I’ve been thinking about the IELTS Writing section and the journey that takes students from Band 5.5 or 6 to Band 7 or 8. I was looking back at all the students I have worked with over the past few years who achieved their goal of 7 or above for writing and thought about the steps they took to get there and a pattern emerged which I think you may find helpful.
It might identify the stage that you are at right now and what needs to happen to move you to the score that you desire.
(If you are already achieving Band 6.5 then you should probably begin at STEP 3 but there may be things from STEP 2 that you need to include).
STEP 1
Generally there are several things that are going on in band 5.5 or 6 writing. These include basic grammatical errors, lack of cohesion, limited use of vocabulary, lots of repetition, probably no complex sentences, punctuation errors and a confused answer to the topic whether that be task 1 or task 2. This is generally where I would meet these students and all of these things need to be unpicked and developed gradually.
Correct sentences
So work on your basic sentence structure to make sure it is correct in every way with no grammar, spelling or punctuation errors.
Combine your sentences
Then you can begin to combine your sentences using simple linking words and expressing bigger ideas. Now you can strat6 to0 organise these into paragraphs around a single idea.
Add new words
Finally you can add in some new words. Think about changing your verbs for less simple ones and learn some vocabulary related to the topic of your writing.
Once all this is in place you can go to step 2 to develop it further.
STEP 2
Learn how to plan
Planning your writing is an essential part of the process and will help you to do everything much faster and more accurately. Many students do not do this and their writing suffers as a result. All the students I know who achieve band 7 have some sort of planning phase in their writing.
Work on Correction
The first thing I believe that needs to happen is to reduce the number of grammatical and other errors. It is very hard to remove all and even with students who are band 7 or 8 some will creep in every time. However, it is vital to keep these to a minimum and also to know and understand the errors that you are making – you should have a list of all the mistakes you make regular so you can check for them. As you work this could be a written list but by the time you arrive at the exam it needs to be a mental list that you can go through in the few minutes you have to check your work.
So at this stage the job is to write good, error-free sentences
Develop a good structure
This can be almost mathematical. I have a fixed number of sentences for the introduction and conclusion and a pattern for each of the inner paragraphs. This overall plan gives 280-290 words for task 2 and can be adapted for Task 1 to reach 170/180 words which is optimum. Once you have a really robust structure to your writing then you can begin to develop what you need for band 7+
Using the plan you develop you can construct each paragraph around one central idea ( a maximum of 2) and the evidence and examples you need to support it.
STEP 3
Now the more serious work starts. You need to start developing the sort of language that will fit the Band descriptors for band 7 and 8 as well as producing a good piece of writing that will convince the examiner of the validity of your ideas and evidence.
Linking Words
This is the ‘glue’ that drives coherence. Appropriate linking words connect your ideas and sentences and make sure that coherence is well-managed.
Varied vocabulary
The examiner wants to see a range of words and grammar structures. Avoiding repetition of both words and sentence types is vital for band 7. At this stage of the IELTS writing process you need to begin learning and using synonyms and expanding your range of sentence structures. One quick way of doing this is by paying attention to verbs – when you start to write a simple verb like ‘have’, ‘can, or ‘go’ think about alternatives that you can use which might be a bit more sophisticated (you should NEVER use get in ielts writing – there is ALWAYS a better word).
STEP 4
By now you should find that your tasks are easier and quicker to write. But you’re not done yet. I generally feel that students at this stage are ‘around’ band 7 but not yet ‘safe’ at band 7. Now you need to consider the matter of complex sentences. Linking words will have done this to an extent but there are other ways of making sure you have them by using various ‘linguistic devices’.
Complex sentences
These are a must at Band 7 and 8 and the higher the band the more will be expected. Complex sentences represent a way of combining two or three simpler sentences into one.
There are several devices you can use such as conditional sentences, as….as…. and not only…. but also…. I’m sure you will be able to find others. If you can manage two or three of these accurately then you will be able to ensure that you have complex sentences in your writing.
Noun Phrases
Basing your sentence around nouns rather than verbs is a very formal way of writing and essential for academic writing. You may need to do some language research into this and also find some exercises to practise but it is worthwhile doing this in order to achieve the right tone for your tasks.
STEP 5
Keep developing your writing
Now you should be close to your target and you just need to keep practising.
Recycle
Now look at what works well in your writing – ask your teacher which sentences will be impressive, which words will stand out etc. and make sure that you use these over and over. Your teacher may be sick of seeing them each time you write 😊 but it will be the first time for the examiner! By doing this you can be certain that you will write these sentence types, words, devices without errors and that’s what counts.
Keep developing your style
Even the most famous of writers will keep developing their style and content so this is what you need to do. Language is never ‘done’ there is always room for improvement and you should keep on practising and improving your writing right up to the exam.
Create a mental checklist
By now you should know what the mistakes are that you make often. These are the ones that annoy you because actually you know about them but sometimes they just slip through. We all have them (yes, even me!) words that are mis-spelled, article errors, wrong prepositions, tense, agreement etc. Check these first (you should also be focusing on them as you write).
STEP 6
Now don’t change anything!
- You should be able to look at the question, decide quickly what you want to say, write up a plan (this stage should take 3 minutes or so for task 1 and 5 to 10 minutes for task 2)
- Start writing using all the language that you have been practising (this should take around 10/12 minutes for task 1 and 25/30 minutes for task 2)
- Now take the final 2/3 minutes to check your work quickly – use your mental check list first and then skim (another reason to develop good skimming skills in reading – for your own writing!) the whole text and see if it is ok.
Stop researching
In this final stage you should be writing everything from your head. It should be exactly like it is in the exam and if you are truly ready then you’ll be able to spend the final week or two just doing this without any extra study.
Now take your IELTS with confidence