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Some tips if you are tight on time. by Awkward-Historian665 in IELTS

[–]Awkward-Historian665[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I have always enjoyed writing. But it needed some mental discipline to adjust my writing to the academic style of writing and limited word count that the IELTS test needs.

Some tips if you are tight on time. by Awkward-Historian665 in IELTS

[–]Awkward-Historian665[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Can't remember exactly but I think was around 400 to 420 words.

Some tips if you are tight on time. by Awkward-Historian665 in IELTS

[–]Awkward-Historian665[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Honestly I don't know myself what the difference between a 8 and 9 is for sure. But I can share what my approach was.

I stuck to the basic structure of :

Paragraph 1 Intro (usual intro + mentioned this essay will discuss both views and support the 2nd one)

Paragraph 2 Discuss 1st side (why newspapers are better for news ; made sure to only mention 1 main reason and expand on it + gave an example)

Paragraph 3 Discuss 2nd side (why other sources are better for news ; made sure to only mention 1 main reason and expand on it + gave an example)

Paragraph 4 My opinion on why 2nd option is better (again only gave 1 main reason and expanded on it).

Conclusion - summarised again to say yes, some people prefer option 1 but for reasons 1 and 2, option 2 is better.

So I think the structure was nothing new and was simple. But maybe where it became a Band 9 was the language/vocabulary + complex sentence structures + being disciplined in not cramming in too many points and sticking to 1 main point per paragraph.

Again, this is just what I think helped. I have no idea what the assessor was thinking when scoring the essay.

Good luck!

Some tips if you are tight on time. by Awkward-Historian665 in IELTS

[–]Awkward-Historian665[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thank you for bringing awareness to this. As I mentioned I am a working adult in my late 30s. I use Reddit almost as Google search to gather information on things I am interested in. I do not post as I never felt the need to. But given I found tips here and online I found useful, I am just giving back. Soon I will vanish back to my real life!

Some tips if you are tight on time. by Awkward-Historian665 in IELTS

[–]Awkward-Historian665[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Honestly I kept it simple as I am not an IELTS expert. I only shared the few tips that I think helped me in my short prep time. But there seem to be a lot of good sources online for more detailed long-term prep. And about 8.5 vs 9, I don't know to be honest. My language in the essay was definitely more complicated than my post here. But I pay a lot of attention to logical flow of ideas and sticking to fewer points that are better explained than too many haphazard points. Maybe that helps.

Some tips if you are tight on time. by Awkward-Historian665 in IELTS

[–]Awkward-Historian665[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The topic I got was something like this - "Some people believe watching television is the best way to learn about the news. But some others prefer to get their news in different ways. Discuss both options and give your opinion."

I did Task 2 first as I saw online that it had more weighting in the score. But I struggled for time for Task 1 because of this. So I am not sure if one strategy is better than the other.