IELTS – Academic – Writing

The Academic Writing section consists of two tasks to be completed within 60 minutes. The purpose of this section is to test whether a candidate is able to convey information and opinions in an organized fashion via the written word or not. Candidates are assigned a band score of 1 to 9 in their Writing test.

Question Modeling & Structure

• The first task of the Writing section will contain a picture.
• This picture could be of any statistical chart or a diagram showing a process or of a table.
• Candidates are asked to interpret the data and make comparisons or to describe the process; this must be done within 150 words.
• The second task consists of an essay question which has to be answered in a minimum of 250 words.
• The essay question will present a point of view or an argument or proposal and candidates are expected to write an essay response to that.

How to Improve Your Skills

The major skills tested in this section are reflected by how a candidate frames his response, especially in the essay question.

• When data is given, drawing conclusions always helps. Marks are distributed on four basic parameters – the cohesion and coherence visible in the answers, the type of lexical resources employed, grammatical accuracy and vocabulary, and task achievement.
• You should focus on improving your assessment skills and presenting your take on any particular situation.

ExamFocus brings to you hundreds of Academic Writing practice samples to help you improve upon your writing skills. On clicking the following five links, you shall go to the page that offers hundreds of sample questions for your practice.