Academic Writing Task 1

In Academic Writing Task 1, you may be asked to describe:

one or more graphs, charts, or tables
a diagram of an object, device, process, or event. You have to include the most important points in the diagram. Some minor points or details may be left out.

You should write in an academic or semi-formal/neutral style.

You should spend no more than 20 minutes on this task. You must write at least 150 words and will be penalised if your answer is too short. While you will not be penalised for writing more than 150 words, you should remember that a longer Task 1 answer may mean that you have less time to spend on Task 2, which contributes twice as much to your Writing Band score.

You should remember that you will be penalised if what you write does not relate to the topic. You will also be penalised if your answer is not written as a whole piece of connected text (i.e. you must not use notes or bullet points). You will be severely penalised if your writing is plagiarised (i.e. copied from another source).

You must write your answer on the answer sheet.

This task tests if you can give a well-organized overview of the visual information using language that is appropriate in its register and style.

Depending on the task type, you will be assessed on your ability to:

organize, present, and possibly compare data
describe stages of a process or procedure
describe an object, event, or sequence of events
explain how something works.

This is an infographic task that requires you to report and summarize the main trends either from a chart, table, diagram, etc

For one to pass the task, you need to equip yourself with a strategy and writing structure

The writing task is marked out of the maximum band of 9.0 but the result is combined together with those of writing task 2 in the ratio of 1:2 respectively to give you a Band score for the writing section.

You need to write your work in paragraphs. For this task you are expected to write four (4) paragraphs as follows:-

Paragraph 1 - Introduction

This paragraph has one or two sentences

1. The first sentence

In this sentence, you paraphrase the given topic (write the topic in your own words ensuring you don't change the examiner's intended meaning)

2. The second sentence (optional) State the unit of measurements

Paragraph 2- Overview

In this paragraph, you write the summary (overview) by reporting the main features/trends (changes).

Remember:

Don't include details
Don't include numbers
Starting words
In general,
Overall,

Paragraphs 3 and 4

When discussing the chart always try to separate information into two so that you discuss the first part in Body 1 and the second in Body 2

Paragraph 3 -Body 1

In this paragraph, you discuss specific features of your first group. Include details but with lots of comparisons

Paragraph 4 -Body 2

In this paragraph, you discuss specific features of your second group. Include details but with lots of comparisons

How do you write an introduction paragraph?

We are now going to deeply understand how to write an introduction to writing task 1. For us to write a proper introduction we need to paraphrase our general topic sentence or title. If you are keen there are two titles here, one on the question and the other one on the chart itself they're speaking about the same thing but using different words (paraphrasing)

You are supposed to write about 1-2 sentences for your introduction.

First Sentence

Your sentence will always start like this.....

*The given chart*

After that you need to write a *verb*, this is where you need to paraphrase

You come across the following verbs immediately after the word line graph:-

Demonstrates
Illustrates
Compares
Elucidates
Shows
Represents
Lists
Etc

Always paraphrase the above verbs and be keen on plurals and singular forms E.g.

The line graph demonstrates

The diagrams demonstrate

The diagram demonstrates

Be keen on tense. Is it the past or the present tense?

Second Sentence

You might also have a second sentence in your introduction and in such cases try to mention those indicators in the Y-axis and X-axis

Paragraph 2-Overview

Some people tend to combine an introduction sentence and an overview sentence to create one paragraph. This is quite acceptable, however, as a writer you wish to bring out your overview clearly and the best way to do that is to have it as an independent paragraph, this will also attract the marker and he will be able to understand your report.

In this paragraph, you write the most observable and important trends, differences, features, or changes in the same chart (s). It's usually one sentence but it can be two

Ensure you present a clear overview by starting with the following words:-

Overall

In general

Etc

The overview sentence can also be combined with an introduction sentence to form paragraph one.

How to analyze and generate a good overview

Method A

1. Identify the starting points and endpoints

2. Get the difference in terms of values

Method B

1. Identify the lowest values and the highest values

2. Get the difference