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  • Hi, everyone. I'm Jade. What we're talking about today is writing a conclusion

  • for an IELTS exam or a CAE exam, so I'm going to give you two ways to write conclusions so

  • that when you get to the end, you don't just sort of put a full stop that doesn't really

  • say anything extra, that doesn't feel like a conclusion. Because when you write a conclusion,

  • a good conclusion has a different tone, there's something that feels finished about it. And

  • more generally, your conclusion should be your last chance to impress, to show that

  • examiner all that English that you know and how fluent you are when you're writing in

  • English, and you should leave the reader with an additional thought in the end, ideally,

  • when you're writing a conclusion. So let's look at a typical IELTS kind of question.

  • "Some people think that parents should teach their children to be good members of society.

  • However, others believe school is the best place to learn this."

  • And then the IELTS question would say: "Share your experience, and give reasons for your answers."

  • So let's imagine that you've already written your essay.

  • So, how do you begin your conclusion? The... The

  • first way I'm going to tell you, I'm going to call it the "As I have discussed" conclusion,

  • and there are three parts to writing this conclusion. And I'm giving you the structure

  • so that you can see how you can put a conclusion together just by putting different pieces

  • in there. And now, this is... This is great for an IELTS essay. It's not a super imaginative

  • kind of conclusion that would be great at university, but for IELTS, it's...

  • It's good for IELTS.

  • So, here are the three parts for this conclusion:

  • "As I have discussed"; then:

  • "However" sentence with "I" or, you know, using your subjectivity, basically;

  • and then making a moral or social observation in the first conditional.

  • So let's have a look. So, "As I have discussed", what

  • we're doing is we're just taking that phrase, basically, and this shows the tone... This

  • establishes the tone of conclusion: "As I have discussed". You're basically saying:

  • "Well, I already told you all of this, but now I'm summarizing."

  • "As I have discussed, there are advantages and disadvantages to the question."

  • I've shown both sides of the argument. You could just learn that, you could learn that whole phrase

  • to begin a conclusion. What do you follow it with?

  • You follow it with a "However" sentence.

  • So, there may be advantages and disadvantages, but there's a catch.

  • "However, I think parents should be responsible for teaching children to be good members of society."

  • So this is you saying: "Yeah, I see both sides.

  • This is good about it, that's good about the other side.

  • But, you know, for me and in my opinion",

  • because now we're using your subjectivity

  • by saying: "I think", you can... You can finally make your position clear,

  • make your position known. Maybe in the rest of the essay, this is discursive... This is a discursive essay.

  • You've been showing both sides of the argument. But if you write your essay in a way where

  • you don't use: "I think", "I believe" in the rest of the essay before, it can be quite

  • powerful just to use "I think" once at the end in your conclusion.

  • So, again: "However, I think parents should be responsible for teaching children to be

  • good members of society."

  • That bit's done. What do we do next?

  • Well, sometimes people like to end essays by giving a grand statement about morals and the world,

  • so you can also do this in your IELTS exam. And this is what I'm talking about when I say:

  • "Make a moral or social observation" to do with the question, of course, not just the general one.

  • So here's an example:

  • "If children are taught to be good members of society,

  • the world will be a better place."

  • So, it's in the first conditional, because we've got "if", then

  • we've got the past simple, followed by a clause with "will".

  • You can use that conditional structure in your essay, in your conclusion.

  • I think that's good because you're showing

  • the examiner you know how to write conditionals. So, because these essays are marked on your

  • style, but also your grammar when you're writing English, displaying a range of structures,

  • it's good to write this moral... Moral or social observation in the conditional. So,

  • that was the first way you can write a conclusion. When we come back, I'm going to show you the

  • second way you can write a conclusion for IELTS or CAE.

  • Let's have a look at the second way to write a conclusion for your IELTS or a similar discursive

  • essay. So, in this conclusion, we have a different structure to follow.

  • First of all, you can make a subjective opinion statement. What do I mean by "subjective"?

  • That basically means using "I". As I mentioned, you should not really use:

  • "I think", "I think", "I think"

  • all the way through your essay, but it's okay to use it just in the conclusion for impact.

  • Then you include the sentence or statement with:

  • "The most important reason is", blah, blah, blah.

  • And then, again, you make a moral or social observation. And this time, if you

  • want, you can use a second conditional, and I'll show you. So, let's have a look.

  • A subjective opinion statement:

  • "I think parents should teach their children to be good members of society."

  • So we're just taking...

  • We're taking...

  • You know, there are two sides to this question. There's:

  • "Parents should teach their children to be good members of society",

  • and there's: "School should teach children to be good members of society",

  • so now you just show us what you think.

  • "I think parents should teach their children to be good members of society."

  • That bit's done.

  • Now we need to do the statement with the most important reason. So you've already

  • given your reasons for this in the main body of your essay. Now you just elaborate and

  • tell us a little bit more about which reason you think is the most persuasive reason or

  • the most important reason. For example:

  • "The most important reason is because parents can share their life experience

  • with their children."

  • There, I'm implying that maybe school teachers can't do this.

  • This bit's done.

  • And then, again, a moral or social observation.

  • We're using the second conditional this time, and we use the second conditional to talk about imagined situations,

  • so that means hypothetical situations. And it's different because we are using "would",

  • and we're using the bare infinitive of the verb, and in the first clause

  • we're using past simple.

  • So let's... Let's read that last one:

  • "If schools were to teach this"

  • -teach children how to be good members of society-

  • "the role of the family would be destroyed."

  • So that's quite moral, quite a strong opinion to leave your essay with, and it does establish that:

  • "I'm finished now. My very important essay is complete."

  • So, there are two ways of writing your conclusions for IELTS, CAE, or a similar discursive essay.

  • There are many more imaginative ways to write essays; this is not a fixed rule.

  • What can you take from this? You can take some phrases,

  • you can start to think about the structure

  • of your conclusion that you're writing, and hopefully when you get there in your exam,

  • you won't get stuck in your conclusion, and you won't just rewrite the answer.

  • You'll have something a little bit different to say, also something that displays a little bit

  • of clever grammar, like a second conditional in your essay.

  • So, yup, if you did like this lesson, please subscribe here on my engVid channel.

  • Also you can do a quiz on this, so you can take this lesson a little bit further,

  • do a little bit of extra work on it.

  • Plus you can subscribe on my personal channel, because I've got two channels.

  • So, yep, I really do wish you luck on those exams, but I'm going now.

  • [Banging noise]

  • [Laughter]

  • Neigh.

Hi, everyone. I'm Jade. What we're talking about today is writing a conclusion

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