My top 5 tips to identifying key features in IELTS Writing Task 1 questions.

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Transcript

My top 5 tips for identifying key features in IELTS Writing Task 1

Ok, so let’s talk about IELTS Writing Task 1 and how to identify the key features of the data.

It’s important to know how to do this because this is what the examiner is looking for in your essay. They are assessing your ability to identify and report on the key features of the data. Also, you simply do not have the time or the word count to report on everything you can see in the data, so you have to learn how to pick out the significant points.

So, in this podcast, I will give you my 5 steps to identifying key features and then in the show notes I have left a link to one of my YouTube videos where I show you how to do it. I thought this would be a good idea so you really get a deeper understanding of you can identify the key features.

1.     Get clear on what the data is about. So look at the title, understand the x and the y axis , what do the numbers represent, look at the key. This shouldn’t take you more than 1 0 seconds. So important to understand how the data is being represented so that you can accurately report it. So many students don’t spend the time doing this or don’t do it properly and just launch into looking at the key features.

2.     Identify if it is data over a period of time, static data, is it comparing two different things, multiple things, or is it a comparison over two dates. So data over time would be comparing data every year over a 10 year period. Static would be just in one period or 2 different periods of time .

Why is this important to identify first? Because, it will inform you on how to report the data in terms of vocabulary, grammar. The way you talk about the data will change according to how the data is being presented.

3.     KEEP IT SIMPLE! If you remember nothing else from this podcast, please just remember this point. Do not make analysing the data more complicated than it needs to be. Simply look at the data and think about what you can see. What are the most obvious things you can see? What is the most striking or the most obvious thing you can see? That’s always a good place to start and that will be your first key feature.

But don’t just look at what is the highest, lowest, biggest changes….actually look at the data and think about what is happening. To help you focus on this, imagine you were restricted to telling someone only 3 or 4 things about the data, what would you say about the data. Look for the general trends.

4.     Don’t try to use set questions for every single Task 1 question whne it comes to identifying the key features. Some students go through a list of questions they ask themselves like “what is the highest, what is the lowest” etc. Every question is different and your approach each question differently by actually looking at the data you have in front of you.

5.     To really practice these skills, find newspapers or magazines where data is reported for example the BBC website in the financial section, or science section. Journalists have to report on a lot of data and like you, they also have a word limit on how long their article can be and so they have to identify the key features of the data to write about. Analyse the data, analyse how they picked the key features, how did they report on it, look at the grammar, vocabulary the structure.

This helps not only with Task 1 but also your reading, vocabulary and grammar.

I really hope you found this episode useful. Remember there is further training on this in the show notes where I have left the link to my YouTube video where I show you what to do.

See you in the next episode.