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  • How To Get Ideas And Plan Your Essays

  • What we're going to do is look at about 5 or 6 IELTS Task 2 questions.

  • And together we're going to work through what we're going to write for each paragraph.

  • I'm going to be quite quick but I just want to show you the process I use for when I'm

  • writing my essays.

  • And I do write a lot of essays 'cause I find out

  • the more I write, the easier it gets (logically).

  • And of course being a native speaker, I don't have to check it.

  • Although, I will admit

  • my spelling isn't fantastic.

  • However, I got Microsoft Word and stuff like that for some of the other problems (usually

  • the vowels and stuff).

  • But anyway, let's get going.

  • First of all, good luck to Shuko and Hamilian.

  • The 2 online students that are gonna take the test.

  • I've been working with them trying to get ideas working on the speaking,

  • get ideas for essays,

  • working on their grammar,

  • and I�m pretty certain they're going to do it.

  • So we'll see.

  • I'll let you know how it goes.

  • But I'm pretty certain they can do it.

  • They've been working quite hard (especially Shuko... she never stop sending me essays).

  • But it's good.

  • Let's get started.

  • So I've decided to take question from about 3 or 4 subjects.

  • Globalization

  • Education

  • and Equality.

  • Let's get started.

  • First question:

  • "Do you think it is better for students to work before the university study?"

  • "Why"

  • "Use reasons and specific examples to support your choice."

  • Now then...

  • For this essay, I decided "Yes, it is better."

  • For the 1st paragraph I said:

  • "The student would get practical experience,"

  • "they get contacts,"

  • "they get on-the-job skills."

  • That's very good collocation to use "on-the-job skills."

  • And then to prove my point, I give an example and I say,

  • "Studies from the UK Government show that graduates with work experience are twice as

  • likely to find employment."

  • So it's quite believable, that example.

  • And of course, these are just rough ideas but it's a solid idea.

  • And I'm going to say "yes" from beginning to the end.

  • I'm not going to write a discussive essay because there's no need to.

  • I agree totally with what the question says.

  • Then for question 2, once again "yes."

  • A second reason.

  • So I'll say, "Can you continue the first argument?"

  • I'll say, "It's better preparation, chance to improve social skills, close the gap between

  • academia and the private sector..."

  • Also more collocations there: "social skills," and "private sector."

  • "It also helps the student to commit..."

  • "It also helps the student before they commit to a long term plan."

  • So it helps them decide.

  • Then for my example, I said:

  • "One out of six students will change their higher education course while at university."

  • If you actually look at the presentation on a slideshow or on the video on YouTube,

  • You'll see that the notes, they're not full sentences.

  • It's just a few bullet points, random ideas, all put together.

  • And I've used the shortened version (I didn't say "university" I just put "uni").

  • 'Cause at this stage, my grammar doesn't have to be perfect.

  • The spelling doesn't have to be perfect.

  • I'm just getting ideas and building the essay.

  • In this podcast, we're just going to look at paragraph 1 and paragraph 2.

  • 'Cause introductions and conclusions can be written after you've got your main ideas for

  • your body paragraphs.

  • ... And that's where you pick up most points.

  • Next question...

  • Also related to education...

  • "Some people believe that children should do organized activities in their free time

  • while others believe that children should be free to do what they want to do in their

  • free time."

  • Not the best written question there but anyway...

  • "Which viewpoint do you agree with?"

  • "Use specific reasons and examples to support your answer."

  • Let's go.

  • Quickly, I'm writing down ideas.

  • I'm going to say:

  • "There's lots of benefits in letting the mind wonder."

  • "Children can express themselves."

  • "They can find themselves."

  • "They can do what they prefer and excel at."

  • Like I said, ideas.

  • Ideas.

  • Just getting them down.

  • Maybe I'll use 2 of these in the actual body paragraph.

  • Then I've got an example... or a believable example

  • (I invented this but it doesn't matter.)

  • (I invented this but it's believable.)

  • "Recent studies show 12% of school students dislike physical education, therefore if sports

  • were chosen it be unfair to this minority."

  • Yeah?

  • That's believable.

  • That's believable.

  • It's about 12%.

  • I remember at school, there's a few that didn�t' like sports, so it's believable.

  • I'm not saying, "99% or all students hate physical activity" because that would just

  • be insanely inaccurate.

  • And also, notice the vocabulary I used.

  • I've used the collocations of course, "physical education"

  • but I also used, "dislike" I didn't say "hate" or "absolutely disgust" because that is very

  • strong language.

  • And this is an academic essay so we have to limit it a little bit.

  • We cannot be so absolute.

  • Now, my second paragraph focuses on the cost and what would be necessary.

  • Basically, the disadvantages.

  • And so I'm saying that:

  • "It'd be costly for the school."

  • "They might need time to plan it."

  • "They might need to buy possible equipment."

  • And then for my example, I would say:

  • "Furthermore studies show that the brain operates better after a distraction from a structured

  • task such as studying."

  • Then finish the sentence with "Therefore recreational time from the students' schedule would have

  • detrimental effects."

  • Also, not the more specific vocabulary.

  • I'm talking about "schedule"

  • "recreational times"

  • This is good vocabulary because it's vocabulary only related to education or specially related

  • to education.

  • So it shows the examiner I've got rich vocabulary.

  • Next question.

  • "Many people say that globalization and the growing number of multinational companies

  • have a negative effect on the environment."

  • "to what extent to you agree or disagree."

  • "Use specific reasons and examples to support your position."

  • So what's the crooks of the question?

  • "That globalization and multinational companies are damaging the environment.

  • Having a negative effect."

  • So first: Globalization, definitely damaging the environment.

  • I could be long.

  • I could give a long and complex, more accurate answer saying that:

  • "Globalization is increasing the cost of world economic resources which is therefore increasing

  • the price of substitute products (or rival products) such as ecological energy from wind

  • farms... blah, blah, blah..."

  • But the examiner doesn't care.

  • Yeah?

  • He wants to see just something logical.

  • So I'm just going to take simple route.

  • Something that's going to be easy to explain and where I've got some good vocabulary.

  • Let's go.

  • This is my idea:

  • "Increased interaction between countries"

  • "Leads to increase goods and services traded"

  • "Which means more production"

  • "Therefore more resource extraction" (such as mining)...

  • Maybe I'll remove that in my final sentence 'cause then I could just talk about the example,

  • which would be:

  • "For example, in China (largely considered the workshop of the world), in many cities

  • air pollution masks are needed to commute around the city center."

  • So therefore, I've proved my point.

  • I said that globalization is damaging the environment.

  • Quite simple.

  • Believable example.

  • And it's easy to follow.

  • Next, I have to go back to the question 'cause I wanted to check.

  • The 2nd point was about multinationals.

  • Once again, I've taken the simple route.

  • It says,

  • "Multinationals are responsible for negative effects in the environment."

  • It's quite a big statement to say that.

  • But I'm just gonna say "yes."

  • I'm just going to say "yes" because it's simple.

  • I'm getting points for my language, not for the quality of my ideas.

  • So I will say,

  • "Yes, multinationals do increase pollution."

  • "Globalization requires global solutions (these can have drastic consequences if accidents

  • happen)."

  • Of course I'm going to expand it a little bit but that's the main part of my argument.

  • It says, "A negative effect in the environment" in the question.

  • Here, I've put "increased pollution" more or less is saying."

  • I've put "destroyed the local ecosystem" in my example.

  • In my example, I talk about:

  • BP

  • The Gulf of Mexico

  • The oil pill (a few years ago)

  • ... destroyed the local system.

  • It proves my point.

  • And if you've caught them before, I said "drastic consequences" just another collocation there.

  • Once again, get in a solid plan together,

  • put in down the points,

  • thinking of an example that will correspond,

  • then I've got 2 solid paragraphs.

  • Now, all I have to do is my conclusion and my introduction.

  • Which I can draw from the body paragraphs.

  • Next question:

  • "Parents want to achieve balance between family career but only a few manage to achieve it."

  • "What do you think is the reason?"

  • "Discuss possible solutions and provide examples."

  • Now, we've got the problem and a possible solution.

  • So the first paragraph will be what is the reason why there is a challenge trying to

  • find the balance between family and career.

  • My second paragraph, I will suggest solutions.

  • This is very important.

  • I've paid attention to the question and each paragraph will correspond

  • to the question,

  • to the parts of the question,

  • structures of the question,

  • and therefore I'm going to pick up points for Task Response.

  • Let's have a look.

  • "The first reason why there is an imbalance..."

  • Notice as well, I used the negative form of the verb.

  • It says, "It's difficult to achieve a balance," so I said, "The reason for the imbalance..."

  • "... is because there's increased competition in the work place,"

  • "changes in society,"

  • "increase in the amount of working mothers put strain on the family..."

  • As you can see, I've got quite a few points here.

  • So I might cut them down and only use the ones most relevant to my example.

  • And my example (once again) is completely invented but it's believable.

  • Here it is:

  • "Studies in the United States (US) show that families with two full-time parents are more

  • likely to separate."

  • "Therefore, this shows that finding the balance is incredibly difficult."

  • This is the reason.

  • This is what I think.

  • They're more likely to separate.

  • Full time, lots of stress, it's going to be difficult.

  • Paragraph two, possible solutions.

  • Possible solutions.

  • Here, I've just gone for something that fitted...

  • I came with my example first, and then I thought "Okay, I can go with this route."

  • First I thought of France having a 35-hour working week.

  • (Which is quite outrageous if you're coming from the UK and from the United States to

  • even do this.)

  • (Due to the culture that we have there in the UK).

  • So the solution would be:

  • Regulations from the government.

  • Government could legislate for increasing maternity leave.

  • More flexible working practices.

  • Reduced working week.

  • For example, "In France, the government proposed and implemented a 35-hour working week."

  • Also, lot of collocations there.

  • "maternity leave"

  • "flexible working practices"

  • "working week"

  • Use these.

  • Once you get in special vocabulary that you're only going to find talking about this topic.

  • So we've done a few questions about globalization, also touching on the environment.

  • We've done a few about education.

  • Now, we're going to do one about...

  • Well, another one about equality.

  • Let's go.

  • "Nowadays both men and women spend a lot of money on beauty care.

  • This was not so in the past."

  • "What may be the root cause of this behavior?"

  • "Discuss the reasons and possible results."

  • Now this one was tricky.

  • This one was tricky for me because it's difficult to find the examples about this.

  • Especially for 2 paragraphs.

  • Okay, it wasn't difficult.

  • It was a bit more of a challenge and I have to think more.

  • But it's important that you do the thinking process beforehand.

  • So let's have a look at paragraph 1.

  • Before I tell you the answers, try and think of some ideas yourself.

  • The more times you do this,

  • the more times you look at a question

  • and think of examples,

  • think of ideas,

  • think of arguments,

  • the easier it gets.

  • Especially regarding the examples.

  • Especially if you invented the examples.

  • So my idea was basically marketing.

  • I'll give you the question again:

  • "Nowadays both men and women spend a lot of money on beauty care.

  • This was not so in the past."

  • "What may be the root cause of this behavior?"

  • "Discuss the reasons and possible results."

  • My idea for paragraph 1:

  • Marketing.

  • For this, it's quite easy to think of examples 'cause we are exposed to publicity everyday.

  • So it's not that difficult.

  • "The beauty market for women is worth millions, consumer goods companies see similar potential

  • for the male market."

  • Once again, just bullet points.

  • "Therefore developing new ranges, e.g. L�Oreal for Men Expert."

  • "Therefore the reason is the potential opportunity."

  • Okay?

  • "The female market for women is worth millions."

  • "The male market isn't developed."

  • "Therefore developing the male market and we've practically doubled our sales."

  • So let's have a look at some of the collocations.

  • "consumer goods companies"

  • And I can even say, "Consumer goods companies such as L�Oreal, Proctor and Gamble, Johnson

  • and Johnson..."

  • "see the potential for male market"

  • For example, L�Oreal developed an expert.

  • And that's fine.

  • That's fine.

  • If I put up all these ideas together in one cohesive paragraph...

  • And if you need to know how to write a cohesive paragraph, have a look at the sentence guide

  • at

  • ieltspodcast.com

  • Because that gives you just a really simple formula to use to drop your ideas in and presto.

  • You have a strong, coherent paragraph.

  • Let's go.

  • Next paragraph.

  • This one was a little bit more difficult to think of.

  • Because I was going a bit off topic.

  • I was going to talk about people are now caring for themselves more.

  • They started to eat more organic food.

  • And then I thought, "Whoa, whoa, whoa.

  • Stop.

  • Stop.

  • That's a crazy idea."

  • "There's nothing to do with organic food."

  • So what I did was just crossed it all out,

  • went back to the beginning,

  • and I said:

  • "It's difficult to say the results of this because it's earlier."

  • I went back to the question.

  • The second part was:

  • Discuss the reasons and possible results.

  • Well, the results are that it's difficult to say because it's early.

  • It's early days.

  • And then I say:

  • "However the general trend is in this direction."

  • For example:

  • "Deodorant was considered unnecessary before the 1950s."

  • "Therefore the market will probably grow and will be completely normal in the future."

  • I didn't have to say reasons to this or stuff like that.

  • Because it's kind of clear.

  • Deodorant wasn't a product available in the 1950s/before the 1950s.

  • However the consumer goods companies slowly introduced it in the society.

  • So maybe if you're from a different country, you'd think of an example.

  • Maybe it's happening at the moment in certain countries.

  • You know?

  • 10 years ago, there was no market for moisturizer in the country.

  • Now, the local market is the 2nd biggest in the world.

  • Blah, blah, blah.

  • Something like that.

  • Now, to get the skill of thinking of ideas and building paragraphs, all you can do is

  • go to

  • ieltspodcast.com/250

  • Download 250 IELTS Task 2 questions,

  • 20 IELTS essays.

  • And if you're still having problems, if you want to develop it further you can go to

  • ieltspodcast.com

  • and have a look at the sentence guide.

  • I've been having lots of success with that.

  • It's making the whole process a lot easier.

  • So definitely consider that.

  • And if you've got any questions, just send us an email and I'll be happy to respond.

  • I'll be happy to help you out.

  • Ok, good luck in the exam.

  • It's just a question of work.

  • I think you can do it.

  • Alright?

  • Keep on it.

  • Keep going.

How To Get Ideas And Plan Your Essays

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