Understanding IELTS

Techniques for English Language Tests

WEEK 4: A teacher’s view of Task 2 (General)

NEIL: This General Writing Task Two is an essay looking at the growth in travel for leisure
purposes and various aspects related to that. This task requires at least 250 words, and
this example has a total of 297, which is fine.
This is a strong essay, clearly at an advanced level and overall the effect on the reader is
a very positive one. In terms of task completion, it deals with all the parts of the task and
develops the responses well, expanding on the basic points with relevant supporting
information, personal detail and extended consideration of specific areas.
It is coherent, well-organised and easy to follow with lots of examples of effective and
appropriate language. Overall the cohesion is well managed, the paragraphing is logical
and effective, although the concluding paragraph does not sum up and draw together
the preceding points as well as it should, which would probably have a slight negative
impact on the score in this area.
In terms of lexical resource, a wide range of vocabulary is used confidently, with a strong
awareness of style and collocation in examples like ‘their preferred tourist destination’,
‘can give the traveller new insights’, ‘I was hesitant at first’, ‘I knew beforehand’ and so on.
There are some inaccuracies, such as ‘accomodations’ rather than accommodation,
which is also misspelled. At the very beginning, ‘would like travel in different places’ and
later on ‘in the internet’ rather than ‘on the internet’, but overall the range and accuracy
of the vocabulary is strong.
In terms of grammatical accuracy, things are a little more mixed. A wide range of
grammatical structures are used but there are errors, for example in the opening
paragraph where it says ‘a few decades ago, only the rich can afford to travel since they
can spend more’. In the second paragraph as well, there are more lapses in using the
past tense with the sentence, ‘long ago there are only few airline companies so they
control and monopolise the industry’. This would certainly impact on the band awarded in
this area but overall, as I said, it is a strong, well-organised and effective essay.