for your opinion.
Okay, what about questions which want you to discuss both sides? For these questions, you need to watch out for the words “both” and “and”. So, if it asks you to discuss both the advantages and disadvantages, you know that you need to have one body paragraph which discusses the advantages, and one body paragraph which discusses the disadvantages.
Now, sometimes they don't include the word “both”. Occasionally you will see just, “discuss the advantages and the disadvantages”. So, really the keyword you're looking out for is “and”. If it asks you to discuss A and B, advantages and disadvantages, benefits and drawbacks, then you know that you need to include one body paragraph about benefits and one body paragraph about the drawbacks. So, body paragraph 1 advantages, and body paragraph 2 disadvantages. So, that's fairly clear as well.
Now, if we go to the two part questions again, this is pretty obvious, because you will clearly have two separate questions within the task rubric. The majority of these are problem or cause and solution questions, which will give you a problem and they will ask you, why does this problem exist? Or, what is the cause of this problem? And, they will ask you to suggest a solution, hence problem and solution questions. This is why you will often see teachers grouping these as a type of question in themselves, because there are quite a few of these. For example, unemployment is often a serious problem in societies, what are the causes of unemployment? So, that's question one question 1, and what solutions are there to the problem, that's question 2. So, the first question you need to answer in body paragraph one and the second question in body paragraph 2. When you read the question, if you see there are two parts, if you see there are two questions, then you need to make sure you answer both questions. It's not rocket science, you just need to make sure you have one question answered in body paragraph 1, and answer the second question in body paragraph two.
Now, I would say the majority of two part questions are this kind of problem or cause and solution question. However, sometimes they ask you two more separate questions, two more separate direct questions. For example, in education and employment some people work hard, or some people work harder than others, and question number one, why do some people work harder? And, question number two, is it always a good thing to work hard? So, question 1, you will talk about in body paragraph 1, and question 2, in body paragraph two.
So that's it really, you don't need to worry about preparing special types of answers for all those different question types we talked about in the beginning. You simply need to read the question you're given and decide, does the question ask for your opinion? Does it ask you to discuss both sides? And, are there two questions, actually two parts? If it asks for your opinion, you need to include your opinion in the introduction and in the conclusion. So, make sure your opinion is the same and clear in both the introduction and the conclusion. In the introduction it will form part of your thesis statement. This is where you give your opinion and then you outline the main ideas you're going to talk about.
If the question asks you to discuss both sides, then you need to have one side in body paragraph 1 and the other side in body paragraph two. And if the question has two parts, then you answer the first part in body paragraph 1, and the second question or second part in body paragraph two.
That's it, so just pay attention to those three things and you will be absolutely fine. And, you don't need to worry about several different question types, just make sure you understand what the question is asking. If it asks for your opinion, include it, if it asks you to discuss both sides, discuss both sides, and if there are two parts, make sure you answer both questions.
So, that's it, best of luck, thank you!
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